Gallery: 55 images for NASA’s 55th anniversary

A half-century of missions, from Mercury to the Mars Science Laboratory and beyond.

Read the whole story

 

[JustAdComics]

Nice tribute. Thank you for doing this.

 

[bengtj]

Great photos and write-up! I'm less pessimistic about the future of NASA; in a recent interview Neil deGrasse Tyson compared current spaceflight to water-going vessels thousands of years ago. He noted that we spent hundreds or thousands of years in the rivers and near shore before building ocean-going vessels. This resonates with me; manned trips to Mars and Europa will come in time.

Here's the interview: http://www.pointofinquiry.org/neil_degr ... ublic2013/

 

[Cervus]

There's nothing I can think of that inspires me as much as space exploration. Thank you for this article.

 

[ddremund]

Beautiful tribute, Lee. My wife and I just watched the last couple episodes of "When We Left Earth" last night, and I can't help but worry that the past tense in the title will remain an accurate connotation for far too long.

 

[atomo]

Great tribute! I find the images inspiring. We will get out there; we have to.

 

[firefox2501]

Well done, sir. I too miss the glory days of NASA. But it is inevitable that we will return.

 

[QtDevSvr]

Typo alert: Caption on Apollo 1 crew photo, date of fire reads "27 January 1961", should read 1967.

 

[Carbon Fibre]

Great article and a glimpse of space exploration history. Thankfully I have many years to see anything come true.

 

[Daros]

Thanks for the new selection of desktop wallpapers!

 

[kleinma]

I thought my browser was broken after the first set of photos, thinking "that couldn't have been 55 already..." clicking furiously on the right arrow without the picture changing.. then I scrolled down.

 

[pokrface]

kleinma[/url]":3tl0kpvh]I thought my browser was broken after the first set of photos, thinking "that couldn't have been 55 already..." clicking furiously on the right arrow without the picture changing.. then I scrolled down.

Let me describe the genesis of this article.

Nate: Hey, I'm thinking of doing this gallery—55 images for 55 years of NASA.

Me: Oh, hey, great idea! Make sure you include some stuff from the Apollo lunar surface journal! Oh, and from the spaceflight gallery! Have you thought about how to segment the piece up? You could do, llike, four—no, five—no six!—no, I guess, five major groupings, by era, you know, starting with Mercury and Gemini. There are some great Gemini images floating around out there, holy crap! And—man, I've got this great image of Enterprise I found on one of the NASA sites, hold on, let me dig it up. This might be too much for one gallery, too—like, maybe actually do one gallery for each era, so more people will see the images without getting bored and giving up. And make sure to include some text, too, to tie it all together. Like, talk about the genesis of each program, what led to what—just the major stuff, right, nothing too deep...

Nate: Hey, so, I'm thinking you're doing this gallery—55 images for 55 years of NASA.

 

[Wheels Of Confusion]

(and a manned asteroid landing, the agency's current vaguely-stated goal, is not a mission of significance).

WhyTF not? Have you seen the moon? That sucker's HUGE! You almost can't miss it. Landing on the moon would be like Charles Lindbergh setting out across the Atlantic with the goal of coming down "someplace East of the US." A manned landing on an asteroid would be like Lindbergh saying, "yeah, I'll fly to Europe. And I'll land on the top of a route 11 double-decker bus at its Aldwych stop, 5:15 am local time." Which is especially impressive because double-decker buses wouldn't enter service until 1956. It takes some swagger, 's what I'm sayin'.

 

[Wheels Of Confusion]

kleinma[/url]":1ek4fo97]Almost sounds like when the US spent all that money on the space pen to write in 0 gravity, and the Russians used pencils instead. Of course one is much cooler than the other.

Space pens also don't leave pencil shavings floating around, potentially to get stuck in the equipment and cause a short or jam a switch.

 

[LuckyJack42]

"What will be the next thing that challenges us, Toby? That makes us go farther and work harder? Do you know that when smallpox was eradicated, it was considered the single greatest humanitarian achievement of this century? Surely we can do it again, as we did in the times when our eyes looked towards the heavens and, with outstretched fingers, we touched the face of God. Here's to absent friends and the ones that are here now. Cheers." -President Josiah Bartlet

Let's get going.

 

[ws3]

kleinma[/url]":y7rt6ib6]

Pokrface[/url]":y7rt6ib6]

kleinma[/url]":y7rt6ib6]I thought my browser was broken after the first set of photos, thinking "that couldn't have been 55 already..." clicking furiously on the right arrow without the picture changing.. then I scrolled down.

Let me describe the genesis of this article.

Nate: Hey, I'm thinking of doing this gallery—55 images for 55 years of NASA.

Me: Oh, hey, great idea! Make sure you include some stuff from the Apollo lunar surface journal! Oh, and from the spaceflight gallery! Have you thought about how to segment the piece up? You could do, llike, four—no, five—no six!—no, I guess, five major groupings, by era, you know, starting with Mercury and Gemini. There are some great Gemini images floating around out there, holy crap! And—man, I've got this great image of Enterprise I found on one of the NASA sites, hold on, let me dig it up. This might be too much for one gallery, too—like, maybe actually do one gallery for each era, so more people will see the images without getting bored and giving up. And make sure to include some text, too, to tie it all together. Like, talk about the genesis of each program, what led to what—just the major stuff, right, nothing too deep...

Nate: Hey, so, I'm thinking you're doing this gallery—55 images for 55 years of NASA.

Almost sounds like when the US spent all that money on the space pen to write in 0 gravity, and the Russians used pencils instead. Of course one is much cooler than the other.

Yes the Russians used pencils, and as a result they didn't make it to the moon.

 

[frozentech]

To Paraphrase a favorite blogger of mine...

"If the government is going to spend my money anyway.... the least they could do is spend it making the skies thunder and the ground tremble while launching People out to see what they might find."

 

[zonnked]

kleinma[/url]":2bhljc9h]

Pokrface[/url]":2bhljc9h]

kleinma[/url]":2bhljc9h]I thought my browser was broken after the first set of photos, thinking "that couldn't have been 55 already..." clicking furiously on the right arrow without the picture changing.. then I scrolled down.

Let me describe the genesis of this article.

Nate: Hey, I'm thinking of doing this gallery—55 images for 55 years of NASA.

Me: Oh, hey, great idea! Make sure you include some stuff from the Apollo lunar surface journal! Oh, and from the spaceflight gallery! Have you thought about how to segment the piece up? You could do, llike, four—no, five—no six!—no, I guess, five major groupings, by era, you know, starting with Mercury and Gemini. There are some great Gemini images floating around out there, holy crap! And—man, I've got this great image of Enterprise I found on one of the NASA sites, hold on, let me dig it up. This might be too much for one gallery, too—like, maybe actually do one gallery for each era, so more people will see the images without getting bored and giving up. And make sure to include some text, too, to tie it all together. Like, talk about the genesis of each program, what led to what—just the major stuff, right, nothing too deep...

Nate: Hey, so, I'm thinking you're doing this gallery—55 images for 55 years of NASA.

Almost sounds like when the US spent all that money on the space pen to write in 0 gravity, and the Russians used pencils instead. Of course one is much cooler than the other.

It's hard to believe the need to post a "snopes" link on Arstechnica but here goes:

http://www.snopes.com/business/genius/spacepen.asp

It's an urban legend. NASA didn't pay a dime for the research and development of the pens, and Russia started buying the same pens shortly after the U.S. did. The price NASA paid for the pens? $2.95 each.

 

[esldude]

I still have a couple of those pens. They write upside down of course. I purchased them at the Redstone arsenal oh like 30 plus years ago.

NASA was cool. What inspired me to go into engineering though I never got to work for NASA itself.

 

[dtich]

great piece, lee, inspiring. and while i agree with your summation points on lack of direction and most especially, funding (what a crime - literally a societal crime - that we spend so much money on our capabilities for killing people, and so comparatively little on scientific exploration and education.. embarrassing on a galactic level..), i think even though we haven't been back to the moon, and mars seems oh so far away, and asteroid landings are super unsexy (that is a nominal goal i feel only because of the still inchoate linkages possible between space exploration and commercial mineral exploitation.. also pretty embarrassing).. the existence and perseverance of the ISS program, and its SPECTACULAR accomplishments, cannot be under-valued in terms of overall contribution to the humans in space program. we are learning a tremendous amount about living and working in micro-g, zero atmos environments that will carry us forward to mars habitation and outer solar system human exploration--very fundamental and necessary first steps, and while not as rahrahrah as landing on planets, every bit as crucial in the overall scheme of space exploration.

so, yes, as massively disappointing as nasa's current level of attention from congress is for all of us, i don't find it dispiriting exactly, and in some ways nasa's leadership should be thanked for managing some pretty amazing stuff while stuck under a pretty heavy thumb of ignorance. LEO activity is still good and important science, and soon this country will get its priorities in order and get moving in the right direction again. it seems it will take the competitive push of private business to break us free perhaps; musk and branson, et al., thank goodness for rich nerds.

 

[DannibusX]

I just watched the Discovery series "When We Left Earth" this week. It was amazing. At some point, I'd like to see a manned mission to Mars, but I'd also like to see manned missions to the Moon as well. It makes me just a little sad that we haven't been to the Moon at all in my lifetime, being as I was born after the last Apollo mission.

Challenger was something that struck me pretty hard, my school made a big deal out of the launch because of Christa McAuliffe, the first teacher to be sent into space. Needless to say, my entire school watched the disaster live on TV. When We Left Earth's part on the Challenger was pretty amazing, especially when it showed mission control from just before the launch through the failure. I actually had goosebumps.

Apollo 1, Challenger and Columbia, 3 missions doomed, but paving the way for safer spaceflight.

I wish more of my tax dollars went to NASA. Many of their inventions have made life much easier for us here on Earth, and I do believe none of them have been the subject of a patent lawsuit.

 

[Mark Havel]

Wheels Of Confusion[/url]":q1s52mh7]

(and a manned asteroid landing, the agency's current vaguely-stated goal, is not a mission of significance).

WhyTF not? Have you seen the moon? That sucker's HUGE! You almost can't miss it. Landing on the moon would be like Charles Lindbergh setting out across the Atlantic with the goal of coming down "someplace East of the US." A manned landing on an asteroid would be like Lindbergh saying, "yeah, I'll fly to Europe. And I'll land on the top of a route 11 double-decker bus at its Aldwych stop, 5:15 am local time." Which is especially impressive because double-decker buses wouldn't enter service until 1956. It takes some swagger, 's what I'm sayin'.

Mars is the little green men, the source of many science-fiction stories, films,... The inspiration that comes from a manned landing on it is much more important than a random small piece of rock, however technical and accurate the landing on an asteroid would be. With Mars, however unrealistic that is, colonization of another planet is also something that comes up sooner or later.
By the way, landing on Mars is landing on a planet with enough gravity to require lots of power to slow down, with enough atmosphere to risk burning a craft but not enough to slow it down with parachutes and it seems the martian dust is also a problem. So if technical challenge is your stuff, Mars ought to provide quite a lot, and I've not even mentioned the quantity of radiations spationauts would receive during such a long space trip.

Now, if landing people on an asteroid happens, it would still be an awesome event that would prompt me to take vacations just to see it on TV whatever the hour.

 

[pitmonster]

Wheels Of Confusion[/url]":2pacllac]

kleinma[/url]":2pacllac]Almost sounds like when the US spent all that money on the space pen to write in 0 gravity, and the Russians used pencils instead. Of course one is much cooler than the other.

Space pens also don't leave pencil shavings floating around, potentially to get stuck in the equipment and cause a short or jam a switch.

Pencil "lead" is also made of graphite, which is highly flammable in an oxygen-rich environment like a space capsule - even if a mechanical pencil is used, which obviously has no wood shavings.

Also NASA did not develop the Space Pen.
Fisher developed it independently, and then NASA bought a bunch of them at $6 each
So did the Russians.

http://history.nasa.gov/spacepen.html


Anyway, great article and images.
I love the space stuff Ars puts up.

 

[Slikkster]

Nice write-up and pics; thanks. I will quibble with you, the author, on your conclusion about Congress. NASA's greatest achievement --in my view, the lunar missions-- were do in no small measure because of a challenge and proclamation by President John F Kennedy. In other words, the mission needs to be heralded from the top, and from the person with the bully pulpit. And he/she has to mean it, not just pay lip service.

Of course, there was that very significant Cold War going on during the time of the lunar missions, which provided a very large impetus to succeed and be first; something we don't have now. And NASA took a huge hit when it made what appeared to many to be a political decision to launch the ill-fated Challenger mission, even after the o-ring manufacturer warned against doing so (if one is to believe the history as it's been documented).

 

[pitmonster]

Lee, you mention the current lack of funding, and this is something I agree with.

After all, a Government can afford what it decides it can afford - it can choose what it does or does not spend its money on (within reason)

I wonder if you have seen this beautiful letter written by a NASA director in 1970, justifying the expense of the space programme?

http://www.lettersofnote.com/2012/08/wh ... e.html?m=1

I also wonder if the currents heads of NASA and the Government have read it., because I think they should.


EDIT : For us non-US readers, could someone say what the current NASA budget is, and what percentage that is of total US Government spending?
Also, how does that compare to the annual budgets for Military/Defense, education, healthcare (or any other dept that you choose) would be helpful.
I'm not after a political opinion, just some numbers to help the rest of us put things into context.
Thanks very much

 

[charleski]

dtich[/url]":1zq5g3ng]the existence and perseverance of the ISS program, and its SPECTACULAR accomplishments, cannot be under-valued in terms of overall contribution to the humans in space program. we are learning a tremendous amount about living and working in micro-g, zero atmos environments that will carry us forward to mars habitation and outer solar system human exploration--very fundamental and necessary first steps, and while not as rahrahrah as landing on planets, every bit as crucial in the overall scheme of space exploration.

I couldn't agree more. Before we go putting human beings on somewhere like Mars we need to be very clear about why we're doing it and what we expect them to achieve while they're there. This means we need to generate extensive knowlege of how people can live and perform useful work in alien environments.

The Apollo program was about putting a Man on the Moon just to show that we could, but then they suddenly realised they had to put their astronauts through a geology crash course so there was something to do while they were there. For Mars we need to put the cart after the horse instead and be prepared with a list of meaningful tasks that genuinely require human presence. And that means learning about how far we can push the human body in these environments.

A Mars program whose aim was nothing more than stepping out of the capsule for a few hours to leave some footprints and snap some pictures would be a travesty and a colossal waste of money. It needs to be focussed on long-term missions that are worth the months of travel needed and will bring back a wealth of data.

From a scientific perspective, the past two decades of NASA have been a massively resounding success: Hubble, COBE, WMAP and other satellites have redefined cosmology; Voyager, Cassini, Spirit/Opportunity and Curiosity are still producing incredible data. The manned spaceflight program, ultimately, needs to meet or exceed this level of quality in terms of the results they bring back.

 

[Tijger]

Thanks for another great article, Lee, keep up the good work and if Nate has any more ideas I suggest you respond with enthusiasm, the results speak for themselves

 

[doppio]

What a difference 55 years made!



No, really, what difference did they make?

Spoiler

Just kidding.

Curiously, and slightly off-topic, in my experience space enthusiasm seems to be inversely proportional to one's distance from Houston, TX, or Bangalore, India. Apart from the USA, I've spent most of my life in two other countries which both have sent people in space, but most folks there don't seem to give a damn.

 

[robotic_tourist]

Sing along with me, now!

"It's been a long road / getting from there to here / It's been a long time / but my time is finally here ... I've got faith / faith of the heart!"

 

[robotic_tourist]

doppio[/url]":mlapvj22]What a difference 55 years made!



No, really, what difference did they make?

Spoiler

Just kidding.

Curiously, and slightly off-topic, in my experience space enthusiasm seems to be inversely proportional to one's distance from Houston, TX, or Bangalore, India. Apart from the USA, I've spent most of my life in two other countries which both have sent people in space, but most folks there don't seem to give a damn.

I find it hard to tell the general interest in space exploration in the UK, but I am very interested and I love all the space articles on Ars, not just for the quality of the articles, but also the comments.

 

[Dr. Jay]

I'd just like to completely disagree with Lee. A manned asteroid mission would be of great significance. Going to the Moon helped us understand how the Moon got here. Going to an asteroid will tell us about how the entire Solar System got here.

 

[brokencog]

ws3[/url]":2f4t0db9]

kleinma[/url]":2f4t0db9]

Pokrface[/url]":2f4t0db9]

kleinma[/url]":2f4t0db9]I thought my browser was broken after the first set of photos, thinking "that couldn't have been 55 already..." clicking furiously on the right arrow without the picture changing.. then I scrolled down.

Let me describe the genesis of this article.

Nate: Hey, I'm thinking of doing this gallery—55 images for 55 years of NASA.

Me: Oh, hey, great idea! Make sure you include some stuff from the Apollo lunar surface journal! Oh, and from the spaceflight gallery! Have you thought about how to segment the piece up? You could do, llike, four—no, five—no six!—no, I guess, five major groupings, by era, you know, starting with Mercury and Gemini. There are some great Gemini images floating around out there, holy crap! And—man, I've got this great image of Enterprise I found on one of the NASA sites, hold on, let me dig it up. This might be too much for one gallery, too—like, maybe actually do one gallery for each era, so more people will see the images without getting bored and giving up. And make sure to include some text, too, to tie it all together. Like, talk about the genesis of each program, what led to what—just the major stuff, right, nothing too deep...

Nate: Hey, so, I'm thinking you're doing this gallery—55 images for 55 years of NASA.

Almost sounds like when the US spent all that money on the space pen to write in 0 gravity, and the Russians used pencils instead. Of course one is much cooler than the other.

Yes the Russians used pencils, and as a result they didn't make it to the moon.

"And as a result" ?!?

Wow, the lack of ability for the Ars general crowd to separate CAUSATION from CORRELATION is appalling - even more considering that Ars articles in general tend to remind it's readers of that difference. Mostly

I suggest a more thorough review of the US/USSR interactions from around 1943 - 1990.

This would include the only attempt by one to invade/attack the other ( 1946? when US 'invaded' the Soviet East coast with a few ships ... "Testing the waters" it was called ).
It would include forming a large alliance of allies (NATO) on the border of the USSR - not a particularly friendly effort
It would include the constant and OVERT posture of offensive first strike maintained by the US / NATO
in which to maintain a corresponding military response plan/spending within the USSR.
It would include that wonderfully expensive pie in the sky StarWars programs to fully bankrupt the USSR.

Don't get your panties in a bunch -- I'm not pretending the Soviet system was in any way near perfect, let's just not pretend we weren't the major reason for it's financial collapse as a result of the Space and Arms Races.

ps: I leave the source finding mission of verification on the above a reader exercise. It should take a competent googler/wikipedia-searcher about fifteen minutes.

-daniel

 

[brokencog]

Sadly Lee Hutchinson blames various administrations ( Government and NASA ) as a core source of the decline.

I would suggest the greater blame lies with the American Public, and the focus of mentality which people made in the early '80s towards "getting themselves rich" rather than "enriching themselves." This trend didn't start in the 1980s, but it did get much stronger and wide spread.

This has resulted in _individuals_ working their way up the corporate ladder increasing corporate profits to the max for their own gains ...
Resulted in _individuals_ using their position in government for personal gain ...
Created a couple generations of _individuals_ who perceive the purpose of a grocery store is to browse the latest "Headlines" on the various skin mags lining the checkout stands. That is, _individuals_ who should be labeled hedonists, _Individuals_ who are happy to be labeled as Consumers, rather than Citizens.

ps: I don't THINK I woke up on the wrong side of the bed ...

-daniel

 

[doalwa]

Haven't had the time at work to thoroughly browse through the pictures, but I know what I'll be doing tonight!

Thanks Ars!

 

[pokrface]

brokencog[/url]":saonw6qc]Sadly Lee Hutchinson blames various administrations ( Government and NASA ) as a core source of the decline.

I've opined on this at length before; I'll let my previous words stand as my response.

Dr. Jay[/url]":saonw6qc]I'd just like to completely disagree with Lee. A manned asteroid mission would be of great significance. Going to the Moon helped us understand how the Moon got here. Going to an asteroid will tell us about how the entire Solar System got here.

Far be it for me to disagree with DrJ—who is an actual for-real doctor—but we'll have to agree to disagree here, at least as with using an asteroid as a flagship manned mission. NASA's talents are better spent elsewhere and an asteroid mission is a "marking time" do-nothing dead end. I'll defer to Norm Augustine and his panel's findings for justification on this, as the current asteroid plan is a cut-back limited bastardized version of the already unpalatable "flexible path" option presented in the report.

There's certainly some scientific value in it, but should it be the focus of the manned program at the expense of all other potential goals? Absolutely not.

 

[AMPhoto]

NASA did an amazing job getting us into space, but I see their future not in manned space travel, but in unmanned probes and vehicles. These are the things that cost less and provide no profit incentive for private companies to get into. The risk is small, and the scientific payoff is often large.

Private companies will take over most of the manned missions. NASA gave them the technological start, and the profit is there to make them want to go places. Maybe millionaires will be the first Mars explorers as tourists. Not ideal, but better than no one going at all. Unless it leads to a whole Weyland Corporation thing. I like my stomach in tact thank you very much.

 

[FlyingKiwi]

NASA still has some neat things in the works but it's in a transistional phase. NASA isn't about rushing new things out partially due to funding, more importantly due to safety. As you have mentioned in the article rushing things probably wasn't the best for NASA:

Project Apollo flew toward its goal with sure feet—until the entire program was halted with the deaths of Gus Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chaffee in the Apollo 1 fire. Critically called "a failure of imagination," the fire was technically the result of frayed wiring sparking in an environment of pure, pressurized oxygen—but more correctly, the fire was the result of NASA management and engineers moving too fast to meet what seemed like an impossible end-of-decade deadline.

What's in the works is exciting to me, the Orion capsule and SLS (Space Launch System). Yes the development could probably have been made faster with more funding but it's still not something to rush. Private companies like SpaceX as well as a partnership with Russia is supporting the ISS currently while NASA spends it's allocations on developing this system.

More information can be found for these systems here:

Orion (NASA)
SLS (NASA)
Orion (wiki)
SLS (wiki)

As a side note (more directed at Ars rather than the author) the image galleries' captions are very hard to read on some of the photos due to the white text with a photo as the background. It would probably be better if the caption was below the photo rather than ontop of it.

 

[qasimq]

As a little boy I looked up to folks working at NASA. And as a grown man I still do.
Keep being awesome NASA and keep inspiring young children to dream of stars.

 

[Drakkenmensch]

It's so sad that we're cutting funds to NASA and funding the NSA instead.