The Seventh Landing: Going Back to the Moon, This Time to Stay PDF
Preview The Seventh Landing: Going Back to the Moon, This Time to Stay
The Seventh Landing Going Back to the Moon, This Time to Stay The Seventh Landing Going Back to the Moon, This Time to Stay Written and illustrated by Michael Carroll 1 3 Michael Carroll 6280 W.Chesnut Ave. Littleton CO 80128 USA [email protected] http://stock-space-images.com ISBN 978-0-387-93880-6 e-ISBN 978-0-387-93881-3 DOI 10.1007/978-0-387-93881-3 Springer Dordrecht Heidelberg London New York Library ofCongress Control Number:2009927129 © Springer Science+Business Media,LLC 2009 All rights reserved.This work may not be translated or copied in whole or in part without the written permission ofthe publisher (Springer Science+Business Media,LLC,233 Spring Street,New York,NY 10013,USA),except for briefexcerpts in connection with reviews or scholarly analysis.Use in connection with any form ofinformation storage and retrieval,electronic adaptation,computer software,or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed is forbidden. The use in this publication oftrade names,trademarks,service marks,and similar terms,even ifthey are not identified as such,is not to be taken as an expression ofopinion as to whether or not they are subject to proprietary rights. Printed on acid-free paper Springer is part ofSpringer Science+Business Media (www.springer.com) “Scientists study the world as it is. Engineers create the world that has never been.” –Theodore Von Karman Acknowledgements My thanks to Gary “SiloMan”Baker for Atlas ICBM photos,Tomomi Niizeki ofJAXA,Bill Worman for NASCAR wisdom,Karl Dodenhofffor Soviet Moon landers, Ben Guenther for his Orlon space suit shot, Ivy Zhang at National Geographic’s China office for help in obtaining Qin Xian’an’s beautiful photo of the launch of Shenzhou VI,Daniel Peters of the Hal Leonard Corporation for musical help, Anatoly Zak for all things Russian-space, Ted Stryk and Don Mitchell for beautiful revamped space panoramas,to Marianne Dyson, John Hall,Dan Durda,Bryce Cox,Doug Haynes,critique buddies Rebecca Rowe and Brian Enke, Mom and Dad for input and inspiration, and my writing soul-mate, Caroline. Special thanks goes to Maury Solomon at Springer, whoshared the vision of this book with me and saw it to fruition,and to the engineers, scientists and astronauts and Public Information Officers (with special commendation to Lynette Madison and Joan Underwood) who put up with my nagging! vii About the Author Artist/writer Michael Carroll has over 20 years experience as a science journalist,which has left him well-connected in the planetary science com- munity.He has written articles and books on topics ranging from space to archaeology. His articles have appeared in Popular Science, Astronomy, Sky and Telescope,Astronomy Now(UK),and a host ofchildren’s magazines.His latest book,Alien Volcanoes,was published by Johns Hopkins University Press in the fall of2007.His children’s book Dinosaurswas a finalist for the ECPA’s Gold Medallion award for excellence in publishing. Carroll has done commissioned artwork for NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.His art has appeared in several hundred magazines throughout the world, including National Geographic, Time, Smithsonian, Astronomy, andothers.One ofhis paintings is on the deck ofthe PhoenixMars lander at the Martian north pole.Carroll is the 2006 recipient of the Lucien Rudaux Award for lifetime achievement in the Astronomical Arts,and is a Fellow of the International Association for the Astronomical Arts. ix Foreword In the early morning hours ofJuly 16,1969,I stood with several hundred NASA and contractor employees and journalists outside of the crew quarters at Kennedy Space Center.I watched as three young Americans,Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin,and Michael Collins,emerged,clad in their white spacesuits.They walked by me,just a few feet away,to a waiting van that took them to Launch Pad 39A for the first step in their journey to the Moon. It was almost as if Ihadbeen present on August 3,1492,as Christopher Columbus set sail from Spain to the New World.Almost four days later,Armstrong and Aldrin became the first humans to land on Earth’s off-shore island. I plan once again to be nearby,a decade or so from now,when four new explorers set off from Florida for humanity’s seventh landing on the Moon. Just as was the case in 1969, that expedition will be a milestone in human history. In The Seventh Landing, Michael Carroll gives us in well-chosen words and vivid images both concise background on the initial round of lunar exploration four decades ago and a clear sense of NASA’s current plans or returning to the Moon. Although there are certain to be changes in the specifics of these plans as they mature,NASA is well along in designing the systems for getting people back to the lunar surface and for setting up a long duration human outpost there.Carroll has talked with many ofthose who are actively involved in this new effort,and he succeeds in communicating their almost palpable excitement as they lay the foundation for sustained human exploration beyond Earth orbit. He also interacted with representatives of the first generation oflunar explorers and finds them equally excited that the United States is finally heading back to the Moon,so many years after its first tentative exploratory journeys. The U.S.return to the Moon will be a very different undertaking than was Project Apollo. Then, the goal—getting to the Moon before the Russians—was linked to the broad political contours of the U.S.-Soviet Cold War competition for world leadership.Apollowas a unilateral demon- stration,peaceful in character,of American power.Maintaining American leadership is also a goal this time around, but in a very different political xi xii FOREWORD context. Many countries are now involved in space exploration, and the United States hopes that they will join a U.S.-led, but global in scope, undertaking. The Apollo goal of being first to the Moon was achieved when Neil Armstrong took that first “small step for a man.”There is no similar end point this time around. The seventh landing on the Moon will be just the first achievement in an open-ended effort to explore the Moon,and eventually Mars and beyond—an enterprise that will last for decades,even centuries. Carroll not only describes the hardware that will carry astronauts to the Moon and allow them to stay there for extended periods.He also summarizes the many reasons why lunar exploration beyond that carried out during Apollo,the eventual exploitation of lunar resources,and using the Moon to prepare for journeys to Mars or other distant destinations are worthwhile objectives that should command the support of the American public and political leadership. The United States has not yet made a final decision to move forward with its human exploration plans; that decision requires the allocation of the funds freed up by retiring the space shuttle in the next few years to building the lunar lander and the launch vehicle for travel to the Moon.I certainly hope that the president who takes office in January 2009 agrees that a return to the Moon should be part ofAmerica’s future. NASA and thirteen other space agencies in 2006 began an effort to coor- dinate their space exploration plans, and in May 2007 the group issued a “Global Exploration Strategy.”It is worth quoting:“Opportunities like this come rarely.The human migration into space is still in its infancy.For the most part, we have remained just a few kilometers above Earth’s surface—not much more than camping out in the backyard.”It is time to leave humanity’s “backyard.” Michael Carroll in The Seventh Landing tells us in words and pictures how that can happen.It is up to all ofus to make real this vision ofthe future. –John M.Logsdon John M.Logsdon is Professor Emeritus ofPolitical Science and International Affairs at George Washington University,Washington, D.C., and author of The Decision to Go to the Moon: Project Apollo and the National Interest. Currently he is the Charles A.Lindbergh Chair in Aerospace History at the National Air and Space Museum. Contents Introduction Doing It Right . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .xv One The First Explorers:Learning from History . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2 Two Getting There the Second Time Around . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .32 Three Shackleton,the Home Site . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .62 Four Robot-Human Combo Systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .78 Five Scientific Reasons to Return . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .98 Six Going to Mars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .120 Afterword To Boldly Stay . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .149 Chapter Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .151 Appendix 1 The Evolving Space Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .155 Appendix 2 Moon Missions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .163 Appendix 3 Mars and Asteroid/Comet Explorers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .167 Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .171 xiii
Description:The list of books you might like
