If an Apollo Lunar Module Crashed on the Moon, Could NASA Investigate the Cause? (1967)

All alone in the gray: the Apollo 17 Lunar Module Challenger photographed by its crew from a distance of about two miles. Image credit: NASA.

The early piloted Apollo missions were a rapid series of test flights. Apollo 7 (11-22 October 1968), the first manned Apollo, saw a Command and Service Module (CSM) spacecraft and its three-man crew put through their paces in low-Earth orbit. Apollo 8 (21-27 December 1968), originally planned as a test of the CSM and the Lunar Module (LM) in high-Earth orbit, might have been postponed because the LM was not yet ready; instead, Apollo 7's success and the perceived threat to American prestige of a Soviet manned circumlunar mission induced NASA managers to make it a lunar-orbital CSM test and a trial run for the Apollo tracking and communications network.

Apollo 9 tested the CSM, LM, and the Apollo space suit in low-Earth orbit (3-13 March 1969). Apollo 10 (18-26 May 1969) tested the CSM and LM in lunar orbit and rehearsed the Apollo lunar descent procedure down to an altitude of 50,000 feet.

Apollo 11 (16-24 July 1969), the first lunar landing attempt, was also a test flight, though it is seldom seen that way today. In an effort to make that first landing as easy as possible, engineers directed the Apollo 11 LM Eagle to the northern Sea of Tranquility, one of the flattest stretches of lunar equatorial terrain scientists could find. It was, however, also a U.S. victory in the Cold War with the Soviet Union and the first time humans had explored an alien world first-hand. Scientists and engineers fought a running battle over the degree to which scientific exploration should play a role in Apollo 11, and President Richard Nixon telephoned moonwalkers Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin to read a celebratory speech as they stood next to the U.S. flag.

Eagle landed downrange of its planned landing site. Its overworked computer might have flown it into boulder-filled West Crater had it not been for the quick thinking of former X-15 rocket plane test-pilot Armstrong. Apollo 12 (14-24 November 1969) thus became a test of the Apollo system's ability to make a pinpoint landing. The ability to reach a predetermined spot on the moon was important to scientists planning Apollo geologic traverses. It also helped to ensure safety. The Apollo 12 LM Intrepid landed on the Ocean of Storms, another flat plain, just 600 feet from its target, the derelict Surveyor 3 lander, which had preceded it to the site on 20 April 1967.

Any Apollo mission might have failed catastrophically far from Earth, a point driven home by the explosion on board the CSM Odyssey during Apollo 13 (11-17 April 1970). Hollywood scriptwriters notwithstanding, failure was an option during Apollo missions. Apollo pushed the limits of 1960s technology to do extraordinary things.

The Apollo Program had, in fact, claimed lives before the first Apollo spacecraft left Earth: the AS-204 (Apollo 1) fire killed Gus Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chaffee during a launch pad training exercise on 27 January 1967, barely a month before their planned launch. Because the Apollo 1 fire occurred on the ground, engineers could take apart the AS-204 CSM piece by piece to try to trace the fire's cause. Even so, they never conclusively identified its ignition source.

A December 1964 report by R. Moore of the Project RAND think-tank anticipated that accidents taking place on the moon would be even more difficult to analyze. Moore proposed that NASA continue the Ranger lunar probe series to enable photography of lunar crash sites. The last four Rangers each carried a battery of six television cameras intended to return images to Earth as the spacecraft plummeted toward destructive impact.

If, for example, Eagle had crashed in West Crater, then NASA would have dispatched a Ranger to image the site. Ranger seemed well suited to aiding accident investigators: Ranger 7, which struck the Ocean of Storms on 31 July 1964, had imaged features as small as 18 inches wide in its final seconds before impact.

Ranger 7, 8, and 9 were designed for close-up photography of the lunar surface. Image credit: NASA.

NASA did not act on Moore's proposal, but the concept of Apollo accident site investigations was not forgotten (or, just as likely, it was discovered again). In November 1967, C. Byrne and W. Piotrowski of Bellcomm, NASA's Washington, DC-based Apollo planning contractor, wrote a memorandum in which they looked at whether a Command Module Pilot (CMP) whose moonwalking colleagues had suffered a fatal mishap on the moon might assist investigators by photographing the accident site from the CSM in lunar orbit.

They began by acknowledging that telemetry could provide valuable accident data: they added, however, that "certain types of failure can be imagined which would not permit enough data to be transmitted to support a diagnosis." In those cases, they wrote, observation from lunar orbit might be the only way to collect data that could guide engineers in their efforts to redesign the Apollo system to avoid similar accidents.

Byrne and Piotrowski then looked at the image resolution necessary to make useful observations of an accident site on the moon. To locate and identify an intact LM, which measured a little more than 20 feet tall, images showing details as small as 10 feet across would be needed. Eight-foot resolution would be needed to determine the status of the LM's 12-foot-tall ascent stage; for example, if it had lifted off from the descent stage and then crashed on the surface. Four-foot resolution would suffice to determine whether the LM had tipped over.

The ability to resolve features as small as a yard across would enable engineers to assess landing site roughness and slope. Two-foot resolution would, they estimated, be adequate to discern astronaut bodies on the surface. One-foot resolution would reveal whether the LM landing gear had failed, "hazardous sinkage" had occurred, the LM ascent stage crew cabin lay open to vacuum, or an explosion in the LM had scattered "litter" around the landing site.

Byrne and Piotrowski then took stock of the cameras and telescopes expected to be on board the CSM during a normal lunar mission and their performance if the CSM were orbiting 80 nautical miles (n mi), 40 n mi, or 10 n mi above the accident site. They suggested that CSM propellants budgeted for rescue of astronauts on board an LM ascent stage that attained only a low orbit could be used to lower the CSM's altitude for accident site observations.

The CSM's scanning telescope would, despite its name, not magnify objects, so would be of "no value" as a diagnostic tool, Byrne and Piotrowski judged. The sextant, on the other hand, could magnify objects 28 times. The Bellcomm engineers found that the sextant would offer 8.6-foot resolution at an orbital altitude of 80 n mi, 4.3-foot resolution at 40 n mi, and 1.1-foot resolution at 10 n mi. (Apollo CMPs did in fact use the sextant to spot LMs — or at least the shadows they cast — on the lunar surface.)

The sextant was, however, designed to superimpose a pair of star images, could not be used to photograph objects, and, with a field of view only 1.8° wide, would require a highly skilled operator to spot an LM at all. This would be the case especially at lower altitudes, when the CSM would be moving fastest relative to the surface. Byrne and Piotrowski estimated that an astronaut searching the surface with the sextant at an altitude of 10 n mi would at most have 10 seconds in which to find and observe an accident site.

Apollo 12 Command Module Pilot Richard Gordon trains with cameras and lenses in a Command Module simulator before his November 1969 flight to the moon. Image credit: NASA.

Byrne and Piotrowski wrote that NASA planned to include among the Apollo CSM experiment equipment a Swedish-built Hasselblad 500EL camera with 80-millimeter (mm) f/2.8 and 250-mm f/5.6 lenses. Used with S0-243 film and the 250-mm lens, the Hasselblad 500EL could in theory take photos of the lunar surface with a resolution of 13 feet at 80 n mi of altitude, 6.5 feet at 40 n mi, and 1.6 feet at 10 n mi.

Other constraints would, however, conspire to reduce camera performance. In particular, there was the problem of image motion compensation. Experience gained through Earth photography during the Gemini V mission (21-29 August 1965) showed that astronaut movements were jerky, not smooth, when tracking and photographing targets. Jerky tracking would cause image "smear," reducing resolution.

Byrne and Piotrowski recommended that the CMP mount the Hasselblad 500EL securely in a new-design clamp or bracket at either the CSM hatch window or one of the side windows after he located the LM site. He would then fire the CSM's Reaction Control System thrusters to roll the spacecraft and keep the surface target in his camera's field of view as the CSM passed over it. This form of image motion compensation was unlikely to be perfect; for one thing, roll rate would be affected by factors beyond the CMP's control, such as the distribution and movement of liquid propellants in the CSM's tanks.

As with the sextant, time-over-target would pose a constraint. The Bellcomm engineers assumed that the CMP would need at least 30 seconds to locate the LM on the moon, 15 seconds to prepare the camera and roll the CSM, and 15 seconds for photography.

For a CSM at an altitude of 80 n mi, an LM on the lunar surface would remain in view for two minutes and 24 seconds. This was ample for photography, but at that altitude resolution would be inadequate — no better than 10 feet. At 40 n mi of altitude, the CMP could keep the LM in view for 90 seconds. At 30 n mi, he would have about 60 seconds — the minimum necessary — to find and photograph his target. Byrne and Pietrowski thus selected 40 n mi as the optimum altitude for accident site photography.

The Bellcomm engineers looked at adding a special cartridge of high-contrast film and a 500-mm f/8 lens for the Hasselblad 500EL, and at replacing the Hasselblad 500EL with the Zeiss Contarex Special 35-mm camera and 200-mm f/4 and 300-mm f/4 lenses. These had already reached space on board Gemini V. They noted that both cameras would yield a resolution of about one yard at an altitude of 40 n mi with a secure mounting bracket and adequate image motion compensation. In the end, they favored the Hasselblad 500EL with 500-mm f/8 lens and high-contrast film because it would be about eight pounds lighter than the Zeiss camera.

Byrne and Piotrowski noted that the camera system and techniques they proposed would have uses other than accident site investigation. They might, for example, be used to photograph the landing site after a successful LM landing. This would, among other things, enable scientists to precisely locate the post-deployment position of the Advanced Lunar Scientific Experiment Package, a suite of instruments the moonwalkers would deploy some distance away from the LM. Images of the landing site might also assist geologists in understanding the context of the samples the moonwalking astronauts would return to Earth.

Sources

"A Suggestion for Extension of the NASA Ranger Project in Support of Manned Space Flight," Memorandum RM-4353-NASA, R. C. Moore, The RAND Corporation, December 1964.

"Diagnostic Observation of Lunar Surface Accidents – Case 340," C. Byrne & W. Piotrowski, Bellcomm, Inc., 7 November 1967.

More Information

What If Apollo Astronauts Could Not Ride the Saturn V Rocket? (1965)

What if an Apollo Lunar Module Ran Low on Fuel and Aborted Its Moon Landing? (1966)

"Assuming That Everything Goes Perfectly Well in the Apollo Program. . ." (1967)

Humans on Mars in 1995! (1980-1981)

Space: 1995? A stylized schematic of NASA's Integrated Program Plan scenario, proposed in 1969, in the form it might have taken in the 1990s. Image credit: NASA.

NASA's Space Shuttle was conceived in the late 1960s as a fully reusable transport spacecraft for reducing the cost of Earth-orbiting space station logistics resupply and crew rotation. By the time of the first piloted moon landing in July 1969, it came to be seen as an element in an expansive Integrated Program Plan that also included upgraded expendable Saturn V rockets, reusable manned Space Tugs and Nuclear Shuttles, Earth-orbital and lunar-orbital space stations, a lunar surface base, and manned Mars expeditions — all by the mid-1980s. This vision of America's future in space found little favor in either the Executive Branch or Congress, however. By 1972, only the Space Shuttle survived, and then only in a partially reusable form.

For a time, the European Space Research Organization (ESRO) sought to provide NASA with a reusable Space Tug that would reach low-Earth orbit in the Shuttle Orbiter payload bay and travel to orbits that the Shuttle could not reach. In August 1973, however, NASA and ESRO agreed that the latter should develop Spacelab, a system of segmented pressurized modules and unpressurized pallets that would operate in the Orbiter payload bay to provide an interim short-duration space station capability. ESRO joined with the European Launcher Development Organization to form the European Space Agency (ESA) in 1975.

Concept art of Space Shuttle Orbiter with cutaway of European-built Spacelab module in its payload bay. Image credit: NASA.

When the semi-reusable Shuttle first reached space in April 1981, NASA anticipated launching Earth-orbiting satellites and planetary probes beyond the Orbiter's operational altitude using a modest flock of expendable auxiliary rocket stages. The largest and most powerful of these would be the Centaur G-prime, a chemical-propulsion stage with a troubled development history. Centaur G-prime was tapped as NASA's main upper stage for boosting planetary probes — for example, the Galileo Jupiter Orbiter and Probe — onto interplanetary trajectories.

During Shuttle development in the 1970s, NASA budgets were tight, and planning for advanced missions — for example, humans on Mars — ceased within the U.S. civilian space agency. According to some within NASA, talk of Moon bases and piloted Mars missions was tantamount to professional suicide. When planning for NASA piloted Mars missions resumed, it did so first outside of NASA. Mars exploration advocates outside the agency hoped that the Shuttle would inexpensively launch Mars spacecraft components, propellants, and crews, and also serve as a source of hardware that could be modified at modest cost to assemble piloted Mars spacecraft.

Robert Parkinson, an engineer with the Propellants, Explosives, and Rocket Motor Establishment in Great Britain, was among the first individuals to write about a NASA piloted Mars mission based on Shuttle and Shuttle-related hardware. Inspired by the writings of Arthur C. Clarke and Wernher von Braun, Parkinson had joined the British Interplanetary Society in 1956. In a series of papers spanning 1980-1981, he wrote of a capable chemical-propulsion NASA Mars expedition plan which he dubbed "Mars in 1995!"

Parkinson inventoried Shuttle-derived and Shuttle-related hardware which he believed would become available by 1990 as part of NASA's planned Earth-orbital operations. Development of such systems, he opined, "probably only awaits freeing of funding currently tied up in [development of] the Shuttle."

His long list of useful hardware included, in addition to the Space Shuttle, three systems designed mainly for rocket propulsion: a powerful Heavy Lift Vehicle (HLV) capable of launching into low-Earth orbit payloads larger than the Shuttle Orbiter's payload bay could accommodate; a Heavy Boost Stage (HBS) roughly the size of the S-IVB stage NASA used in the late 1960s/early 1970s to launch Apollo spacecraft out of Earth orbit toward the moon; and a drum-shaped high-performance Orbital Transfer Vehicle (OTV) with an optional crew cabin.

Parkinson's inventory also included important systems not related to propulsion: an extendable solar array for generating up to 25 kilowatts of electricity; Spacelab modules capable of operating in free-flyer mode (that is, outside of a Space Shuttle payload bay); closed-cycle Space Station life-support systems; and androgynous docking units resembling those which linked together Soviet and American spacecraft during the July 1975 Apollo-Soyuz Test Project mission.

Because such systems would be developed for Earth-orbital operations regardless of whether NASA planned a Mars expedition, a Mars expedition which employed them could be carried out in the 1990s with essentially no development cost. The piloted Mars lander would be the only wholly new piloted spacecraft developed for the Mars expedition.

Parkinson placed the cost of his expedition at just $3.3 billion in his first "Mars in 1995!" paper, of which developing and testing the Mars lander would account for about $740 million. He raised the total cost to $4.844 billion in a subsequent paper, of which $2.359 billion would be spent on the lander. Even this higher cost figure was, he noted, only five times the cost of the twin robotic Viking missions which landed on and orbited Mars in 1976. He added that "given the right circumstances, it is actually cheaper to send men [to Mars] than to try to do the same thing with dozens of robot expeditions."

Parkinson's 1995 NASA Mars expedition would begin with eight Space Shuttle launches in September-October 1994. Reflecting early Shuttle-era optimism, Parkinson estimated that each of the eight weekly Shuttle launches would cost just $28.75 million. Assembly of the expedition's three Orbital Assembly (OA) spacecraft — in reality, a single spacecraft system launched from Earth orbit in three parts — would take place in a 400-kilometer-high circular Earth orbit. The eighth Shuttle Orbiter would deliver the five Mars astronauts and stand by to observe the beginning of their departure from Earth orbit. In the event of trouble before the beginning of Earth-orbit departure, the Shuttle could recover the Mars astronauts and return them to Earth.

The view from Orbital Assembly 1: A rear-facing porthole displays the setting Sun and OA 2 and OA 3 during departure from Earth-orbit. OA 2 is the nearer of the two. From fore to aft, it comprises the docking module with stowed twin rectangular solar arrays; a Spacelab-derived crew module; an unpressurized pallet with extended medium-gain dish antennas; a Mars-orbit departure/Earth-orbit capture OTV; a Mars-orbit capture OTV; and a Heavy Boost Stage. OA3 from fore to aft comprises the Lander Module; a stores module; an OTV with a crew cabin; and a Heavy Boost Stage. Image credit: © David A. Hardy/http://www.astroart.org

Two OAs, which Parkinson also designated "Orbiters," would at launch from Earth orbit each comprise an HBS, a pair of 30-ton OTVs (one for Mars orbit capture and one for Mars orbit departure/Earth-orbit capture), and a Spacelab-derived pressurized module with an aft-mounted unpressurized pallet and a forward-mounted androgynous docking unit. The Spacelab-derived modules would provide living and working space for the crew, as well as protection from the six solar flares Parkinson said the crew could expect during their 18-month Mars expedition.

Orbiter 1, with a crew of three and a mass at launch from Earth orbit of 211.3 metric tons, would have stowed on its unpressurized pallet a deployable six-meter-diameter high-gain dish antenna for high-data-rate radio communication with Earth and two 2.5-meter-diameter Venus atmosphere entry probes. Orbiter 2, with a mass of 210.9 metric tons and a crew of two, would include attached to its forward-mounted androgynous unit a 1750-kilogram cylindrical docking module with three unoccupied androgynous docking ports and two extendable solar arrays. Either Orbiter could support the entire crew in an emergency.

OA 3, the unmanned Lander Assembly (LA), would have at launch from Earth orbit a mass of only 193.5 metric tons. In addition to an HBS, it would comprise an OTV; a three-meter-diameter drum-shaped OTV crew cabin with an androgynous docking unit; a drum-shaped stores module; and the 7.6-meter-diameter, 15.98-metric-ton Lander Module, which would transport three astronauts from Mars orbit to a preselected landing site on the martian surface. The stores module would partially cover the Lander Module to shield it from meteoroids.

Parkinson's stores module had a central tunnel running from its aft-mounted androgynous docking unit — linked to the OTV/crew cabin — to its forward-mounted androgynous docking unit. The forward unit would link to the Lander Module's lightweight "skeleton" androgynous unit. The module would carry supplies for the expedition's Mars-bound leg; three 1225-kilogram automated Mars sample-returner landers; a 938-kilogram propulsion package that would enable one Mars sample-returner to change its orbital plane from near-equatorial to near-polar and back so that it could reach and return a sample from one of the martian polar ice caps; six 31-kilogram penetrator hard-landers; and a 473-kilogram Mars-orbiting radio-relay satellite to enable Mission Control on Earth to remain in continuous contact with the crew on the surface of Mars.

On 8 November 1994, the three OAs would ignite their HBS engines to begin Earth-orbit departure. Over the course of several revolutions about the Earth, they would fire the HBS rocket motors at their perigee (Earth-orbit low point) to raise their apogee (Earth-orbit high point). A maneuver at final apogee would tweak the plane of the expedition's Sun-centered Mars-intersecting orbit, then a final perigee burn would push the three OAs out of Earth's gravitational grip.

After escape from Earth, the OAs would cast off their spent HBSs and dock to form the Earth-to-Mars cruise configuration. The crew would first dock Orbiter 1 and Orbiter 2 nose-to-nose with the docking module between them. The LA OTV/crew cabin would undock from the stores module/Lander Module, then the former would dock at one of the docking module's lateral (side) ports. The stores module/Lander Module would dock automatically at the other lateral port, opposite the LA OTV/crew cabin. The crew would then extend the twin solar arrays mounted on the docking module. After they finished assembling their spacecraft, the five astronauts would have available 1125 cubic meters of living space.

The OAs would reach Mars on 10 June 1995. Shortly before arrival, the crew would retract the solar arrays to protect them from deceleration stress during the Mars capture maneuver. Orbiter 1 would undock from the docking module on Orbiter 2, and the LA OTV/crew cabin and stores module/Lander Module would both undock from the docking module lateral ports and redock with each other.

The two Orbiters would then ignite their Mars orbit capture OTV engines to slow down so that martian gravity could capture them into a 23,678-by-3748-kilometer Mars-centered orbit with a period of 13.5 hours. The single LA OTV would perform an identical maneuver. Parkinson proposed the high elliptical orbit as a propellant-saving measure; relatively loosely bound to Mars, it would enable an economical Mars escape when time came to begin the return to Earth.

Parkinson's "Mars in 1995!" spacecraft in Mars orbit. Spacelab-derived crew modules are labeled "NASA" and "esa." Numerals on the twin Mars orbit departure/Earth-orbit capture OTVs identify the Orbiters of which they are part. The Lander Module is at upper right, docked with the stores module, which is in turn docked with the Orbiter 2 docking module. Extended solar arrays place the LA OTV/crew cabin (labeled "3") in shadow. The painting shows a deorbit rocket pack strapped to the Lander Module heat shield; Parkinson also proposed using the Lander Module Reaction Control System thrusters for the deorbit maneuver ahead of landing on Mars. Image credit: © David A. Hardy/http://www.astroart.org

The two Orbiters would cast off their spent Mars orbit capture OTVs and redock to form their Mars orbital configuration. The Lander Assembly would split as before so that its components could resume their places at the docking module lateral ports. Because the Lander Assembly would be less massive than the two Orbiters, its OTV would retain about 7000 kilograms of nitrogen tetroxide/hydrazine propellants after its Mars orbit capture burn and would not be cast off.

After they surveyed prospective landing sites from orbit at periapsis (orbit low-point) over several days, the astronauts would ready the Lander Module for descent to Mars's surface. Three astronauts would strap into couches in its cramped ascent module capsule and undock from the stores module. At apoapsis (orbit high-point), they would fire the Lander Module's Reaction Control System thrusters to lower its periapsis to 50 kilometers, where Mars atmosphere entry would begin. A bowl-shaped heat shield modeled on the Viking lander aeroshell design would protect the Lander Module during its fiery descent through the thin martian atmosphere.

The Lander Module would slow to Mach 2.5 by the time it fell to an altitude of 10 kilometers, then a 20-meter-diameter ballute ("balloon-parachute") would deploy to slow it to subsonic speed. Five kilometers above Mars, the ballute would separate and a parachute would deploy. At the same time, the Lander Module heat shield would fall away, exposing its four landing engine clusters and three landing legs. A downward-pointing camera would enable the Lander Module pilot to observe the planned landing site for the first time since leaving Mars orbit. The landing engines would ignite 800 meters above Mars; then, moments later, the parachute would separate. The pilot would then guide his craft to a safe landing.

Parkinson's Lander Module design, which resembled conical lander designs put forward beginning in the mid-1960s, included in its lower section a two-by-three-meter crew cabin. Soon after landing, the crew would climb down through a tunnel into the cabin and don Mars surface suits. After depressurizing the crew cabin, they would open a door-like hatch, walk down a short ramp, and put the first human boot prints on another planet.

At the Mars landing site. Image credit: © David A. Hardy/http://www.astroart.org

Parkinson called for a 20-day Mars surface stay, during which the three astronauts would explore using 500 kilograms of science equipment and a 500-kilogram unpressurized electric-powered rover more capable than the Lunar Roving Vehicle used during the Apollo 15, 16, and 17 missions. As they explored, they would collect up to 350 kilograms of Mars rock and dirt samples for return to laboratories on Earth.

The two astronauts on board the docked OAs, meanwhile, would deploy the mission's cargo of automated Mars probes. The 2.5-meter-diameter automated sample-returners would each collect and launch up to a kilogram of rock and soil (ice, in the case of the polar sample-returner) into a 350-kilometer circular Mars orbit.

When the time came to leave Mars's surface, the three astronauts would resume their places in the Lander Module ascent capsule and ignite three engines similar to the Apollo Lunar Module ascent-stage engine. The ascent capsule would blast free of the Lander Module's lower section, leaving behind the crew cabin. During the first-stage burn, four strap-on propellant tanks would feed the three engines. After first-stage shutdown, the tanks and two outer engines would detach; then, after a brief coast, the remaining engine would reignite to place the ascent capsule into a 350-kilometer circular Mars orbit.

As the docked OAs neared apoapsis, one astronaut would board the Lander Assembly OTV/crew cabin and undock from the docking module, then would ignite the OTV's rocket engine to descend to a rendezvous with the Lander Module ascent capsule. The OTV/crew cabin would link up with the ascent capsule, then the surface crew would transfer with their Mars samples.

After the Lander Module ascent capsule was cast off, the OTV/crew cabin would rendezvous with and recover the three orbiting sample-returner sample capsules. The OTV/crew cabin pilot would then fire its engine at periapsis to raise its apoapsis so that it could return to the docked OAs. Parkinson calculated that, even after this series of maneuvers, the OTV/crew cabin would retain enough propellants for two astronauts to carry out a 10-day sortie to Phobos, the  innermost and largest martian moon.

On 25 July 1995, the expedition would depart Mars orbit. Before departure, the astronauts would cast off the OTV/crew cabin and depleted stores module, retract the twin solar arrays, and undock Orbiter 1 from Orbiter 2. Each would then ignite its remaining OTV engine at periapsis to escape Mars orbit and begin a five-month journey to Venus. After OTV shutdown, the crew would redock the two Orbiters and extend the solar arrays. With the stores module gone, the astronauts would rely on supplies packed along the walls of the Spacelab-derived crew modules; these would have served as radiation shielding during the Mars-bound voyage and in Mars orbit.

The Venus detour, Parkinson explained, would accelerate the spacecraft toward Earth. Without the gravity-assist from Venus, the round-trip Mars voyage would need three years; with it, the Mars expedition could be completed in half that time. During the Venus swingby, the crew would deploy the twin Venus probes mounted on Orbiter 1's unpressurized pallet. The probes would be modeled on the Large Probe from the 1978 Pioneer Venus Multiprobe mission.

NASA's first Mars expedition would return to Earth 10 months after departing Mars, on 16 May 1996. The astronauts would again undock the Orbiters and retract the twin solar arrays on the Orbiter 2 docking module. They would ignite the OTV engines for the final time to capture into a 77,687-by-6800-kilometer Earth orbit with a period of 24 hours, then would redock and extend the solar arrays.

A Space Shuttle Orbiter, meanwhile, would transport into low-Earth orbit an OTV/crew cabin, which would climb to a rendezvous with the waiting Mars spacecraft and dock with the docking module. The Mars crew would board with their samples, then the OTV/crew cabin pilot would undock and fire his craft's motor to return to the waiting Shuttle Orbiter. The abandoned docked OAs would remain in Earth orbit as a long-lived monument to the early days of U.S. piloted Solar System exploration. The Shuttle Orbiter would deorbit to deliver the Mars astronauts, physically weakened by 18 months in weightlessness, to a hero's welcome on Earth.

NASA human spaceflight would follow a path very different from any Parkinson and other optimistic early 1980s space planners anticipated, though until early 1986 they could be forgiven for holding onto their dreams. In July 1982, President Ronald Reagan declared the Space Shuttle operational. The first Spacelab flight, STS-9/Spacelab 1 in late 1983, saw an ESA astronaut join American astronauts in Earth orbit for the first time. In his January 1984 State of the Union address, Reagan called for a Space Station and invited European, Canadian, and Japanese participation. The Shuttle-launched station was to be completed by 1994.

Reagan's station was meant to serve as a relatively low-cost laboratory. Such an orbital facility would have no need of the heavy-lift rockets, large in-space stages, and OTVs Parkinson had assumed would become available by 1990. NASA hoped that the lab station might be designed as a foot in the door leading eventually to a more ambitious and costly "shipyard" station, but the January 1986 Challenger accident meant that such schemes came under close scrutiny and were found wanting. At the same time, systems such as the Centaur G-prime stage were judged to be too volatile to carry on board a piloted spacecraft.

The cost of Shuttle operations was also a major factor in the death of optimistic early 1980s space plans. The Nixon Administration had made decisions that ensured low Shuttle development cost and high operations cost. NASA, a part of the Executive Branch, felt obligated despite this to continue to tout Shuttle economy.

The U.S. space agency was, however, cagey about how much it actually spent on Shuttle missions. For a time, a figure of $110 million per flight was used in Shuttle payload cost calculations. Independent cost estimates placed the per-flight cost of the Shuttle as high as $1.5 billion; even assuming that the true cost was "only" $1 billion per flight, the Earth-to-orbit transportation cost of Parkinson's Mars expedition would have reached $9 billion, or about double his highest cost estimate for his entire expedition.

The third, fourth, and fifth images of this post are © David A. Hardy/http://www.astroart.org. Used by kind permission of the artist.

Sources

"Is Nuclear Propulsion Necessary? (or Mars in 1995!)," AIAA-80-1234, R. Parkinson; paper presented at the AIAA/SAE/ASME 16th Joint Propulsion Conference in Hartford, Connecticut, 30 June-2 July 1980.

"Mars in 1995!" R. Parkinson, Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact, June 1981, pp. 38-49.

"A Manned Mars Mission for 1995," R. Parkinson, Journal of the British Interplanetary Society, October 1981, pp. 411-424.

"Mars in 1995!" R. Parkinson, Spaceflight, November 1981, pp. 307-312.

More Information

Evolution vs. Revolution: The 1970s Battle for NASA's Future

Gumdrops on Mars (1966)

Dyna-Soar's Martian Cousin (1960)

Astronaut Sally Ride's Mission to Mars (1987)

Astronaut Dr. Sally Ride on board the Space Shuttle Orbiter Challenger during STS-7 (June 1983), her first flight into space. Image credit: NASA.

Dr. Sally Ride was a member of the 1978 astronaut class, the first selected for Space Shuttle flights. During mission STS-7 (18-24 June 1983), she became the first American woman in space. Ride flew one more Shuttle mission — STS-41G (5-13 October 1984) — and served on the Rogers Commission investigating the 28 January 1986 Shuttle Challenger accident before James Fletcher, in his second stint as NASA Administrator, made her his Special Assistant for Strategic Planning on 18 August 1986.

Fletcher charged Ride with drafting a new blueprint for NASA's future. She had help from a small staff, a 12-member advisory panel led by Apollo 11 astronaut Michael Collins, and a six-member space mission design team at Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC) in Schaumburg, Illinois. The result of her 11-month study was a slim report called Leadership and America's Future in Space.

On 22 July 1987, Ride testified before the U.S. House of Representatives Subcommittee on Space Science and Applications about her report. She told the Subcommittee that the "civilian space program faces a dilemma, aspiring toward the visions of the National Commission on Space, but faced with the realities of the Rogers Commission Report." The National Commission on Space (NCOS), mandated by Congress and launched by President Ronald Reagan on 29 March 1985, had been meant to blueprint NASA's future until about 2005. The NCOS counted among its members such luminaries as Neil Armstrong, Chuck Yeager, Gerard O'Neill, Kathryn Sullivan, physicist Luis Alvarez, planetary scientist Laurel Wilkening, and former U.S. Ambassador to the UN Jeane Kirkpatrick.

Headed by Thomas Paine, NASA Administrator from 1968 to 1970, the NCOS had exceeded its mandate. Its report, titled Pioneering the Space Frontier, was a wide-ranging 50-year master plan for "free societies on new worlds" that would have been dismissed as unrealistic even had it not been unveiled in the chaotic aftermath of Challenger. By some accounts, Paine dominated the NCOS process to such an extent that some of its less patient members — for example, Chuck Yeager — ceased to attend meetings.

The Ride Report. Image credit: NASA.

Ride's study aimed to produce a more realistic blueprint of NASA's future. Whereas the NCOS report urged immediate adoption of its expansive (and expensive) "vision," Ride outlined four much more limited "Leadership Initiatives." They were, she explained, meant to serve "as a basis for discussion." They included a piloted Mars program; "Mission to Planet Earth," which aimed to study Earth from space using satellites; "Mission from Planet Earth" (exploration of the Solar System using robotic spacecraft); and construction and operation of a permanent outpost on the Moon.

Each of Ride's proposals could occur in isolation; none necessarily depended on or followed from the others. By Fletcher's command all would rely to some degree on NASA's planned low-Earth orbit (LEO) Space Station.

SAIC began design of the Ride Report's piloted Mars program in January 1987. The company presented its final report to the Office of Exploration (nicknamed "Code Z" for its NASA Headquarters mail code) in November of that year. James Fletcher created Code Z in June 1987 and placed Ride in charge as his Acting Assistant Administrator for Exploration. By then, Ride had announced that she would leave NASA in August. John Aaron, who replaced her as Code Z chief, made SAIC's report the basis for piloted Mars and Phobos mission "Case Studies" in Fiscal Year 1988.

SAIC employed a split/sprint Mars mission design. The company credited a 1985 joint University of Texas/Texas A & M student design project with originating the split/sprint concept, though similar concepts can be traced back to the 1950s. The split/sprint mission would use a pair of spacecraft: an automated one-way cargo spacecraft "slowboat" launched first followed by a piloted "sprint" spacecraft. Both would burn chemical propellants and aerobraking.

The cargo spacecraft would follow a propellant-saving low-energy path to Mars. It would transport to Mars orbit propellants for the piloted spacecraft's return to Earth. The piloted sprint spacecraft would leave LEO only after the cargo spacecraft had arrived safely in Mars orbit.

So that its six-person crew would be exposed to weightlessness, radiation, and isolation for as short a time as possible, the piloted spacecraft would follow a roughly six-month path to Mars, remain at the planet for only one month, and then return to Earth in about six months. This would yield a piloted Mars mission duration of no more than 14 months.

Shuttle-derived heavy-lift launch vehicle. Image credit: M. Dowman/Eagle Engineering.

In common with most other post-Challenger piloted Mars plans, the SAIC team abandoned the Space Shuttle as its primary means of launching spacecraft components and propellants to LEO. In the Shuttle's place, it proposed a heavy-lift rocket based in part on Shuttle hardware. The new rocket would debut in 1996 with a launch capability of 36 metric tons to LEO, then would evolve by 2002 to carry 91 metric tons to LEO.

Though it featured a piloted mission of short duration — which in most cases would imply large propellant expenditure — the SAIC split/sprint mission design provided substantial propellant savings by refueling the crew spacecraft in Mars orbit. This would in turn slash the number of costly heavy-lift rockets required to launch spacecraft components and propellants to the Space Station for assembly.

Launching a single round-trip combined crew/cargo sprint spacecraft would, SAIC calculated, need 25 heavy-lift rockets, while the two-spacecraft split/sprint design would need only 15. In addition, because the cargo and crew spacecraft would depart Earth more than a year apart, heavy-lift launches could be spread out over a longer period, making launch vehicle, payload, and launch pad preparations less sensitive to delays caused by weather or rocket malfunctions.

By the time the heavy-lifter attained its maximum launch capability in 2002, Phase I of SAIC's three-phase Mars program would be ended and Phase II would just have begun. Phase I, starting in 1992, would comprise a series of robotic precursor missions. Mars Observer, in 1987 already an approved NASA mission, would map Mars from orbit beginning in 1993; then, in 1995, Mars Observer 2 would establish and act as radio relay for a planet-wide network of hard-landed penetrator sensor stations. Orbital mapping and the seismic/meteorological net would help scientists and engineers to select landing sites for automated Mars Sample Return (MSR) and piloted Mars missions.

Mars Rover Sample Return concept. Image credit: NASA.

A pair of MSR spacecraft would depart Earth in 1996 to collect Mars surface samples and return them to high-Earth orbit (HEO) in 1999. A reusable Orbital Maneuvering Vehicle (OMV) based at the LEO Space Station would retrieve the samples from HEO and deliver them for quarantine and initial study to an "isolation half-module" added to the Station in 1998. The samples would enable scientists to identify hazards in Mars surface materials and would aid engineers in the design of spacecraft, rovers, habitats, space suits, and tools.

Phase I would also include biomedical research on board the Space Station, which Ride assumed would reach Permanent Manned Configuration (PMC) in 1994. Almost immediately after it achieved PMC, NASA would add a Life Science Module. A six-person crew would then conduct a Mars mission simulation on board the Station that would last for the planned piloted sprint mission duration of 14 months.

If the astronauts remained healthy after the simulation, which would be conducted in weightlessness, then in 1996 NASA would begin development of a Mars sprint spacecraft lacking any provision for artificial gravity (that is, no part of it would rotate to create acceleration which the crew would feel as gravity). A module for housing Mars spacecraft assembly crews would join the Station in 2002, kicking off Phase II of SAIC's Mars program. The cargo spacecraft for the first split/sprint mission would depart LEO during the favorable 2003 low-energy Earth-Mars transfer opportunity.

If, on the other hand, biomedical researchers determined that the simulation crew had suffered harm from their long stay in weightlessness, then NASA would add a "variable-gravity module" to the Station in 2001. Crews would conduct simulations in the spinning module to determine the minimum level of artificial gravity required to safeguard astronaut health. Development of an artificial-gravity sprint spacecraft would not commence until after the simulations ended in 2004. If the artificial-gravity sprint spacecraft needed as much development time as its no-gravity counterpart, then the first piloted Mars mission might not leave Earth until 2013. SAIC largely ignored this possibility.

SAIC's automated cargo spacecraft (right) in Earth-orbit launch configuration with large Orbital Transfer Vehicle (OTV). The conical vehicle at the center of the cargo spacecraft's dish-shaped aeroshell is the piloted Mars Lander. Spherical tanks around the Mars Lander contain Earth-return propellants for the piloted sprint spacecraft. Image credit: Science Applications International Corporation.

Launching parts and propellants from Earth's surface for the 238.5-metric-ton cargo spacecraft and a single 349.6-metric-ton reusable Orbital Transfer Vehicle (OTV) would require seven heavy-lift rocket launches. The cargo spacecraft would carry at the center of its 28-meter-diameter bowl-shaped Mars Orbit Insertion (MOI) aerobrake heat shield the mission's two-stage, 60-metric-ton Mars Lander.

Spherical tanks surrounding the Lander would hold the 82.5 tons of cryogenic liquid hydrogen/liquid oxygen propellants the piloted sprint spacecraft would need for return to Earth. The cargo spacecraft would also carry 4.2 metric tons of propellants for correcting its course during flight from Earth to Mars and 16.4 metric tons of propellants for circularizing its Mars-centered orbit after it aerobraked in the martian atmosphere. A 9.1-metric-ton refrigeration system would prevent the propellants from boiling and escaping.

On 9 June 2003, the 30.5-meter-long cargo spacecraft/OTV stack would move away from the Space Station using small thrusters. The OTV would then ignite its main engines to push the cargo spacecraft out of LEO. After sending the cargo spacecraft on its way, the OTV would separate, turn end over end, fire its engines to slow itself, aerobrake in Earth's upper atmosphere, fire its engines to circularize its orbit, and return to the Station for refurbishment, refueling, and reuse.

The cargo spacecraft's course would intersect Mars on 29 December 2003. It would aerobrake in the upper atmosphere of Mars to slow itself so that the planet's gravity could capture it into orbit. The cargo spacecraft would rise to its orbital apoapsis (high point), then fire its rocket engines to raise its orbit periapsis (low point) out of the martian atmosphere and circularize its orbit. Flight controllers would then begin careful checkout and monitoring of the cargo spacecraft and its cargo, paying special attention to the propellants the piloted sprint spacecraft would need for return to Earth.

Partial cutaway view of SAIC's piloted sprint Mars spacecraft. A = bowl-shaped Mars Orbit Insertion aerobrake heat shield; B = cylindrical habitat modules (2); C = cylindrical logistics module; D = cylindrical "bridge" tunnel; E = cylindrical tunnel linking docking unit (right), bridge tunnel, and Earth Recovery Vehicle; F = drum-shaped Earth Recovery Vehicle; G = flattened conical aerobrake heat shield; H = engines (2); I = spherical liquid hydrogen tank; J = spherical liquid oxygen tanks (2). Not shown: cylindrical command module, cylindrical airlock module, and one spherical liquid hydrogen tank. Image credit: Science Applications International Corporation/DSFPortree.

SAIC offered a piloted spacecraft design with 4.4-meter-diameter Station-derived pressurized crew modules connected in a "race track" configuration; that is, in a square with each module linked by short tunnels at or near their ends. A pair of 12.2-meter-long habitat modules, each with a mass of 15.5 metric tons, would form two sides of the square; a 12.2-meter-long, 10.8-metric-ton logistics module would form the third side; and an 8.5-metric-ton command module and a 3.2-metric-ton airlock module would together make up the fourth.

A pressurized "bridge" tunnel would cross the inside of the square, linking directly the two habitat modules. Another tunnel would pierce the center of the bridge tunnel vertically. Its forward end would link with the top of the drum-shaped, 11.9-metric-ton Earth Recovery Vehicle (ERV), while its aft end would carry a docking unit. The ERV, situated deep within the spacecraft's structure, would double as the crew's solar flare "storm shelter."

Four spherical tanks holding a total of 91.9 metric tons of cryogenic liquid hydrogen/liquid oxygen propellants and two rocket engines with a combined mass of 4.6 metric tons would be mounted atop the crew modules. The vertical tunnel's docking unit would protrude beyond the sprint spacecraft's twin engine bells.

The ERV/storm shelter would be mounted at the center of a one-metric-ton, 11.4-meter-diameter flattened conical aerobrake heat shield. ERV, ERV aerobrake, crew modules, tunnels, propellant tanks, and engines would nest within a bowl-shaped, 25-meter-diameter, 16.1-metric-ton MOI aerobrake. Except during propulsive maneuvers and aerobraking, four solar arrays capable of generating a total of 35 kilowatts of electricity at the piloted spacecraft's maximum distance from the Sun (that is, in Mars orbit) would extend beyond the edge of the MOI aerobrake. During maneuvers and aerobraking, the arrays would be folded out of harm's way atop the crew modules. Fully assembled and loaded with propellants, the piloted spacecraft's mass would total 193.7 metric tons.

An assembly crew at the Space Station would link a newly assembled small (197.4-metric-ton) OTV to the piloted spacecraft, then would attach the larger OTV used to launch the cargo spacecraft to the new OTV. This would create a 48-meter-long, 738.7-metric-ton Earth-departure stack.

SAIC's piloted sprint spacecraft (right) in Earth-orbit launch configuration with large and small reusable OTVs. Image credit: Science Applications International Corporation.

The stack would move away from the Space Station on 21 November 2004. Shortly thereafter, the first OTV would ignite its engines to start the second OTV and the piloted sprint spacecraft on their way. Its work completed, it would then separate, aerobrake in Earth's atmosphere, and return to the Station for reuse. The second OTV would repeat this performance, then the piloted sprint spacecraft would burn nearly all of its propellants to place itself on course for Mars.

The piloted spacecraft would aerobrake in the martian atmosphere and fire its engines to circularize its orbit on 3 June 2005. Almost immediately after MOI, the crew would rendezvous with the waiting cargo spacecraft. Three astronauts would board the Mars Lander, deorbit, and land at the pre-selected landing site. They would explore the site for between 10 and 20 days.

The other three astronauts, meanwhile, would transfer the Earth-return propellants stored on board the cargo spacecraft to the piloted spacecraft's empty tanks. They would also discard the piloted spacecraft's MOI aerobrake.

SAIC noted that the ideal trajectory for a sprint Mars mission launched as soon as possible after the cargo spacecraft arrived at Mars on 29 December 2003, would have the piloted spacecraft depart Earth on 8 January 2005, reach Mars on 2 August 2005, depart Mars on 1 September 2005, and return to Earth on 8 January 2006. SAIC's Earth-departure date, a little more than a month ahead of the ideal date, would increase piloted mission duration by almost two months (that is, to 14 months).

Launching the piloted sprint spacecraft early would, however, add an abort option to the mission. For example, if the sprint spacecraft were en route to Mars and the cargo spacecraft propellant refrigeration system failed, allowing the sprint spacecraft Earth-return propellants it kept liquid to turn to gas and escape, then the crew could use the propellants they would have used to circularize their orbit around Mars after aerobraking to cause their spacecraft to skim through Mars's uppermost atmosphere on 3 July 2005. This aero-maneuver, if properly executed, would nudge the piloted spacecraft's course enough that it would intersect Earth on 15 January 2006.

SAIC's Mars crew lander would reach Mars orbit 18 months ahead of its three-person crew. It would become the surface crew's base of operations during a Mars surface stay lasting up to 20 days. Image credit: P. Hudson/NASA.

SAIC envisioned that NASA would launch a series of three split/sprint missions by the end of the first decade of the 21st century. While the first crew explored the surface of Mars and worked in orbit to prepare their spacecraft for the trip home, the cargo spacecraft for the second Mars crew would depart LEO boosted by the same large aerobraking OTV the first mission's cargo and piloted spacecraft had used. The second crew would leave Earth orbit in early 2007 and return from Mars in early 2008. The final crew in the series would depart for Mars in early 2009 and return home in early 2010.

After the third Mars expedition, establishment of a Mars base — Phase III of SAIC's program — could begin. The company provided few details of Phase III.

With their surface mission completed, the first Mars explorers would lift off in the Mars Lander ascent stage. SAIC calculated that the ascent stage would make up about half the mass of the Lander. The piloted spacecraft would rendezvous and dock with the ascent stage in Mars orbit to collect the surface crew and their samples of Mars rocks, sand, and dust. On 2 August 2006, shortly after casting off the spent ascent stage, the astronauts would fire the piloted spacecraft's twin engines to begin their five-month return to Earth.

As Earth loomed large ahead of what remained of the sprint spacecraft, the astronauts would enter the ERV capsule with their samples. The ERV, which would resemble the early "hat box" design of NASA's planned Space Station lifeboat, would slide out of a radiation shield housing that would remain behind on the crew spacecraft. The abandoned sprint spacecraft would then fire its engines a final time to miss Earth and enter orbit about the Sun.

SAIC based its ERV configuration on this NASA design for a Space Station lifeboat. Image credit: NASA.

The ERV would aerobrake in Earth's atmosphere, then an automated OMV from the Space Station would retrieve it. After physical examinations and a period of quarantine on board the Station, the first Mars crew would return to Earth on board a Space Shuttle.

SAIC wrote that its piloted split/sprint Mars mission could support international space cooperation. Other countries, both allies and rivals, could contribute money, services such as propellant delivery, crew members, robotic precursor missions, spacecraft components, and even entire spacecraft. For all the countries involved, piloted Mars missions would "provide an effective catalyst for significant advances in automation, robotics, life sciences[,] and space technologies. . .[and], through direct experience, address and answer key questions about long-duration human space flight and the role of human beings in space exploration."

NASA did not much care for the Ride Report; in fact, the agency at first refused to publish it. Ultimately NASA printed about 2000 copies — an unusually small number for such a high-level report. Perhaps this was because Ride acknowledged that NASA could not hope to lead in all areas of space endeavor. In addition, Ride proposed a manned Mars program after the Space Station was built with no intervening manned Moon program, placed robotic programs on a par with their piloted counterparts, and implied that NASA might not need a new piloted space initiative after it finished building the Space Station.

Her matter-of-fact tone seems also to have annoyed some within NASA. Ride was nearing the end of her nine-year NASA career, so felt free to express herself. She was quick to point out when NASA's actions apparently belied its enthusiasm for piloted missions beyond LEO; for example, when she noted the uncomfortable fact that NASA boss Fletcher had committed only 0.03% of the agency's budget to funding the new Office of Exploration. This, Ride noted, gave the appearance that Code Z had been established merely to quell critics who complained that NASA had no long-term goals.

Following her departure from NASA, Ride worked briefly at Stanford University, her alma mater. In 1989, she became a physics professor at the University of California, San Diego. She led space public outreach projects for NASA, co-founded the Sally Ride Science education company in 2001, participated in the Columbia Accident Investigation Board in 2003, and co-authored several science books for children. In early 2011, she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. She died at age 61 on 23 July 2012.

Sources

"Piloted Sprint Missions to Mars," AAS 87-202, J. Niehoff and S. Hoffman, The Case for Mars III: Strategies for Exploration - General Interest and Overview, Carol Stoker, editor, 1989, pp. 309-324; paper presented at the Case for Mars III conference in Boulder, Colorado, 18-22 July 1987.

Leadership and America's Future in Space, Sally K. Ride, NASA, August 1987.

Piloted Sprint Missions to Mars, Report No. SAIC-87/1908, Study No. 1-120-449-M26, Science Applications International Corporation, November 1987.

Humans to Mars: Fifty Years of Mission Planning, 1950-2000, David S. F. Portree, Monographs in Aerospace History #21, NASA SP-2001-4521, NASA History Division, February 2001.

More Information

The Collins Task Force Says Aim for Mars (1987)

McDonnell Douglas Phase B Space Station (1970)

Think Big: A 1970 Flight Schedule for NASA's 1969 Integrated Program Plan

Gumdrops on Mars (1966)

The Collins Task Force Says Aim for Mars (1987)

The Apollo 11 crew of Neil Armstrong (left), Michael Collins, and Edwin Aldrin. Image credit: NASA.

The January 1986 Challenger Space Shuttle accident laid bare many shortcomings of the U.S. space program. NASA, which only 14 years before had soared to the Moon, had suffered chronic underfunding since the truncated Administration of President Richard Nixon (1969-1974). At the same time, expectations for the Shuttle grew, until, in January 1984, President Ronald Reagan called upon NASA to use its Shuttle fleet to build an Earth-orbiting Space Station within a decade.

NASA had eagerly encouraged such expectations. The Shuttle, it promised, would fly cheaply and often, permitting it to replace all U.S. expendable rockets and fly commercial payloads for domestic and foreign customers. It would fly so inexpensively that Shuttle astronauts would economically service Earth-orbiting satellites. The Shuttle would reliably launch all U.S. robotic planetary missions, saving so much money that a new era of planetary exploration could begin. By conducting secret military missions — many launched from California into near-polar orbits — it would help to ensure U.S. national security. It would be safe enough that it would carry non-astronaut passengers — researchers, teachers, journalists, and others — and its crews would fly without pressure suits.

The Space Shuttle would also open the door to new space programs. The Space Station, NASA declared, was "the next logical step" after the Shuttle. That implied other, unspecified steps after the Space Station, in the 1990s and beyond.

Even before the Challenger accident called many of NASA's promises into question, Reagan had come under pressure to give the space agency a long-term goal that would provide a clear rationale and context for the Shuttle and Station programs. In late 1984, in fact, Congress mandated that the White House appoint an independent commission to study NASA's long-term options and offer recommendations for its future direction.

The Space Shuttle was developed in a dangerously constrained funding environment. Despite this, NASA sought to promote a bold vision of a Shuttle-launched future. Image credit: NASA.

The National Commission on Space (NCOS) began its planned year-long study on 29 March 1985. Reagan tapped Apollo-era NASA Administrator Thomas Paine to head up the Commission. Among its commissioners were such aviation and spaceflight luminaries as first moonwalker Neil Armstrong, Chuck Yeager, the first person to fly faster than sound, and Kathryn Sullivan, the first U.S. woman to walk in space.

The NCOS report, titled Pioneering the Space Frontier, reached the news media in March 1986. Paine formally presented it to the White House and Congress on 22 July 1986. It called for a 50-year program that included fully reusable shuttles, heavy-lift rockets, an Earth-orbiting spaceport, a variable-gravity space station for biomedical research, lunar oxygen mines, cycling Mars liners, an outpost on inner martian moon Phobos, and a science base on Mars. It touched on topics as wide-ranging as self-replicating space factories, submersibles for the hypothetical world-ocean of Uranus, and U.S. involvement in the International Space Year of 1992.

Set against the backdrop of the Challenger accident and NASA's revealed weaknesses, the NCOS program appeared at best grandiose. The Reagan Administration quietly shelved the NCOS report.

Concern over NASA's long-term direction had, however, not abated. If anything, it had increased, in part because the Soviet Union had launched its long-awaited Mir core space station (20 February 1986). Many feared that the U.S. civilian space agency had lost not only its sense of direction, but also its place as the world leader in spaceflight.

On 18 August 1986, less than a month after the NCOS report reached Congress and the White House, NASA Administrator James Fletcher appointed Sally Ride, the first U.S. woman in space, as his Special Assistant for Strategic Planning. He charged her with preparing a new blueprint for NASA's future — one more focused and readily achievable than the NCOS blueprint — that would emphasize specific ways that NASA could demonstrate U.S. leadership in space.

Robotic Mars missions would have played significant roles in both the Collins Task Force piloted Mars program and Sally Ride's robotic Solar System exploration "leadership initiative." Image credit: NASA.

While drafting her report, Ride received input in the form of a three-and-a-half-page paper from the NASA Space Goals Task Force, a 12-member group appointed by NASA Advisory Council chairman Daniel Fink and chaired by Apollo 11 Command Module Pilot Michael Collins. The Council gave the Collins Task Force final report its blessing during its 3-4 March 1987 meeting, and Fink submitted the report to Fletcher to pass on to Ride on 16 March.

The Space Goals Task Force declared that a "bold goal, clearly stated" would help the space agency to "focus and clarify" its long-term objectives. Mars, the Task Force report continued, stood out as "the one entity most likely to capture widespread enthusiasm and support, while pulling considerable scientific and technical capability in its wake." It called for a public declaration that astronauts "exploring and prospecting on Mars" would henceforth become NASA's "primary goal."

The Task Force then outlined "preliminary steps" that the U.S. would need to take before Americans could take steps on Mars. First, the Space Shuttle would need to resume operations and new expendable rockets would need to be developed to supplement it. This would help to ensure uninterrupted U.S. space access. Funding for space technology research would need to be increased to reverse the "serious erosion of our technology base" that began during the Nixon Administration. In addition, an "aggressive" program of robotic Mars missions would be required.

NASA would also need to complete the Space Station as soon as possible so that it could serve as a test-bed for the development of Mars Program technologies and a laboratory for studying long-duration spaceflight effects on human physiology. "The Space Station is an element of human expansion [into space] in its own right," the Task Force declared, "but it is far more important because of its essential role in building the capability to conduct programs that achieve and demonstrate [space] leadership."

One of many piloted Mars lander designs proposed in the mid-to-late 1980s — the "molly bolt" configuration. Image credit: Eagle Engineering/NASA.

When Americans set foot on Mars, the Task Force continued, it should be as part of a "peaceful enterprise done in the name of all humankind." It asserted, in fact, that American Mars explorers should, "[u]nder appropriate conditions," be accompanied by astronauts of other "qualified nations," including the Soviet Union.

The Task Force called for "a realistic schedule" for its Mars Program that would ensure "stable planning and execution of a studied, orderly, progressive series of events." As part of the effort to develop a schedule, NASA, the President, and the Congress would need to decide "whether the Moon should be used as stepping stone to Mars, or should be bypassed."

It concluded by considering commercial opportunities that the Mars Program might create. NASA would "pull" commercial space ventures into existence through its revitalized research programs, the Collins Task Group report argued, adding that the "history of this Nation is replete with examples of successful commercial activity stimulated by the technologies resulting from the exploration of new frontiers." "The technical challenges associated with a program of human exploration of Mars are of such a magnitude," it continued, that they would "certainly provide many direct and indirect stimuli to American industry."

The Space Goals Task Force report influenced Sally Ride's August 1987 report Leadership and America's Future in Space, though she gave equal emphasis to four leadership initiatives (Earth studies, robotic Solar System exploration, an outpost on the Moon, and humans to Mars). She believed that the U.S. could not demonstrate space leadership in all areas of spaceflight endeavor, so should choose one or two and excel in them. She also believed that NASA should return astronauts to the Moon before accepting the greater challenge of astronauts on Mars.

Collins, probably the most articulate of the astronaut writers, subsequently sought to build support for the Mars-centered Space Goals Task Force program. In a prominent article in the November 1988 issue of the widely circulated National Geographic magazine and in his 1990 book Mission to Mars, he called upon NASA to bypass the Moon and launch humans to Mars as early as 2004.

Sources

Letter with enclosure, Daniel J. Fink to James C. Fletcher, "NASA Space Goals Task Force Final Report," 16 March 1987.

"Mission to Mars," Michael Collins, National Geographic, Volume 174, November 1988, pp. 732-764.

Mission to Mars: An Astronaut's Vision of Our Future in Space, Michael Collins, Grove Press, 1990.

Humans to Mars: Fifty Years of Mission Planning, 1950-2000, David S. F. Portree, Monographs in Aerospace History #21, NASA SP-2001-4521, February 2001, pp. 68-69.

More Information

Sally Ride's Mission to Mars (1987)

Evolution vs. Revolution: The 1970s Battle for NASA's Future

What Shuttle Should Have Been: NASA's October 1977 Space Shuttle Flight Manifest

Where to Launch and Land the Space Shuttle? (1971-1972)

To Mars by Way of Eros (1966)

True-color image of Eros, the second-largest Near-Earth Asteroid, from the NEAR Shoemaker spacecraft. Image credit: NASA.

German astronomer Gustav Witt discovered the asteroid Eros on 13 August 1898. Eros was both the first asteroid found to orbit entirely outside of the Main Belt of asteroids between Mars and Jupiter and the first known planet-crosser; it crosses the orbit of Mars. Eros orbits the Sun in a little more than 643 days. Eros and Earth pass nearest each other — at a distance of about 14 million miles — every 81 years.

In March 1966, Eugene Smith, an engineer with Northrop Space Laboratories in Hawthorne, California, described a piloted Eros flyby mission. The mission would, he explained, help to prepare NASA for piloted missions to Mars. He wrote that "the value of the Eros mission to subsequent manned planetary flights having a higher level of difficulty and complexity is of no small consequence."

Eros exploration might also help scientists to understand Main Belt asteroids and small planetary moons (for example, the martian satellites Deimos and Phobos). Smith noted that Eros — which he described as "brick-shaped" — would pass within 14 million miles of Earth on 23 January 1975, its closest approach of the 20th century.

This proposal might seem prescient to readers familiar with current NASA Mars plans, which include a peculiar scheme to capture a boulder from the surface of a Near-Earth Asteroid using a robotic spacecraft and then send a crew to rendezvous with it in lunar orbit. The astronauts would perform spacewalks to sample the boulder. The mission, it is argued, would test a variety of technologies with potential piloted Mars mission and asteroid deflection applications.

Smith's mission was, however, part of a distinctly different piloted Mars program evolutionary strategy. At the time Smith presented his paper, NASA and its contractors devoted considerable effort to studies of piloted free-return Mars/Venus flyby missions based on Apollo technology. The first of these was expected to depart Earth for Mars in late 1975. Among other expected benefits, a piloted Mars flyby would provide interplanetary flight experience ahead of 1980s piloted Mars landings.

The Northrop engineer expected that a Mars flyby spacecraft would likely be so heavy that placing all of its components and propellants into space would need either a Saturn V rocket with a nuclear-thermal upper stage or multiple all-chemical Saturn V launches followed by assembly through multiple dockings in Earth orbit. He called instead for a 1975 piloted Eros flyby that would provide experience applicable to Mars landings, yet could depart Earth on a single uprated Saturn V rocket.

The 527-day Eros flyby mission would begin with launch from Cape Canaveral on 3 May 1974, at the opening of a 30-day launch window. The Eros Saturn V and its payload, the Eros Flyby Spacecraft Vehicle (EFSV), would stand 21 feet taller than the 363-foot-tall Apollo Saturn V.

Apollo (left) and Eros spacecraft configurations compared. With one exception (D is the Eros Mission Module while d is the Spacecraft Launch Adapter housing the Apollo Lunar Module), the lower-case and upper-case letters identify equivalent systems. a/A = Launch Escape System; b/B = Command Module; c/C = Service Module; e/E = Saturn V rocket Instrument Unit; f/F  = Saturn V S-IVB third stage; g/G = J-2 rocket motor. The Apollo configuration would measure 143 feet long; its Eros counterpart, 164 feet. Image credit: David S. F. Portree/Northrop Space Laboratories.

Eros Command Module/Eros Service Module. Image credit: Northrop Space Laboratories.

Smith's EFSV would comprise the conical Eros Command Module (ECM), outwardly a twin of the Apollo Command Module, but bearing a six-man crew; the Eros Service Module (ESM), a 21.5-foot-diameter, 34.3-foot-long substitute for the 12.8-foot-diameter, 25.7-foot-long Apollo Service Module; and the cylindrical, 21.5-foot-diameter, 30-foot-long Eros Mission Module (EMM). An S-IVB stage and Instrument Unit — respectively the third stage and the "electronic brain" of the Saturn V rocket — would inject the EFSV into 100-nautical-mile (n-mi) Earth orbit. Mass injected into orbit including the S-IVB and IU would total about 165 tons.

When Smith presented his paper, the Apollo Saturn V was still more than a year away from its maiden flight. NASA expected that it would be able to launch about 130 tons into 100-n-mi Earth orbit.

Smith suggested that NASA boost Saturn V capacity to 165 tons by uprating the five J-2 engines in its S-II second stage. Alternately, the rocket's S-IC first stage might be fitted with twin 260-inch-diameter solid-propellant strap-on rocket motors, increasing its capacity to a whopping 215 tons. The latter alternative, Smith wrote, would provide ample margin for EFSV weight growth during development. It would, of course, also constitute a more radical (and thus more costly) change in the basic Saturn V design than would S-II engine uprating.

During Apollo Moon missions, an S-IVB would ignite following S-II stage separation and burn for 2.5 minutes to place itself, the IU, a shroud housing the Apollo Lunar Module (LM), and the Apollo Command and Service Module (CSM) into 115-n-mi parking orbit about the Earth. About two hours and 44 minutes after launch, the S-IVB would ignite a second time and burn for six minutes to put the CSM and LM on course for the Moon. The stage and the IU would then separate.

When used as part of Smith's EFSV, the S-IVB would carry out its first burn much as in the Apollo Moon missions, but its second burn would be different. Upon arrival in parking orbit, the crew in the ECM would check out the EFSV's systems. Assuming that all appeared normal, they would then ignite the S-IVB engine at perigee (the low point in its Earth-centered orbit) to raise the ESFV's apogee (the high point in its Earth-centered orbit) and gain over 90% of the velocity needed to depart Earth orbit for Eros. At S-IVB burnout they would still orbit Earth, but in an elliptical "Intermediate Departure Orbit" with an orbital period of two days.

Eros flyby mission plan. Please click on image to enlarge. Image credit: Northrop Space Laboratories.

The astronauts would next separate the ECM/ESM from the EMM/spent S-IVB and turn it end for end so that it could link its nose-mounted probe docking unit with a drogue unit at the bottom of a conical recess in the top of the EMM. After casting off the spent S-IVB stage, the crew would transfer to the EMM, their main living and working space during the Eros flyby mission.

There they would deploy the EMM's eight solar panels, a steerable "sensor turret," a large dish antenna, and a "support structure" which, along with the conical recess in the top of the EMM, would shield the ECM from harsh sunlight and micrometeoroids. The disk-shaped solar panels would ride to Earth orbit folded and stacked under the aft end of the EMM. After linking the EMM and ECM/ESM electrical and control systems, they would check out all EFSV systems a second time.

The ESM would include two RL-10A-3 main engines that would burn high-performance cryogenic liquid hydrogen/liquid oxygen propellants. Smith calculated that the ESM would need only one engine to perform most Eros flyby mission maneuvers, but he included separate twin engines in his design for redundancy.

If the EFSV failed its second checkout, the astronauts could abort their mission by separating from the EMM in the ECM/ESM, pointing the ESM engines forward, and firing them at next perigee on 5 May 1974 to reduce speed. They would then separate from the ESM in the ECM and reenter Earth's atmosphere. If EFSV systems continued to function normally, however, the astronauts would fire the ESM engines at perigee to add enough velocity to place their spacecraft on course for Eros.

Eros Flyby Spacecraft Vehicle configured for Earth-orbit departure and interplanetary flight. A = twin RL-10A-3 engines; B = Eros Service Module; C = Eros Command Module; D = Eros Mission Module; E = high-gain antenna; F = sensor turret; G = four-panel solar array. The spacecraft would orbit the Sun with its twin solar arrays pointed Sunward and its high-gain antenna pointed toward Earth. Image credit: David S. F. Portree/Northrop Space Laboratories.

The EMM would contain near its center a spherical pressurized habitat module similar to the one in NASA Marshall Space Flight Center's February 1965 Mars/Venus piloted flyby study (see "More Information" below). In the event of a solar flare, the crew would retreat to a "storm cellar" with hatches at both ends. The forward hatch would lead to the ECM and the aft hatch to the habitat sphere.

A centrifuge would divide the sphere into forward (crew quarters) and aft ("mission task area") halves. Smith hoped that periodic "centrifugation" in the small centrifuge would be sufficient to maintain crew health during the 17.5-month Eros voyage, since spinning the entire EFSV to create acceleration which the crew would feel as gravity would create engineering challenges — for example, designing solar arrays that would track on the Sun as the spacecraft rotated. Smith wrote that meeting these challenges would increase the EFSV's mass so that it no longer could depart Earth on a single uprated Saturn V.

A hatch in the aft end of the habitat sphere would lead to a pressurized equipment room, which would in turn lead to a round "probe hatch" in the aft end of the EFSV. The probe hatch would open into space.

The solar arrays and aft end of the EFSV would point toward toward the Sun during most of the mission. This would place the ECM/ESM in shadow, which, along with heavy insulation, would prevent the cryogenic propellants in the ESM from boiling away during the long voyage.

On 18 January 1975, the astronauts would begin tracking Eros using radar, a reflecting telescope with a 30-inch primary mirror, and other instruments mounted in the sensor turret. On 23 January 1975, they would adjust their course using the ESM engines to ensure an Eros close-approach distance of about 50 miles and would begin gathering Eros science data.

About eight hours before closest approach, the astronauts would "catapult" a 200-pound automated probe out of the probe hatch toward the asteroid. The probe would function much as the Block III Ranger lunar probes had been meant to do; that is, it would image Eros until it smashed into its surface and was destroyed, yielding detailed close-up images in its final seconds. The EMM's dish antenna would relay to Earth data from the probe's TV camera and other instruments.

Closest approach to Eros would occur about 14 million miles from Earth on 28 January, just five days after the Earth-Eros close approach. Close proximity would permit a higher rate of data transmission from the EFSV to Earth during the flyby than would otherwise be possible.

The piloted Eros flyby spacecraft would spend about 90 seconds within 200 miles of the asteroid's sunlit side and about 30 seconds within 100 miles. On 30 January 1975, the crew would end Eros tracking and fire the ESM engines to correct course deviations imparted by the 23 January maneuver, the automated probe launch, and the weak tug of the asteroid's gravity.

The astronauts would load the ECM with scientific data — mainly film — and check out its systems beginning on 10 October 1975. On 12 October, they would abandon the EMM and use the ESM engines to place the ECM on course for Earth atmosphere reentry. They would then jettison the ESM, reenter the atmosphere at about 40,000 feet per second — about 3500 feet per second faster than Apollo lunar-return speed — and descend to a landing on parachutes.

Image credit: NASA.

Congress killed NASA's plans for piloted Mars and Venus flyby missions in August 1967, in the aftermath of the January 1967 Apollo 1 fire. Smith's piloted Eros flyby proposal received little attention. The only U.S. piloted mission of 1975 was the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, which saw the final Apollo CSM dock with the Soviet Soyuz 19 spacecraft in low-Earth orbit.

When NASA at last explored a near-Earth asteroid, it explored Eros. The $112-million Near-Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) robotic mission — the first mission in NASA's low-cost Discovery Program — left Earth on 17 February 1996, 22 years after the planned launch date of Smith's piloted Eros flyby.

On 20 December 1998, NEAR failed to enter Eros orbit because its computer aborted a crucial engine burn. Three days later, after some quick reprogramming, NEAR flew past the 22-mile-long, 13-mile-wide asteroid at a distance of 2375 miles. It returned 222 images. They revealed that Eros is shaped like a ballet slipper or, as some would have it, a banana.

On 14 February 2000, after another revolution around the Sun, NEAR at last orbited its target. NASA renamed the spacecraft NEAR Shoemaker in March 2000 to commemorate renowned planetary geologist and asteroid and comet discoverer Eugene Shoemaker, who had died in a car crash in Western Australia in July 1997 while looking for ancient asteroid impact craters. During the year that followed, the spacecraft radioed to Earth more than 160,000 close-up images of Eros. New images revealed many odd smooth "ponds" made of dust.

Though designed as an orbiter, NEAR Shoemaker succeeded in landing on Eros on 12 February 2001. It may have landed in a dust pond, cushioning its impact. It returned gamma-ray spectrometer data from the asteroid's surface until 28 February 2001.

Eros flew past Earth at a distance of 16.6 million miles on 31 January 2012, its closest approach since 1975. The asteroid will pass slightly closer to Earth than it did in 1975 on 24 January 2056.

Sources

"A Manned Flyby Mission to Eros," Eugene A. Smith, Proceedings of the Third Space Congress, "The Challenge of Space,” pp. 137-155; paper presented at the Third Space Congress in Cocoa Beach, Florida, 7-10 March 1966.

The Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous Mission: A Guide to the Mission, the Spacecraft, and the People, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, December 1999.

NASA Press Release 01-29, "Asteroid Mission Not Yet 'NEAR' An End," D. Savage, NASA Headquarters, 14 February 2001.

"NEAR Shoemaker Weekly Report," Michelle Stevens (for Debra Fletcher), 2 March 2001.

More Information

After EMPIRE: Using Apollo Technology to Explore Mars and Venus (1965)

Missions to Comet d'Arrest & Asteroid Eros in the 1970s (1966)

Earth-Approaching Asteroids as Targets for Exploration (1978)