The Star: July 18, 2019

Thursday July 18 2019 The Star
news online at www.star.kiwi
NEWS 15
50 years since the Eagle landed
HISTORY: Lyttelton’s Fred Tunnicliffe with four posters previewing The Christchurch Star’s coverage of the Apollo 11 mission. (Right) – The Apollo 11
Saturn V rocket on launch pad 39A.
It was being broadcast live
on radio . . . so we all had time
off school and went outside, it
was history. This was the biggest
thing. To even believe that people
could do that, it was amazing. I
can vividly remember that day at
school.
“To believe that humans
in 1969 could do such an
extraordinary thing, it was like
the world was going to change in
that moment.”
Coastal Ward city councillor
David East was a student at
Shirley Boys’ High School at the
time of the event,
which he called
“fascinating.”
Cr East said
the historic
moment was a
memorable one
which you always
remember, along
with events such as Kennedy
being shot in 1963 and former
Prime Minister Norman Kirk’s
death in 1974.
NASA senior engineer and
Canterbury University Erskine
fellow Tim Atkins was a young
boy living in the US at the time.
“As a nine-year old boy, I
watched in amazement with my
family as this history unfolded
on TV. The lunar lander
precariously navigated above the
moon, gently landed, with only a
few seconds of fuel to spare, and
people stepped down a ladder to
its surface.
“America was in a period of
intense national strife, with
internal conflicts against racism
at home, a dubious war abroad,
and reeling from
assassinations. Even
in my youth, I felt the
weight of this. But in
this hot summer month,
people of all races and
political bents came
together to celebrate
this monumental
achievement.
Canterbury University Mt John
Observatory astronomer
Alan Gilmore remembers
hearing ‘the Eagle had landed’
just before he went to work that
day.
“After the landing, there
was a comment from
mission control that the
guys there were turning
blue from holding their
breaths as the lander used
most of its fuel seeking a
suitable landing site. There
was a quip that the astronauts
having to climb into space suits
in the tiny lander was like two
women getting into ball gowns in
a telephone box,” he said.
The 14.6m long space
station had just one
docking port. The first crew
aboard spent 23 days on
the station, but the three
men tragically died on their
way back to earth when
the air leaked out of their
spacecraft.
•1971: NASA’s Mariner 9
became the first satellite to
orbit another planet – Mars
– on November 14.
•1971: Mars 3 achieved the
first successful soft landing
on the martian surface on
December 2. The Soviet
lander reached the red
planet’s surface, but failed
just 20sec after touch
down.
•1972: Apollo 17, NASA’s
last crewed mission to
the moon, left the lunar
surface on December 14.
No crewed spacecraft has
landed on the moon since.
•1973: US probe Pioneer
10 became the first spacecraft
to fly by Jupiter on
December 3.
•1975: The US spacecraft
Apollo and the Soviet craft
Soyuz docked in what
was the first international
rendezvous. Known as the
Apollo-Soyuz Test Project,
the important mission
proved US and Russian
crews could work together
successfully in space.
•1976: On July 20, the first
pictures of the surface of
Mars were sent back to
earth by Viking 1, the first
US spacecraft to successfully
land on another planet.
The pictures revealed a
rocky, desolate landscape
with no signs of life.
•1977: The Voyager 1 space
probe was launched by
NASA on September 5. Part
of the Voyager programme
to study the outer solar
system, Voyager 1 was
launched 16 days after its
twin, Voyager 2.
•2001: A spacecraft landed
on an asteroid for the
first time on February 12. At
the time, asteroid 433 Eros
was 121 million kilometres
from earth. The probe
NEAR survived the landing
and returned data about
the asteroid’s surface.
•2010: SpaceX launched
its Falcon 1 rocket on December
8, marking the first
time Elon Musk’s company
reached orbit. SpaceX had
three failures before the
fourth rocket succeeded. It
launched an industry of reusable,
lower-cost rockets.
•2011: Robonaut 2 became
the first humanoid robot
in space on February 24.
NASA scientists designed
the 149kg robot to use the
same tools as humans on
the International Space Station
where it remains today.
•2012: The Curiosity rover
landed on Mars on August
6. It was as large as a car
and carried advanced
equipment to research the
planet. It remains there
today.
•2012: About August 25,
Voyager 1 departed the
solar system bubble and
entered interstellar space.
•2014: The first ever spacecraft
goes into orbit around
a comet in August.
•2015: NASA’s Dawn
spacecraft made the first
visit to a dwarf planet on
March 6. It went into orbit
around Ceres roughly eight
years after leaving earth.
•2015: July 14, NASA’s
nuclear-powered New
Horizons probe visits Pluto
and its moon for the first
time in history after a nineyear
journey.
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