The Apollo Project was the US space project to land a person on the moon in order to prove to the world the ideological superiority of the American system over that of Communist Russia. It was reportedly achieved by Apollo 11 in July 1969. The three-stage vehicle to carry the astronauts to the moon was code named Saturn, and the contract to develop the Apollo three-man spacecraft was awarded to North American Aviation Incorporated in 1961 by NASA. The first launch into orbit of an Apollo command module was made by Saturn SA-6 on May the 28th 1964, and the first manned flight was made after a fire during ground tests killed the three astronauts - Virgil Grissom, Edward White and Roger Chaffee - on January the 27th 1967.
Controversy surrounds the supposed moon landing, with theories abounding that in 1969 it was technically impossible to land on the moon, and as a result NASA faked the moon landing, filming the 'landing' at the top secret military base, Area 51, in the Nevada desert while the astronauts actually orbited the earth for eight days before returning. This theory was later illustrated in the film 'Capricorn One' which told the fictional story of a faked landing on the planetMars. Research Apollo Project
NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) is an American government agency founded in 1958 for space flight and aeronautical research. Its headquarters are in WashingtonDC. Its main installation is the Kennedy Space Centre. Research NASA
Astronomy is that science which investigates the motions, distances, magnitudes, and various phenomena of the heavenly bodies. That part of the science which gives a description of the motions, figures, periods of revolution, and other phenomena of the heavenly bodies is called descriptive astronomy; that part which teaches how to observe the motions, figures, periodical revolutions, distances, etc, of the heavenly bodies, and how to use the necessary instruments, is called practical astronomy; and that part which explains the causes of their motions, and demonstrates the laws by which those causes operate, is termed physical astronomy. In the 19th century new fields of investigation developed. The first of these - celestial photography - furnished us with invaluable light-pictures of the sun, moon, and other bodies, and recorded the existence of myriads of stars invisible even by the then best telescopes; while the second, spectrumanalysis, revealed a knowledge of the physical constituents of the universe, revealing for the first time for instance that in the sun there exist many of the elements familiar to us on the earth. It has also been applied to the determination of the velocity with which stars are approaching to, or receding from, our system; and to the measurement of movements taking place within the solar atmospheric envelopes. From analysis of some of the unresolved nebulae the inference was drawn that they are not star-swarms but simply cosmical vapour; whence a second inference results favourable to the hypothesis of the gradual condensation of nebulae, and the successive evolutions of suns and systems.
The most remote period to which we can go back in tracing the history of astronomy refers us to a time about 2500 BC, when the Chinese are said to have recorded the simultaneous conjunction of Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, and Mercury with the moon. This remarkable phenomenon is found, by calculating backward, to have taken place 2460 BC Astronomy has also an undoubtedly high antiquity in India. The mean annual motion of Jupiter and Saturn was observed so early as 3062 years BC; tables of the sun, moon, and planets were formed, and eclipses calculated. In the time of Alexander the Great, the Chaldeans or Babylonians had carried on astronomical observations for 1900 years. They regarded comets as bodies travelling in extended orbits, and predicted their return; and there is reason to believe that they were acquainted with the true system of the universe. The priests of Egypt gave astronomy a religious character; but their knowledge of the science is testified to only by their ancient zodiacs and the position of their pyramids with relation to the cardinal points.
It was among the Greeks that astronomy took a more scientific form. Thales of Miletus (born in 639 BC) predicted a solar eclipse, and his successors held opinions which are in many respects wonderfully in accordance with modern ideas. Pythagoras (about 500 BC) promulgated the theory that the sun is the centre of the planetary system. Great progress was made in astronomy under the Ptolemies, and we find Timochares and Aristyllus employed about 300 BC in making useful planetary observations. But Aristarchus of Samos (born in 267 BC) is said, on the authority of Archimedes, to have far surpassed them, by teaching the double motion of the earth around its axis and around the sun. A hundred years later Hipparchus determined more exactly the length of the solar year, the eccentricity of the ecliptic, the precession of the equinoxes, and even undertook a catalogue of the stars. It was in the second century after Christ that Claudius Ptolemy, a famous mathematician of Pelusium in Egypt, propounded the system that bears his name, viz that the earth was the centre of the universe, and that the sun, moon, and planets revolved around it in the following order: nearest to the earth was the sphere of the moon; then followed the spheres of Mercury, Venus, the Sun, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn; then came the sphere of the fixed stars; these were succeeded by two crystalline spheres and an outer sphere named the primum mobile or first motion, which last was again circumscribed by the coelum empyreum, of a cubic shape, wherein happy souls found their abode.
The Arabs began to make scientific astronomical observations about the middle of the eighth century, and for 400 years they prosecuted the science with assiduity. Ibn-Yunis (around 1000 AD) made important observations of the disturbances and eccentricities of Jupiter and Saturn. In the sixteenth century Nicholas Copernicus, born in 1473, introduced the system that bears his name, and which gives to the sun the central place in the solar system, and shows all the other bodies, the earth included, revolving around him. This arrangement of the universe came at length to be generally received on account of the simplicity it substituted for the complexities and contradictions of the theory of Ptolemy. The observations and calculations of Tycho Brahe, a Danish astronomer, born in 1546, continued over many years, were of the highest value, and claim for him the title of regenerator of practical astronomy. His assistant and pupil, Johann Kepler, born in 1571, was enabled, principally by the aid he received from his master's labours, to arrive at those laws which have made his name famous: 1. That the planets move, not in circular, but in elliptical orbits, of which the sun occupies a focus. 2. That the radiusvector, or imaginary straight line joining the sun and any planet, moves over equal spaces in equal times. 3. That the squares of the times of the revolutions of the planets are as the cubes of their mean distances from the sun, Galileo, who died in 1642, advanced the science by his observations and by the new revelations he made through his telescopes, which established the truth of the Copernican theory.
Isaac Newton, born in 1642, carried physical astronomy suddenly to comparative perfection. Accepting Kepler's laws as a statement of the facts of planetary motion he deduced from them his theory of gravitation. The science was enriched towards the close of the eighteenth century by the discovery by Herschel of the planetUranus and its satellites, the resolution of the Milky Way into myriads of stars, and the unravelling of the mystery of nebulae and of double and triple stars. The splended analytical researches of Lalande, Lagrange, Delambre, and Laplace, mark the same period. The nineteenth century opened with the discovery of the first four minor planets; and the existence of another planet (Neptune) more distant from the sun than Uranus, was, in 1845, simultaneously and independently predicted by Leverrier and Adams. Of later years the sun attracted a number of observers, the spectroscope and photography having been especially fruitful in this field of investigation. From transit observations carried out at the end of the 19th century the former calculated distance of the sun has been corrected, and is now given as 92,560,000 miles. The two satellites of Mars, and of others belonging to Jupiter were also discovered towards the end of the 19th century.
The objects with which astronomy has chiefly to deal are the earth, the sun, the moon, the planets, the fixed stars, comets, nebulae, and meteors. The stellar universe is composed of an unknown host of stars, many millions in number, the most noticeable of which have been formed into groups called constellations. The nebulae are cloud-like patches of light scattered all over the heavens. Some of them have been resolved into star-clusters, but many of them are but masses of incandescent gas. Of the so-called fixed stars, many are now known to be by no means fixed, but revolve in company with another or others. Variable stars and non-luminous stars are also known. The fixed stars preserve, at least to unaided vision, an unalterable relation to each other, because of their vast distance from the earth. Their apparent movement from east to west is the result of the earth's revolution on its axis in twenty-four hours from west to east. The planets have not only an apparent, but also a real and proper motion, since, like our earth, they revolve around the sun in their several orbits and periods.
The mid-20th century saw great leaps in astronomical research with rockets, derived from the German terror weapons of the Second World War, being used to send probes and men into space for closer examination of the heavenly bodies. A retroreflector left on the Moon's surface by Apollo astronauts during the NASAApollo missions returns a high-power laser beam emitted from the Earth, enabling researchers to carry out regular monitoring and measure the distance between the Earth and the Moon to an accuracy of a few centimetres.
We now know something of the planets in our solar system. We know that Mercury is too hot to retain an atmosphere, and that Venus' brilliant white appearance is the result of its being completely enveloped by thick clouds of carbon dioxide. Below the upper clouds Venus has a hostileatmosphere containing clouds of sulphuric acid droplets. The cloud cover shields the planet's surface from direct sunlight, but the energy that does filter through warms the surface, the heat being trapped by the dense clouds, resulting in a very high surface temperature of almost 480 degrees Centigrade. Radar can penetrate the thick Venusian clouds which obscure the surface from telescopes, and has been used to map the planet's surface. Yet, despite advances, the origins of the universe, the stars planets, and the planets' asteroids remains a matter of conjecture, theory and debate. Research Astronomy
Project Gemini was the second phase of the American manned space programme of the 1960's. Gemini followed on from the Mercuryproject and utilised a two-man spacecraft. The object of Gemini was to demonstrate the ability of the astronauts and their spacecraft to manoeuvre in space using manual controls, the feasability and techniques for orbital rendezvous and docking, and various spacecraft systems. Project Gemini was managed by NASA, but the American Department of Defense was also strongly involved and the project had to meet requirements and objectives of both organisations. Twelve flights were made during the Gemini project during the period 1964 to 1965. Research Gemini
Mariner was the NASAproject for the design and manufacture of unmanned space probes for missions to Mars and Venus. The first Mariner probe was launched in 1962, but the launch vehicle veered off course and had to be destroyed. The second launch, that of Mariner 2 was successful and Mariner 2 passed by Venus in December 1962.
Mariner 3, planned to report on Mars, failed in its launch in 1964, but Mariner 4 was successfully launched later in 1964 and passed Mars transmitting information about the atmosphere and magnetic field of the planet as well as photographs of the planet's surface.
Mariner 5 was launched in June 1967 to fly past the planetVenus and transmit back data on the planet. Research Mariner
ATS (Applications Technology Satellite) was a series of American satellites developed by the Hughes Aircraft company on behalf of NASA during the 1960's. ATS-1 was launched in 1966 and successfully placed in a synchronous equatorialorbit over the Christmas Islands in the Pacific. ATS-1 provided the first two-way voice communications between aircraft and the ground via satellite, as well as other communications and experimental facilities.
ATS-2 was launched in 1967 and was essentially an experimental craft to evaluate a passive gradient control system. Research ATS
Intelsat 2 is a series of communications satellites developed from the earlier Intelsat 1 satellite, having improved communications capacity. The Intelsat 2 series were drum-shaped satellites, the outer surface being covered with 12756 solar cells delivering 85 watts of electrical power. The Intelsat 2 were equipped with a four-element bi-conical hornarrayaerial. The first Intelsat 2, Intelsat 2A was launched in 1966, but failed to go into the planned synchronous equatorialorbit over the Pacific due to a failure of the final stage rocket to complete firing. The satellite resulted in having an elongated orbit and was used for communications experiments.
Intelsat 2B, popularly known as Lani Bird, was successfully launched in 1967 and manoeuvred into a geostationary orbit east of the International Date Line above the equator in the Pacific.
Intelsat 2C, popularly known as Canary Bird, was launched in 1967 and placed in a geostationary orbit over the Atlantic just off the west coast of Africa.
The two successful Intelsat 2 satellites provided television and telephone communications facilities to two thirds of the world, and provided communications facilities to the US military and the NASAApollomoon landing programme. Research Intelsat 2
The Bell Lunar Landing Research Vehicle (LLRV) was a VTOL aircraft produced for NASA's Apollo space programme in 1964 and first flown in 1964. The LLRV was designed to assist in a research programme conducted at the NASA Flight Research Center at Edwards, California to provide a realistic simulation on Earth of landing operations on the Moon. Research LLRV
The Lunar Orbiter was a series of American unmanned spacecraft developed primarily by Boeing for NASA during the 1960's. Lunar Orbiter 1 was launched on August 10th 1966 and returned high-quality photographs of the moon's surface. Lunar Orbiter 2 was launched on November 6th 1966 and returned photographs of the moon's surface. Lunar Orbiter 3 was launched on February 5th 1967 and returned photographs of the moon's surface. Lunar Orbiter 4 was launched on May 4th 1967. Research Lunar Orbiter
Scanner was an American scientific spacecraft developed by Honeywell for NASA to measure the natural radiation gradients that define the horizon of Earth as seen from a spacecraft during a sub-orbital flight, and the altitude relationship of these gradients to the solid Earth horizon. Scanner comprised a probe launched by a two-stage solid-propellant booster. Research Scanner
The Probert Encyclopaedia was designed, edited and programed by
Matt and Leela Probert
Abbreviations
Research Apollo Project
