One Small Step Read online

  Soyuz 10 was launched a few days after Salyut 1—the Soviet’s first space station. It had a crew of three. Vladimir Shatalov and Alexei Yeliseyev had flown together in Soyuz 4, 5 and 8. Nikolai Rukavishnikov was on his first flight. Meanwhile, the Salyut 1 space station had encountered problems. After it had reached orbit, controllers realized that the large exterior cover protecting its telescope had not been jettisoned. It was a major blow, and it was not to be the only problem.

  Despite a successful launch, the outlook for the Soyuz 10 mission was not good. As well as the problem with the cover and other failures, six of the eight ventilation units in the life-support system had failed, raising the prospect of high levels of carbon dioxide inside the space station. At a distance of 10 miles (16 km) from the station Shatalov switched on the Igla rendezvous docking system, which successfully brought Soyuz 5 to within 200 meters (656 ft.) of Salyut 1 before he took over manual control to dock. However, the docking indicator warning light suggested that hard-docking had not taken place. Ground telemetry confirmed that full docking had not occurred and that there was still a 9-centimeter (3.5-in) gap between the two vehicles. Shatalov attempted to push the two ships together by firing the Soyuz engines, but it did not work. After four orbits he was ordered to undock, but for some reason the two craft would not separate. Suddenly they were in severe danger. There were two options. One was to dismantle the docking apparatus, detach it from Soyuz 5 and move away from the station. The other was to separate the spheroid living compartment from the Soyuz 5 spacecraft, leaving the other compartment docked to Salyut 1. In both cases, the station would be unusable in the future because its only docking port would be occupied. While mission controllers contemplated these unappealing scenarios Shatalov tried again to separate from Salyut, and to everyone’s relief succeeded. Soyuz 5 could not remain in space after this near-disaster, however; they had to plan for an emergency reentry, performing the first-ever night landing in the Soviet program. Upon reentry the capsule filled with toxic fumes, causing Rukavishnikov to pass out. In total the aborted mission had lasted only one day, 23 hours, 46 minutes and 54 seconds. The Soviet media called it a success.

  First Occupants of the Space Station

  Two months later the Russians tried again with Soyuz 11. Originally the crew was to have been Leonov, Kubasov and Kolodin, but doctors suspected that Kubasov was about to contract tuberculosis. Under Soviet mission rules this meant the entire crew had to be replaced by their backups—in this case, Georgi Dobrovolsky, Vladislav Volkov and Viktor Patsayev. A reporter for the newspaper Pravda was at the Cosmonaut Hotel in Baikonur when the crew change took place. He later said that Leonov broke down and visibly lost his temper. Kubasov, who was the center of the controversy, was shocked and Kolodin, the third primary crew member, arrived at the hotel completely drunk. According to one report, Kolodin told Mishin that “history would never forgive him” for his decision to send the backup crew.

  The doomed Soyuz 11 crew (from left to right): Georgi Dobrovolsky, Viktor Patsayev and Vladislav Volkov.

  The new crew left Earth on June 6 and docked successfully, becoming the first to occupy a space station. As the days turned into weeks they managed to carry out a full experimental program, despite Salyut 1’s nagging problems. At last it seemed that the USSR had a real space success to celebrate. Reports from the cosmonauts in Salyut 1 were shown on Soviet television. Many of their exchanges were humorous in nature. Soon they had become household names in the Soviet Union. Perhaps now they could start to put Apollo behind them?

  The crew began their preparations to return to Earth after 23 days, having broken the space endurance record. It was clear that they were very tired. On the eve of June 29 they moved into Soyuz 11, which was docked to Salyut 1, and entered the descent capsule, sealing the hatch between it and the spherical living compartment. There was a major crisis at this point when the hatch open indicator light between the Soyuz 5 living compartment and the descent apparatus failed to turn off. Tired and anxious, Volkov asked mission control what to do. They resealed the hatch, but the warning light remained on. Amazingly, ground control eventually recommended they cover the hatch sensor with a piece of paper, thus disabling it! Fortunately, the subsequent pressurization checks were satisfactory. The crew undocked and loitered for a little while taking exterior photographs of Salyut 5. They then started the process for automatic reentry and routinely signed off communications. The Soyuz drifted out of voice contact. The main engine was to begin firing at 0135 hours and 24 seconds Moscow Time on June 30, followed by separation of the three Soyuz 5 modules.

  An Agonizing End

  Later, after hearing nothing from the returning crew, rescuers overflew the planned landing site. The capsule had landed safely, but the crew were dead inside. There is a heartbreaking video that emerged in Russia many years later showing the ground crew pulling the cosmonauts out of the capsule and attempting mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and heart massage. Investigations showed there was blood in the crew’s lungs, nitrogen in their blood and hemorrhages in their brains—they had asphyxiated when the air escaped from their capsule. The crew, realizing they were losing air, had tried desperately to find the source of the leak—it was a valve that had been jolted open during reentry as the Descent Module separated from the Service Module. They knew the danger and what would be the consequence if they did not rectify it. The shoulder straps of all the cosmonauts were unfastened, and Dobrovolsky himself had become tangled in his straps as he struggled for freedom. Records indicated that his breathing rate shot up from a normal 16 breaths to 48 breaths per minute. They had ten to 15 seconds of agonizing consciousness—too little to do anything about the situation—and in less than a minute they were dead. The problematic valve was inaccessible behind their seats; ironically, a finger or an adhesive plaster over it would have saved them.

  Afterward, Kubasov’s lung problem, which had effectively saved his life as well as those of Leonov and Kolodin, turned out to be only an allergic reaction. It would be over two years before a cosmonaut would venture into space again. Salyut 1 reentered and was destroyed in the Earth’s atmosphere four months later.

  The Soviets tried to resurrect their N1 program with another test launch on June 27, but it only flew for 51 seconds. A year later they regrouped and tried again. This time the N1 lasted 107 seconds before it broke up. The Moon project was finally canceled in 1974. The mighty N1s were scrapped for use as sheds and shelters at Baikonur and, as was the habit in Soviet Russia, an attempt was made to obliterate them from history.

  Salyut 2 was launched on April 4, 1973. It was not really a part of the Salyut series although it was included under that classification. In reality it was a prototype military space station called Almaz, but it malfunctioned in orbit and reentered a few weeks later. The “true Salyut 2” was launched a little later under the name Cosmos 557, but it did not work either and lasted only a week.

  TIMELINE

  1971 April 23 Soyuz 10 is launched, intended to be the first craft to visit Soviet space station Salyut 1. But it experiences potentially disastrous docking problems and the mission is aborted

  May 19 American Mars 3 orbiter and lander are launched successfully

  June 6 Soyuz 11 is launched and docks successfully with Salyut 1. The crew suffer a catastrophic loss of air on the return journey and are dead on landing

  “Their majesty overwhelmed me”

  BRINGING BACK MOONBEAMS

  APOLLO 15, 16 AND 17

  1971–1972

  The Apollo missions 15, 16 and 17 were notable not only for the well-executed, almost routine, way in which the journeys to and from the Moon were conducted. These three missions also carried lunar rover vehicles, which enabled the astronauts to explore terrain at some distance from the lander. Furthermore, the scientific purpose of the missions was emphasized by the fact that among the crew were trained geologists.

  In July 1971 Apollo 15 hit its target precisely—a large amphitheater girded by moun
tains and a deep canyon on the eastern edge of a vast plain. Later, Commander David Scott said he would never forget the Command Module Endeavor hurtling through the Moon’s strange nightscape. Above were the stars, below lay the Moon’s far side, an arc of impenetrable darkness that blotted out the sky. As the moment of sunrise approached, barely discernible streamers of light—actually the glowing gases of the solar corona around the Sun—played above the Moon’s horizon. Finally, the Sun exploded into view. In less than a second its harsh light flooded Endeavor, dazzling Scott’s eyes.

  The early lunar morning stretched into the distance. Long, angular shadows accentuated every hill and crater. As the Sun rose higher the moonscape turned the color of gunmetal. The shadows shrank, and at lunar noontide it shone down on a bleached and featureless world.

  Apollo 15 astronaut Jim Irwin loads the lunar rover prior to the first lunar extravehicular activity (EVA).

  The Lunar Geology

  Dave Scott and Jim Irwin spent 67 hours on the Moon, landing in the bright morning of the 710-hour lunar day. Opening the top hatch, Scott made a preliminary survey of a world he described as still being in the epoch of its creation. Craters left by “recent” meteorites millions of years ago stood out startlingly white against the soft beige of the gently undulating terrain. On the Moon the horizon is only 1.2 miles (2 km) away. To the south of Falcon, the Lunar Module, a 3300-meter (10,824-ft.) ridge rose over the plain. To the east was an even higher summit. To the west was the Hadley Rille, snaking across the landscape and 300 meters (984 ft.) deep. To the northeast was a great mountain towering 5000 meters (16,494 ft.) above them. “Their majesty overwhelmed me,” said Scott.

  Scott was a space veteran on his third flight, but he was also a new breed of astronaut. Eight years of training in lunar geology had made him aware of intriguing details in the landscape and the rocks. A dark line, like a bathtub ring, smudged the base of the mountains. Was it left by the subsiding lake of lava that once filled the immense cavity of Palus Putredinis on the fringes of the vast Mare Imbrium (Sea of Rains) billions of years ago?

  Once on the lunar surface, Scott found the one-sixth Earth gravity more enjoyable than weightlessness, for while it enabled him to enjoy the almost same sense of buoyancy it still provided a reassuringly fixed awareness of “up” and “down.” Scott felt like an intruder, he said, in an eternal wilderness. The flowing moonscape reminded him of the Earth’s uplands after a covering of snow. Most of the scattered rocks shared the same grayness as the dust around them, but he found two that were jet black, two that were pastel green, several with sparkling crystals, some coated with glass and one that was white. No wind blew, no sound echoed, only shadows moved.

  Acclimatizing to the Moon

  At first, Dave Scott and Jim Irwin experienced a troubling deception in perspective. There were no trees, clouds or haze to determine whether an object was far away or near. Each of the three spacewalks was due to last seven hours, and they dug and drilled, gathered rocks and took photographs. Back in Falcon between excursions it took them two hours to remove their suits and do housekeeping chores. For the first 20 minutes or so, before the air filtration system purified the air, they were aware of a smell like that of gunpowder. But even when the smell disappeared, the moondust stuck to everything. To help them sleep they put shades over the windows.

  By the third moonwalk they felt at home. Using the lunar rover on its first mission they ventured over the horizon—the first astronauts ever to do so. In case the navigation system on the lunar rover failed, Scott made a small cardboard compass. Although shriveled in the savage lunar sunlight and covered with moondust, it would give him the bearings back to Falcon if he needed them. On their way back the astronauts even dared to take a short cut as the rover bounced between undulations and crater walls that hid their view of the Lunar Module for long minutes. Too soon they would have to leave the Moon, and already felt a sense of impending loss. They would never return to the plains of Hadley. Clutching the ladder, Scott raised his eyes from the moonscape and saw the vivid blue sphere of the Earth.

  In times to come, other astronauts from Earth, or perhaps from elsewhere, would come this way and gaze upon the abandoned gear of Apollo 15. As with all Apollo landers, a plaque of aluminum fitted to the descent stage of the Lunar Module portrayed the two hemispheres of Earth, the name of the spacecraft, the date of the mission and the roster of the crew. The crew of Apollo 15 left behind a falcon’s feather and a four-leaf clover. In a little hollow in the moondust they placed a stylized figure of a man in a spacesuit alongside a metal plaque bearing the names of the 14 Russian and American spacemen who had given their lives so that man might explore the cosmos. Alongside, Scott placed a single book, the Bible.

  Apollo 16 Leaves Its Mark

  In April 1972 Charles Duke, the astronaut who communicated with Armstrong and Aldrin as they landed on the Moon, got his chance to land on the Moon himself on Apollo 16. When they reached lunar orbit, a malfunction in the Service Module controlling the angle of the booster nozzle nearly caused the cancelation of the lunar landing. Duke and Commander John Young were already undocked in their Lunar Module when their descent was postponed. Eventually it was decided that the problem was not a showstopper, and they got the go to descend. A communications problem meant that they had to start their descent with the windows facing out into space instead of toward the Moon, and needed to rely on the landing radar to update them on their altitude.

  Duke: So at 7000 feet, the guidance program maneuvered the vehicle to windows forward down, and I saw the lunar surface close up for the very first time. It looked exactly like the mockup. “John, there it is! You know, there’s Gator. There’s Lone Star and North Ray Crater.”

  We landed in the Descartes highlands of the Moon—a valley 8 to 10 miles across, and the objective was to explore to the south to a place we called Stone Mountain and then to the north, 3 or 4 miles, to a place called North Ray Crater, which was at the base of the Smoky Mountains. With the rover, you could do that. It took us 40 to 50 minutes to drive down south; and I was the navigator. We had trained, so I was the navigator; and John was the driver of the rover.

  We landed within a couple of hundred meters of where we thought we were going to land. So we, you know, basically recognized the major landing spots. And I remember as John started off, I said: “Okay, John. Steer 120 degrees for 1.2 kilometers, and then turn left to 090 degrees and go another 2 kilometers” or whatever it was. And so, that’s the way we navigated. The Lunar Rover had a little directional gyro. There was no magnetic field on the Moon, so a magnetic compass wouldn’t work. So we had a little gyroscope that was mounted in the instrument panel of the rover. We had a little odometer on the wheel that counted out in kilometers, and so that was our distance. And so, that’s how we navigated up on the lunar surface. We’d start out one direction and we’d make a big loop and come back to the Lunar Module six to seven hours later. That was the plan. And, you never really worried about getting lost up there because everywhere you drove, you left your tracks. And so, if you really were unsure of your position, it was easy just to turn around and follow your tracks back.

  We kept jogging and jogging, and the rock kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger. And we were going slightly downhill, that we didn’t sense at first, and so we get down to this thing and we called it “House Rock.” You know, it must’ve been 90 feet across and 45 feet tall. It was humongous. And we walked around to the front side or the east side, which was in the sunlight, and, you know, it was towering over us and John and I hit with a hammer, and a chunk came off, and we were able to collect a piece of House Rock. But—then we had to hike back. It was uphill, and it was a struggle getting back up.

  Before he left, Charlie Duke left on the surface a picture of his family. A message on the back reads: “This is the family of Astronaut Duke from Planet Earth. Landed on the Moon, April 1972.” Underneath were the signatures of his wife and children.

  Apollo 17—The Last M
oon Landing

  Probably the most challenging landing on the moon was the last, Apollo 17. On December 6, 1972, Gene Cernan, Harrison Schmitt and Ron Evans were in the Command Module on top of a fueled Saturn V for the first night launch in US spaceflight—a time dictated by the angle of the Sun at the landing site in the Taurus-Littrow Highlands—the shadows cast by the craters must be low enough to show sufficient relief to allow a safe landing.

  Apollo 17 astronaut Harrison Schmitt is dwarfed by a boulder during the third EVA at the Taurus-Littrow landing site.

  Gene Cernan was the commander. He was making his third trip into space and his second on an Apollo mission. This time he was to land on what was to be the final Moon landing, along with geologist Harrison Schmitt. Originally Joe Engle was due to accompany Cernan, but when it was realized that Apollo 17 would be the last such mission NASA decided to replace him with a trained geologist who had been preparing for the now-canceled Apollo 18.

  Gene Cernan: Our valley where we were to land in was surrounded by mountains on three sides that are higher than the Grand Canyon is deep, to give you some idea. So at 7000 feet we were down among them. I mean the mountains rose above us on both sides. The valley was only 20 miles long and about five miles wide. We had good photography. So I practiced this 100, 500—I don’t know how many times. So what I was looking at I’d seen before basically, because of the simulation and the pictures. So I knew we were in the right spot. At 7000 feet as the craters and rocks and the boulders and so forth began to appear I could begin to pick up my landing site. We had a particular target point, but it was only as good as we expected it to be. But when I got closer and I could see, then I could what we called redesignate where we were going to land. As I say, all the way down the engine is firing, you’re in a suit, it’s noisy, it’s vibrating, people are talking to you from both ends, needles are going left and right. You know you don’t have much fuel. So you got to get down quickly. But you can’t get down too quick, you got to have your rate of descent under control.