Skylab program, the suspension of HEAO, and the cutback in communications activities. In fiscal year 1974, our civil service team will support the remaining Skylab launches and prepare for the ASTP mission. Significant effort will also be applied to the Shuttle development activities which will begin to accelerate. My next subject is construction of facilities. I would like to emphasize that in the Shuttle facilities area, for which we are requesting $67.2 million, we are making maximum utilization of the great capability we had built for Apollo. Of the nine projects requested in fiscal year 1974, eight projects provide for only modifications and adaptation of existing capability to support Shuttle. By the way, the basic cost of the facilities we are modifying, was about $300 million. An example of modifying Apollo facilities for the Shuttle is the use of the S-IC test stand at the Mississippi Test Facility for Orbiter propulsion testing. The only new construction project requested this year is to provide for the Orbiter landing facilities at KSC. For institutional facilities, we are asking for one project only, at a cost of slightly over one million dollars ($1.08 million). The purpose of this funding is to modify the electric power system at the Slidell Computer Complex. The modified system will supplement the commercial power supply which experienced frequent interruptions in the past. This facility, incidentally, has broadened its support role to include Government agencies other than NASA, such as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the U.S. Geological Survey, the Maritime Commission, and the U.S. Forestry Service. Let me summarize the Manned Space Flight schedule activity. As I indicated earlier, Skylab operations will begin in May of this year. In July 1975, we will launch the ASTP mission. The Shuttle horizontal test flights will start in 1977, leading to the first manned orbital flight in December 1978. Operational missions will begin a year later and the European Spacelab will start flying. Our future planning includes the Tug in the same timeframe. The year 1974 is going to be a year of significant accomplishment and real challenge in space as well as here on Earth. We are entering many new and challenging management and technological areas, all with the promise of tremendous payoff. We are moving rapidly towards exciting and challenging space flights, with opportunities to reduce dramatically the cost of space operations, while opening up whole new opportunities in space. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, this concludes my summary of the Manned Space Flight program for 1974. APOLL DESC TO LI DETAILED STATEMENT FOR THE RECORD BY DALE D. MYERS, ASSOCIATE ADMINISTRATOR FOR MANNED SPACE FLIGHT NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION Apollo INTRODUCTION The achievements of the Apollo program stand as a monument to this generation. In the last decade, man has extended his domain from the seas, the surface, and the atmosphere of this planet Earth into space; first with suborbital flight, and then, in the "One Giant Leap for Mankind” by the Apollo 11 crew, (figure 62) he reached across thousands of kilometers of space to land and walk on the dusty ancient surface of another planetary body, the Moon. History may well call this the greatest adventure and achievement of man in the 20th century. Aeons have been required for terrestrial life to evolve the capability of one species to make the jump to another body of the solar system. To deny that man will not eventually consolidate this hard-won foot-hold would require a very shortsighted view of the nature of man. Nine teams of astronauts have now made the epic journey and 12 Americans have walked the lunar surface. They have returned some 387 kg (851 lbs.) of lunar rocks and soil for analysis in Earth-based laboratories, and have established scientific stations on the Moon that are continuing to transmit scientific and engineering data back to Earth. One of the first scientific instruments placed on the Moon by the Apollo 11 astronauts, the laser retroreflector (figure 63) will provide scientific information that over the next decade will be very important. Two other retroreflectors have been strategically-placed on the Moon rugged and dependable than the other ALSEP's, and so it too should continue to provide useful lunar scientific and engineering data for several years to come. The Apollo program has increased our knowledge of the Moon beyond expectation, it has provided new knowledge and techniques for study of both the Earth and Sun, it has led to a wealth of new technology, and has given mankind a new frontier and the beginning of the technology necessary to exploit it. With the conclusion of the Apollo program, not only do we know much more about the Moon, enabling us to formulate much more sophisticated questions about it, but equally important, we know more about the Earth and the solar system as well. The Moon is a scientific treasury-house of knowledge to and in understanding the origin and evolution of the terrestrial planets and the material they are made of. The Apollo program is important not only for the information that it has given us about our physical surroundings, but perhaps its greatest long-term effect will be due to the information that it has given us about ourselves. It has proved that we can dedicate our resources to the achievement of a large-scale demanding technological goal without the stimulus of war. Although we have now completed the initial flight phases of lunar exploration, study of the Moon will remain a dynamic and viable enterprise due to the wealth of data that will now be studied as the concluding capstone to our past efforts. Apollo Program The fifth and sixth manned lunar landings were accomplished in April and December, 1972. Apollo 16 and 17 are the final Apollo lunar missions. Science investigations using data already obtained as well as data that will be received from experiments deployed on the lunar surface are to continue over the next several years (figure 66). The fifth Apollo manned lunar mission was launched on April 16, 1972, carrying the crew, John W. Young, commander; Thomas K. Mattingly II, command module pilot; and Charles M. Duke, Jr., lunar module pilot (figure 67) (see p. 356). The landing in the Descartes area (figure 68) (see p. 356) was 230 meters northwest of the planned target point. |