Alan Shepard - Moon Shot: The Inside Story of Americas Apollo Moon Landings

Alan Shepard AND Deke Slayton

WITH Jay Barbree

INTRODUCTION BY Neil Armstrong

Moon Shot is for the quintessential space journalist Howard Benedict, the senior aerospace writer for the Associated Press and a perennial winner of spaceflights top awards.

Howard employed his magnificent talents to herd the facts and details for the original Moon Shot. He was simply the best and we miss him.

Houston, Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed.

MORE THAN A BILLION PEOPLE heard this terse message from the surface of the Moon on July 20, 1969. It was a singular moment for humankind, and the world was united in awe at the enormity of the accomplishment. Nowhere was the jubilation greater than in Mission Control near Houston where Alan Shepard and Deke Slayton watched history unfold and led the cheering as it did. Both were members of the Mercury Seven, Americas elite original astronauts. Shepard was the first American in space, and the astronaut who took the longest walk on the moon. Slayton would fly on the last Apollo missionthe historic first rendezvous with the Russians in earth orbit.

They were at the very heart of Americas effort to reach the moon, and no one else was more qualified to write this fascinating and thrilling account of victories won and defeats endured by a small, but remarkable, group of astronauts. Here are the successes: the first space flights, the first spacewalk, the first rendezvous and docking in space, and the first moon landing. Here, too, are the failures: the masterful saving of an out-of-control Gemini 8, the Apollo 1 launch pad fire that resulted in the deaths of three astronauts, the split-second decision to land Apollo 11 on the moon despite overloaded computers and low fuel, and the Herculean failure is no option effort to save the crippled Apollo 13.

Moon Shot reflects the risks and accomplishments of those who traveled faster and farther than any before or since. As the captain said, fasten your seat belt. Were going to the moon, the damnedest trip youll ever make.

Neil Armstrongs Moon

LUNA INCOGNITA. THE UNKNOWN MOON. A silent sentinel. For all of mans history it had hung overhead, remote, unreachable, unknowable.

Marching across the heavens each day and circling our earth monthly, the moon has fascinated scientists and inspired poets. Its changing shape provides a perpetual clock-calendar in the sky, a marker for planting, for holidays, for religious celebrations. So near and yet so far, men and moon intertwining for millennia, but never touching.

In the twentieth century, two distinctly different technologies emerged: the digital computer and the liquid-fueled rocket. Two great world powers, ideological adversaries, each recognized that the rocket, which could operate in a vacuum, and the computer, which could enable precision navigation, might break the barrier to space travel.

Both the Soviet Union and the United States believed that technological leadership was the key to demonstrating ideological superiority. Each invested enormous resources in evermore spectacular space achievements. Each would enjoy memorable successes. Each would suffer tragic failures. It was a competition unmatched outside the state of war. Finally, and unpredictably, the competitors would join in a cooperative effort that would contribute to the demise of the Cold War that enveloped them.

The moons isolation of nearly five billion years would soon end. Early in the space age, man-made probes flew near the moon. Others soon crashed into the lunar surface. Robot craft landed and transmitted pictures and scientific measurements back to earth laboratories. The stage was set for a visit by man.

The Soviets established an impressive number of firsts: first to place a satellite in orbit, first to send a probe to the moon, first to place a human in space, first to orbit two manned craft simultaneously, first to have a human exit his craft in space. But it would be the Americans who would accomplish the seemingly impossible, sending men to the moon and returning them safely to earth.

History will remember the twentieth century for two technological developments: atomic energy and space flight. One threatened the extinction of society, one offered a survival possibility. If Earth were ever threatened by man-made or natural catastrophe, space flight could, just possibly, provide protection or escape.

Alan Shepard and Deke Slayton knew the practical aspects and the visceral feelings of flight. Both were experienced airplane test pilots. Test pilots have the responsibility for finding errors in airplane design. The may discover them during flight, but they would much prefer to identify the problems before going aloft. As two of the seven initial American astronauts, this search for perfection served them well.

Deke and Alan were at the heart of the manned space program. Deke was responsible for the selection of flight crews and their preparedness to fly in space. He took an intense interest in the well being of his flock, protecting, supporting, and encouraging them. They were test pilots, and he understood them. He was a superb boss.

Alan, as chief of the Astronaut Office, was responsible for day-to-day operations. Astronauts were needed for spacecraft tests, for design reviews, for newspaper interviews. With equanimity, he distributed these seemingly limitless tasks to a very limited number of his boys. He was an impenetrable barrier to inappropriate or untimely requests. He was the man in the middle and handled it well.

Moon Shot is their story. Much more than the story of their flights in space, it details their central role in the most exciting adventure in history. Jay Barbree, one of the worlds most experienced space journalists, reported the triumphs and the tragedies from the dawn of the space age. He is exceptionally well qualified to recall and record the remarkable events and emotions of the time.

Luna is once again isolated. Four decades have passed without footfalls on its dusty surface. No wheeled Rovers patrol the lunar highlands. Silent ramparts guard vast territories never yet visited by man. Unseen vistas await the return of explorers from Earth.

And they will return.

Neil Armstrong

2011

DURING THE FIVE DECADES FOLLOWING Alan Shepards first launch in 1961, NASAs enormous accomplishments were respected and admired the world over. Those responsible for the agencys successes followed a simple axiom: Good is the enemy of great. Yet they were now watching NASA leaders aim for good enough and settle for misions on the cheap. On this particular night many of the old guard had gathered to witness the countdown for the final night launch of a space shuttle. Among the gathering was a man known to few in todays NASA. Only veterans recognized him as a member of the astronauts original trio of commandthe space flyer that had replaced Alan Shepard in the astronauts front office, had taken the helm when Shepard left to fly Apollo 14 to the moons third landing. This day he still served at a meaningful post in NASA as the Chairman of the International Space Station Advisory Task Force.

He had not always been at a desk. Thomas P. Stafford had sat atop four rockets: Gemini 6, the first ever rendezvous of two manned spacecraft; Gemini 9, with Astronaut Gene Cernan; and Apollo 10, again with Cernan, a full dress rehearsal of the historic Apollo 11 mission. It was Tom Staffords fourth and final spaceflight that would arguably be the planets most important. He commanded the historic Apollo-Soyuz flight with Deke Slayton and Vance Brand. More than 80,000 nuclear warheads were pointed by and at the Soviet Union and America when Apollo and Soyuz launched. The rendezvous, docking, and handshake in space were credited with arresting the Cold War.