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Aviation History
1961
1961 - 1127.PDF
FLIGHT, 17 August 1961 AMERICA AIMS AT THE MOON . . 229 Contrasting launch vehicles in the US space programme: left, four-stage all-solid Scout on the pad at Wallops Island; centre, three-stage Thor-Delta at Cape Canaveral; right, the massive Saturn booster begins its 2,200-mile water journey to Cape Canaveral by special barge from Florence, Alabama, on the Tennessee River, after having been hauled overland around the damaged Wheeler Dam Earth aboard a Saturn booster late in 1963, and an orbit aroundthe Moon in 1965 at the latest. It is generally agreed that if the first date is met, subsequent flights may be accomplished sooner. Contracts for the Apollo capsule will run to nearly a billiondollars, and this prospect has stirred US space contractors more than anything since McDonnell Aircraft Corporation won theMercury capsule contract. By and large, the industry is impressed by the dispatch with which NASA now moves and the way it isbiting off space work in big chunks. Space contractors also recog- nize that the competition among them is going to be keen, and thatApollo may mean "quick death" for a few big firms in the space business. Those who do not win a place on Apollo, or do not makea try for it, may well end up outside the space field for good. This is because Apollo represents a major step forward in the state ofthe art, and those who are not familiar with what is done on this project will find it hard to catch up. But on the whole they see the picture as encouraging. Increasedmilitary spending, together with NASA's enlarged outlays, already are being felt in partially empty aircraft, missile, electronics andengine plants across the country. Recruiting of technical personnel, which dropped off sharply in 1960, shows signs of being renewed ona grand scale. A few contractors are finding their facilities insuffi- cient for the new military and space business they anticipate overthe next several months, and are looking around for rental space, or are thinking of putting up more brick and mortar. NASA willconstruct its own centre for Project Apollo and similar programmes to follow, and several states are vying with one another to havethe centre located within their borders. On the New York Stock Exchange, issues even remotely identified with space are booming,and in some instances are selling at 30 to 40 times earnings, without prospect of a cash dividend for years. The American space effort, including NASA programmesplus those of the US Air Force and other, lesser agencies, will cost United States taxpayers almost $3 billion in 1962. Spending forspace programmes will increase markedly over the next several years, if Congress approves. NASA privately estimates the totalcost of the man-on-the-Moon project at $20 billion, and figures as high as $40 billion have circulated from unofficial sources. This has not bothered the American public, which has yet tohear how it will pay for the space programmes. No new taxes are likely to be passed this year, but next year the prospect is for ageneral overhaul of the US tax structure and the collection of more money by the government. President Kennedy has put the case forthe space race in a positive way, appealing to national pride. A recent Gallup poll, taken just before the President's announce-ment, asked a cross-section of American people whether they thought it worthwhile to spend an estimated $225 for every man,woman and child in the United States to send a man to the Moon. Only 33 per cent said "yes," 58 per cent said "no," and 9 per centhad no opinion. This perhaps proves little, except that the typical Americanwould like to see one of his countrymen be first to take a trip to the Moon, but doesn't like paying for the ticket. Even that may besomewhat of a false premise. When Commander Alan Shepard made his flight in a Mercury capsule, a US news agency put outthe story that the cost to each American, on the average, was S2.23. As a result, NASA received letters by the basket enclosingchecks for $2.23—so many that it had to set up a special account that now runs to five figures. Above, space payloads have the strangest shapes. Left, mock- up of NASAfGrumman Orbiting Astronomical Observatory; right, mock-up of NASA/Hughes Surveyor Moon-landing spacecraft. Below, the man at bottom centre gives scale to the huge test stand at Edwards built for the static firing of twin F-l engines
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