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CSM-107, more popularly known as Columbia, with LTA-8 lunar module in background.Lee Hutchinson
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Columbia in repose.Lee Hutchinson
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Another look at Columbia. Visible at bottom-left is the "steam duct," where vapor from the capsule's cooling evaporator was allowed to escape into space. Other openings include the roll motors for the CM's RCS (oval openings), the urine and waste water dump valves (below the oval RCS openings), and, below the hatch, the CM RCS pitch motors.Lee Hutchinson
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From the side, Columbia's yaw thrusters are visible at bottom.
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Detail on Columbia's lower and upper ablative heat shields. The heat shield is made out of a material called AVCOAT, which is a phenolic resin fixed in a fiberglass honeycomb. The small, white, irregular marks indicate areas where assembly technicians had to drill out and re-apply the coating due to subsurface bubbles.
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Detail on Columbia's wide-field Scanning Telescope (left) and sextant (right), which were used for, among other things, aligning the spacecraft's inertial guidance platform with the stars at various points throughout the mission.Lee Hutchinson
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Detail on the utility connection between Columbia and her service module.Lee Hutchinson
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Columbia's hatch, displayed separately. In spite of the mechanism's apparent complexity, it enabled crews to open the hatch in an emergency in only a few seconds, thanks to a gas-assist system.
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Trying to push some light into Columbia's dark interior with a speedlight. Center console's controls are somewhat visible.Lee Hutchinson
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Detail on LTA-8. Though it now hangs from Space Center Houston's ceiling, LTA-8 was the first flight-rated production lunar module and used extensively for environmental testing on the ground. It was never flown.Lee Hutchinson
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One of the propellent injector plates from Apollo 11's Saturn V, recovered from the bottom of the ocean by Amazon and Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos in 2013. The copper baffles projecting from the injector were smashed by the impact with the ocean after being discarded.Lee Hutchinson
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Rear view. The injector plate was positioned at the top of the rocket's thrust chamber and sprayed fuel and oxidizer into the thrust chamber for combustion. Massive pumps shoved about one ton of refined RP-1 fuel and two tons of liquid oxygen through this plate... per second.Lee Hutchinson
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A few items from Buzz Aldrin's and Mike Collins' private collections.Lee Hutchinson
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An overhead view of the entire exhibit, which will remain open to the public until March 2018.Lee Hutchinson
HOUSTON—After carrying Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins to the Moon in 1969, the Apollo 11 command module splashed into the Pacific Ocean. The spacecraft then returned to Houston with the astronauts before embarking on a tour to all 50 states in 1970 and 1971. An estimated three million people visited the spacecraft along the way as it stopped in one city per state, usually the capital.
Following that tour, the historic capsule was installed at Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum, and it remained there as one of the institution's most prized artifacts. Now, finally, the 3.9-meter wide spacecraft is going on tour again. It won't be visiting all 50 states but instead a select few cities—Houston, St. Louis, Pittsburgh, and, lastly, for the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing in 2019, Seattle. The latter city gets the honor because Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is among those underwriting the tour.
The capsule makes its first public appearance on Saturday, October 14 at Space Center Houston. During a media preview, we got a look at the exhibit, which will let visitors get a little more than an arm's length away from the capsule. This close, we could see how hard the return trip through the atmosphere was on the spacecraft's heat shield, as well as the wear and tear from the reaction control system thrusters. The capsule is indeed an iconic sight to behold, and it looks all the better for a thorough cleaning and conservation effort before the tour began.
During its engagement until March 2018 at the visitor's center near Johnson Space Center, space buffs can see both the Apollo 11 capsule and, in a nearby exhibit, the Apollo 17 capsule. Both vehicles have launched to the Moon and back and appear similar. "This is an opportunity to see the historic bookends of the Apollo program," said William Harris, president and chief executive of Space Center Houston.
Other intriguing objects in the "Destination Moon" exhibit include the visor and gloves Aldrin wore on the Moon's surface, a shiny lunar sample return container, Michael Collins' Omega Speedmaster watch, and more. A 3D tour of the spacecraft also highlights graffiti left inside the "Columbia" module by the astronauts. There is also a Moon rock, of course.
This four-city tour, coming on the 50th anniversary of NASA's Moon landings, is a welcome addition to efforts to highlight the amazing things humans can do in space with clear goals and the funding to accomplish them. In the coming months, Ars will launch its own ambitious series to commemorate the Apollo program, from its successes and travails, to a legacy that reverberates even today in the spaceflight community.
Listing image by Lee Hutchinson
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