Page 5 - The Appollo Story

The Apollo story t--------------

The Apollo Goal
The Apollo requirement was to take off from a point on the surface of the Earth that was travelling 1,000
mph (1 ,609 km/h) as the Earth rotated, to go into orbit at 18,000 mph (28,968 km/h) to speed up at the
proper time to 25,000 mph (40,233 km/h) to travel to a body in space 240,000 miles (386,242 km) distant
which was itself travelling 2,000 mph (3,218 km/h) relative to the Earth, to go into orbit around the body,
and to drop a specialised landing vehicle to its surface. Three men were to make observations and measure-
ments, collect specimens, leave instruments that would send back data on what was found, and then repeat
much of the outward-bound process to get back home. One such expedition would not do the job so NASA
had to develop a reliable system capable of doing this time after time.

ROBERT DOUGLAS
W 1106 HARKER AVE
00DBUR~ N.J.oso96

A project Apollo cover dated 26 July 1971. USS Salinan added support operations for NASA, serving as
the launch site sea salvage vessel for the Apollo 8 mission. As such, she stood by for recovery purposes
should the mission be ab01ied within a few minutes after launch. She performed the same service for
Apollo 10, and in July 1969 stood by for the historic launch of Apollo 11 - the first successful lunar land-
ing. On 26 July 1971, USS Salinan served NASA once more for the launch of Apollo 15, for which she
also recorded sonic boom data for analysis by NASA personnel.