The show counts down the greatest moments in NASA's nearly 60-year history, revealing the incredible stories behind the missions and discoveries that have remade our understanding of the Final Frontier.
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LearningTranscript
00:00:00Space, the last great unknown.
00:00:04NASA's mission, to unravel the mysteries of mankind's final frontier.
00:00:11To search for new knowledge and understanding.
00:00:15Godspeed, John Glenn.
00:00:17And to lead us towards a peaceful and unified future in space.
00:00:22To the moon and to the planets beyond.
00:00:24The Eagle has landed.
00:00:27We applaud NASA's greatest achievements.
00:00:31And explore how their impacts continue to shape how we view our place in the universe.
00:00:37That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.
00:00:42For the eyes of the world.
00:00:44Absolutely incredible.
00:00:46Now look into space.
00:00:47Okay, here we go.
00:00:49To the moon and to the planets beyond.
00:00:52Liftoff.
00:00:53And we set sail on this new sea.
00:00:56To solve these mysteries.
00:00:58To solve them for the good of all mankind.
00:01:011957 heralds the unprecedented orbit of the Sputnik satellite.
00:01:19Launched by the Soviet Union.
00:01:22This milestone sends waves of fear throughout the US government.
00:01:26About the technological superiority of their cold war enemy.
00:01:31Shortly thereafter.
00:01:33A federal organization.
00:01:35Whose sole purpose is spearheading the American space effort.
00:01:38Is born.
00:01:39The National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
00:01:43Known as NASA.
00:01:45Despite its cold war genesis.
00:01:48NASA is a distinctly civilian agency.
00:01:51With a focus on the peaceful exploration of space and science.
00:01:56President Eisenhower wanted a space program for science and technology.
00:02:02That was not based on the military occupation of space.
00:02:06And his emblem was space for peace.
00:02:10He was deeply concerned that if left to their own devices.
00:02:15The military would occupy space.
00:02:18And take the high ground.
00:02:20Had that occurred.
00:02:22You would never have seen.
00:02:24Any of the great accomplishments in science.
00:02:26Or engineering.
00:02:27That embraced the world.
00:02:29The world.
00:02:30Thanks to Eisenhower's forward-thinking administration.
00:02:34NASA remains the world's leading manned and unmanned space research agency.
00:02:39Since its inception in the late 1950s.
00:02:42Setting the precedent for all present and future space-faring nations.
00:02:46Ladies and gentlemen.
00:02:55Today we are introducing to you and to the world.
00:02:58These seven men.
00:02:59Who have been selected to begin training for orbital space flight.
00:03:03These ladies and gentlemen.
00:03:05Are the nation's Mercury astronauts.
00:03:08On April 9th, 1959.
00:03:17NASA introduces the world to the Mercury 7.
00:03:20The astronauts selected to pilot America's first manned space program.
00:03:27These men immediately become national heroes.
00:03:32Project Mercury's first goal is to put a solo human into Earth's orbit.
00:03:36Which is named Freedom 7.
00:03:41Freedom 7 was America's first foray into human space flight.
00:03:47And it came at a rather difficult period in time.
00:03:50Because three weeks before the launch of Freedom 7.
00:03:53Russia had successfully launched Yuri Gagarin.
00:03:55Who became the first human in space.
00:03:59From the Mercury 7.
00:04:00Astronaut Alan Shepard has chosen to become the first American to fly in space.
00:04:06He pilots the Mercury Redstone launch vehicle.
00:04:09A hybrid of a U.S. Army ballistic missile.
00:04:12And a research and development rocket.
00:04:14Modified for human flight.
00:04:17And on May 5th, 1961.
00:04:19Shepard leaves Cape Canaveral.
00:04:21And leads the United States into a new era of manned space exploration.
00:04:27Flight, this is M&O.
00:04:29Go ahead, M&O.
00:04:30All self-system status green.
00:04:32Roger, M&O.
00:04:33Understand all systems green.
00:04:34With 60 seconds and counting.
00:04:362-1 minutes and counting.
00:04:38Status check.
00:04:39Pressurization.
00:04:40Locks tanking.
00:04:41You are go.
00:04:42Motor systems go.
00:04:43T-minus 30 seconds.
00:04:45Mercury capsule go.
00:04:47All pre-start panel lights are correct.
00:04:50The ready light is on.
00:04:51T-minus 15 seconds.
00:04:53Eject Mercury umbilical.
00:04:54Mercury umbilical clear.
00:04:56Mercury is on.
00:04:57Light's on.
00:04:58T-minus 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.
00:05:06Engine start.
00:05:07Ignition.
00:05:08All right.
00:05:09Lift off and the clock has started.
00:05:14This is Freedom 7.
00:05:15Reading you loud and clear.
00:05:17The fuel is go.
00:05:181.2 G.
00:05:20Cabin at 14 PSI.
00:05:22Oxygen is go.
00:05:24All systems are go.
00:05:34Freedom 7 suborbital flight lasts 15 minutes.
00:05:37And follows a parabolic trajectory.
00:05:39Arking over the Earth's surface to land in the ocean.
00:05:42302 miles down range.
00:05:45The main scientific objective of project Mercury.
00:05:49Is to determine man's capability in the space environment.
00:05:52And the conditions under which astronauts would work.
00:05:55In contrast to Yuri Gagarin's flight.
00:05:59Which was effectively an automated flight.
00:06:02Gagarin had the ability to control the spacecraft.
00:06:05But didn't.
00:06:07Shepard's flight allowed him to exercise some control over the spacecraft.
00:06:15He's going to hand control movements now.
00:06:20Switching to manual control of the pitch attitude.
00:06:23So Shepard genuinely took real control of the spacecraft.
00:06:28He wasn't just there for the ride.
00:06:31He wasn't simply baggage.
00:06:33After re-entry.
00:06:34The capsule of Freedom 7 lands by parachute in the Atlantic Ocean.
00:06:38With Alan Shepard paving the way for every NASA astronaut and manned mission to come.
00:06:44The initial Mercury manned space flight certainly helped lift the spirits in America.
00:06:51Of people who felt that the Russians were racing ahead.
00:06:54That they'd been eclipsed with Sputnik.
00:06:57They'd been eclipsed with Yuri Gagarin.
00:06:59In the first months of a president who had criticized the government it replaced.
00:07:05For sitting on their hands while the Russians romped away into the future.
00:07:09So it was vital to restore American pride.
00:07:13And to mobilize a can-do spirit.
00:07:16So that weeks later when Kennedy announced the decision to go to the moon.
00:07:22People could believe it.
00:07:23I believe that this nation should commit itself.
00:07:26To achieving the goal.
00:07:28Before this decade is out.
00:07:30Of landing a man on the moon.
00:07:32And returning him safely to the earth.
00:07:34Freedom 7 was a vital component of Kennedy's moon program.
00:07:42That had been decided before Alan Shepard first went into orbit.
00:07:47And in fact the announcement of that decision was held back.
00:07:50Until Alan Shepard's flight on the 5th of May 1961.
00:07:55Freedom 7 had to happen for Kennedy's commitment to go to the moon.
00:08:02To be publicly announced and to be a funded program.
00:08:05Otherwise we would probably not have been on the moon even yet.
00:08:09Freedom 7 is only the beginning of Al Shepard's space flight career.
00:08:15He serves as chief of the astronaut office.
00:08:18And then in 1971 flies to the moon as commander of Apollo 14.
00:08:23We can see you coming down the ladder right now.
00:08:30That's bad for it old man.
00:08:33It's been a long way.
00:08:35But we're here.
00:08:37Human space flight has changed dramatically since 1961.
00:08:43Today's flights are complex, multi-crew, multi-national missions.
00:08:48Working together in the spirit of international collaboration.
00:08:52But the legacy of Freedom 7, Alan Shepard and the pioneering Mercury project.
00:08:57Will be remembered every time NASA launches humans into space.
00:09:03The flight director says get back in.
00:09:04The flight director says get back in.
00:09:05The flight director says get back in.
00:09:10The flight director says get back in.
00:09:11The flight director says get back in.
00:09:15The flight director says get back in.
00:09:33As we celebrate NASA's greatest achievements, the epic spacewalk of astronaut Ed White is
00:09:45momentous.
00:09:54Once President Kennedy announces plans to land Americans on the moon by the end of the
00:09:581960s, NASA gets to work developing the techniques needed to support these future moon missions.
00:10:07NASA unveils its second manned human spaceflight program known as Project Gemini in January 1962.
00:10:15Gemini bridges the Mercury and Apollo programs, designed to test the endurance of astronauts
00:10:21and spacecraft for extended moon missions.
00:10:28Perhaps the moon would take over a week to complete, and so one of Gemini's main aims
00:10:34was to establish the ability of humans to withstand long-duration spaceflight, to understand the
00:10:42physiological effects of spending that much time in a zero-gravity environment.
00:10:48Project Gemini also develops techniques for rendezvous and docking spacecraft in orbit, refines atmospheric
00:10:56re-entry and splashdown procedures, so specific landing sites are reached, and perfect spacewalking.
00:11:02For an astronaut to walk on the surface of the moon, they must first lead the safety of the spacecraft.
00:11:10EVA stands for extravehicular activity, which means the astronaut is working outside of the confines of the spacecraft, essentially in free space.
00:11:23It was critical as a part of the preparations for the lunar landing, because one of the main objectives of the lunar landing is to work outside of the spacecraft,
00:11:37to leave the lunar module and work in the lunar surface environment.
00:11:41It was also very important to be able to leave the spacecraft in the event that any repairs were required.
00:11:51The first NASA mission to attempt an EVA is Gemini 4, with the unofficial goal of proving the U.S. could catch up to the Soviets.
00:12:01On June 3, 1965, astronauts Jim McDivitt and Ed White leave Cape Canaveral in the program's new launch vehicle, the Gemini Titan II rocket.
00:12:13We have a roll program initiated.
00:12:25We have a roll program initiated.
00:12:27We have staging, and it's been confirmed here on the ground.
00:12:45The thrust looks good.
00:12:47The thrust looks good on the second stage.
00:12:49And McDivitt, in a very, very calm voice, said it looks great up here.
00:12:55After their third orbit around Earth, Ed White opens the hatch of the Gemini capsule and makes history, becoming the first American spacewalker.
00:13:05Okay, I'm separating from the spacecraft.
00:13:07My feet are out.
00:13:09Okay, I'm out.
00:13:15Tethered to the spacecraft, Ed White floats 200 miles above the Earth, traveling at 17,000 miles per hour.
00:13:23Okay, I'm coming over.
00:13:25You see me yet?
00:13:27I feel like a million dollars.
00:13:29This is the greatest exchange that is just tremendous.
00:13:33The footage of Ed White's EVA is one of the most recognizable and iconic set of images from the early period of the space program.
00:13:45Ed White's EVA proves the United States could match early Soviet achievements, with NASA training and hardware key to winning the space race to the moon.
00:13:55However, NASA's first spacewalk doesn't go completely to plan.
00:14:00A communications problem means that mission control can't establish radio contact with Gemini 4 for the majority of the EVA.
00:14:09Gemini 4, Houston Capcom.
00:14:13Gemini 4, Houston Capcom.
00:14:15Ground control were very concerned because the astronauts were losing track of time.
00:14:20The people on the ground were frantically trying to get a signal to the astronauts to terminate the spacewalk.
00:14:27If the astronauts don't stick to the mission timeline, Ed White could be spacewalking on the night side of the Earth.
00:14:34In total darkness, it would be extremely difficult to maneuver back to the capsule.
00:14:39Jimmy 4, Houston Capcom.
00:14:42Jimmy 4, Houston Capcom.
00:14:46Jimmy 4, Houston Capcom.
00:14:48Finally, Jim McDivitt notices and fixes an incorrect switch configuration in the capsule that reopens communication channels with mission control.
00:14:58And as he did that, Jim McDivitt said, we better see, we better find out what Capcom think.
00:15:04Think what the flight director's got to say.
00:15:08Capcom got the signal and the immediate response was,
00:15:11The flight director says get back in.
00:15:13This is Jim, got any message for us?
00:15:16Jimmy 4, get back in.
00:15:18Okay.
00:15:20So the audio coming from Capcom is essentially mission control telling the astronauts to stop playing about and get back into the capsule.
00:15:28Roger, we've been trying to talk to you for a while here.
00:15:31No, back in, come on.
00:15:32No, back in, come on.
00:15:35I'm done.
00:15:36Okay.
00:15:38Ed White's EVA lasts just 23 minutes, but NASA learns a very important lesson about how humans operate in the vacuum of space.
00:15:47NASA discovered that EVA is difficult.
00:15:50Working in that space suit, which is very constraining, is really exhausting.
00:15:55And the subsequent Gemini EVAs all led to the astronauts returning to the capsule in a really overheated, exhausted state.
00:16:05Eight Gemini missions later, astronaut Buzz Aldrin, who would later walk on the moon alongside Neil Armstrong, conducts the first extensive EVA.
00:16:14Gemini 12, Houston Capcom, one minute to EVA record, beautiful job.
00:16:21His success is attributed to his experience as a scuba diver.
00:16:30Aldrin pioneers the technique of underwater neutral buoyancy training, which simulates an environment similar to space.
00:16:37Project Gemini flies ten manned missions between 1965 and 1966, firmly putting the United States ahead of the Soviets in the Cold War space race.
00:16:52To this day, the neutral buoyancy training developed during the Gemini program remains integral to astronaut training.
00:17:04Coming up, the red planet reveals its mysteries.
00:17:09This is crazy. This is science fiction.
00:17:22As we count down NASA's all-time greatest achievements, the red planet boldly stakes its claim.
00:17:34NASA gets a bird's eye view of planet Mars from the Mariner and Viking programs of the 1960s and 70s.
00:17:42These historic missions give us our first views of the mysterious red planet, both from orbit and on the dusty surface.
00:17:50The exploration of Mars could be considered one of NASA's greatest achievements.
00:17:56The early period of its exploration from 1965 to the late 1970s saw NASA achieve the first landing on the surface of Mars of two laboratories that extensively analyzed, trenched and photographed the surface at two separate sites.
00:18:17After the early pioneering Mars missions, NASA goes on a hiatus.
00:18:23It isn't until the early 1990s when they began developing a new program of landers and rovers that could travel across the Martian surface to investigate multiple scientific sites.
00:18:33We'd seen with Apollo how the lunar roving vehicle had been able to move around various areas of geologic interest around a common site.
00:18:46We wanted to do that with Mars, get it mobile, not just have a lander that sat there, but could move on.
00:18:53And, you know, it's entirely coincidental with the human spirit. You climb one hill, you see another and want to climb that. And that's what these rovers are capable of doing.
00:19:06After almost 20 years, NASA triumphantly returns to the red planet with the Mars Pathfinder mission.
00:19:13Pathfinder's goal is to deploy the first free-ranging wheeled robotic rover on the Martian surface.
00:19:21Pathfinder houses a suite of scientific instruments to analyze the Martian atmosphere, climate and geology.
00:19:28After a 309 million-mile flight, the spacecraft arrives at Mars on July 1997.
00:19:43In addition to its scientific objectives, Pathfinder will test an innovative descent and landing system.
00:19:50The approach that was used to try to successfully get not just a lander but a rover onto Mars, if you'd have read about it in the books 10 years earlier, you'd have said, this is crazy. This is science fiction.
00:20:05If Pathfinder could successfully demonstrate this new technology, it would forever change the way scientific probes are deployed down to a planet's surface.
00:20:14The spacecraft enters the Martian atmosphere at four miles a second.
00:20:24It heats up to more than 1,000 degrees centigrade but slows the spacecraft down enough so parachutes can be deployed.
00:20:34Mars's atmosphere has got such a low density that even with these huge supersonic parachutes, it's still moving faster than the Earth.
00:20:43faster than a car speeding down a highway.
00:20:49So the final stage for landing, the lander and the rover were cocooned within a huge assembly of airbags.
00:21:06When Pathfinder impacted with Mars, the first thing it did was bounce.
00:21:11In Mars's much lower gravity, those bounces continued. There were more than 15 in total.
00:21:21And then finally, when the spacecraft came to a standstill, it only had a matter of hours of battery power for it to deflate its airbags, turn it the right way up.
00:21:32If any chain in that link had failed, then this mission would have been consigned to the scrap heap.
00:21:40And we need to remember that when it comes down to Mars, less than half of the missions at that time that had been dispatched to the red planet had resulted in success.
00:21:50Now down on the Martian surface, the Pathfinder lander opens, releasing the rover to begin its scientific investigation.
00:21:58Pathfinder wasn't designed to go and test if there were bugs or bacteria or indeed if there's anything that existed on Mars in the past or at the present time.
00:22:08It was a geological exploration mission. However, the Pathfinder mission did suggest that Mars may have had a wetter, warmer past.
00:22:17And where there's water, there's always a possibility for life.
00:22:20Collecting over 8 million measurements, 16 and a half thousand images, and outliving its design life by 12 times,
00:22:29Pathfinder's unprecedented mission reshaped long-held scientific theories about Mars.
00:22:37But perhaps Pathfinder's greatest contribution is how it has paved the way for NASA's continuing exploration of the red planet.
00:22:45Pathfinder led to Spirit and Opportunity in the new century.
00:22:522004 they landed. More than 10 years Opportunity was moving across the surface, visiting different sites,
00:23:00traveling more than 25 kilometers across the surface.
00:23:04A mission that was designed to last for 3 months has lasted more than 10 years.
00:23:09And that has been followed by an extraordinary new level of capability with the one-ton Curiosity lander.
00:23:20That, lowered on a sky crane, is a new way we will be sending big landers and rovers to Mars.
00:23:26And in 2020, a copy of that vehicle, with different instruments, will gather up samples and leave them at a location that a future lander will visit for returning to Earth.
00:23:48And that, itself, will be precursor to the first human footprints on the red planet, which could easily come in the 2030s.
00:24:00But the missing link that made our modern rovers possible was the Pathfinder mission.
00:24:05What a tremendous legacy to have. What NASA achieved in that magical summer of 1997, deploying for the first time a Martian rover, really paved the way for the successes and the future explorations that the agency is currently planning for the red planet.
00:24:26NASA's innovative Mars rovers continue to rewrite our understanding of the red planet.
00:24:37The legacy NASA began in 1997 with the Pathfinder mission will one day culminate in an international human expedition to set foot on Mars.
00:24:47Coming up, NASA boldly travels into uncharted territory.
00:24:59Those objects weren't stars. They were all galaxies. And a typical galaxy has 200 billion stars.
00:25:04NASA's mission to explore the cosmos continues as we venture beyond the asteroid belt into the outer solar system.
00:25:24In the early 1970s, there is a hunger within the scientific community to know more about the four outer planets that dominate our solar system.
00:25:40Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune.
00:25:44If more can be understood about these gas giants, it could unlock secrets to the history and formation of our Earth and the solar system.
00:25:55Exploring the solar system in which we live enables us to understand more about how our own Earth was formed.
00:26:03To understand our position in the evolution of the solar system, let alone the galaxy, we needed to get out there beyond the asteroid belt and really get to grips with what those planets were about.
00:26:19That was Voyager.
00:26:23NASA does not have the luxury of time on their side.
00:26:26This plan to explore the deepest, darkest, and most inhospitable regions of our solar system must take advantage of a favorable alignment of the four outer planets that would not occur again until the 22nd century.
00:26:40The Voyager program, the Voyager missions, that would allow the spacecraft to fly by planets and use the gravitational energy of the flyby to increase the velocity of the spacecraft and change the trajectory, change the direction in which the spacecraft was moving in order to encounter another planet.
00:27:05So it was almost like a game of planetary billiards.
00:27:08This favorable planetary alignment would occur in the late 1970s and allow NASA to harness gravitational assistance to slingshot the two Voyager probes from one planet to the next.
00:27:22Exploiting gravity in this way not only reduces the need to carry large quantities of fuel, but also has a huge impact on the mission timeline.
00:27:31Without the gravitational flybys that this alignment made possible, it would have taken 30 years for the Voyagers to reach Neptune instead of 12 years, which was ultimately possible.
00:27:45Launched a few weeks apart in the summer of 1997, the twin probes of Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 set sail for their one-way tour through our solar system.
00:28:04After 18 months, the Voyager spacecraft arrived at Jupiter in 1979.
00:28:17The Voyager program really transformed our view of the solar system.
00:28:22And at Jupiter, Voyager showed us the first ever active volcanism at a place other than the Earth with Jupiter's innermost moon, Io.
00:28:33And they were found to be the signature of an enormous volcanic plume rising from the surface of this extremely turbulent moon of Jupiter.
00:28:44It was really one of the landmark discoveries.
00:28:46The dynamics of the famous Great Red Spots, this enormous storm that has a size equivalent to that of the Earth, were studied in great detail.
00:29:01The Saturn encounter was arguably the most photogenic of the Voyager program.
00:29:07One of the most famous discoveries that Voyager made at Saturn was the existence of what are known as Shepard moons.
00:29:14In the outer ring system of Saturn, there are two very small moons which were moving on either side of these rings.
00:29:21And these became known as the Shepard moons because the gravitational influence of those moons actually shepherds those particles into a stable orbit and makes the existence of these rings possible.
00:29:33At this point, the two Voyager probes part company to follow very different trajectories, with Voyager 1 heading to Saturn's largest moon.
00:29:42Titan is a very interesting moon.
00:29:46It's a very enigmatic moon.
00:29:47It was known from ground-based observations that this largest moon of Saturn had an atmosphere which was very rich in methane.
00:29:55And methane is of great interest in terms of the ability of a moon or a planet to sustain life.
00:30:02But a consequence of that was that the trajectory would take the Voyager 1 spacecraft out of the plane in which the planets move, and therefore Voyager 1 would not be able to encounter Uranus and Neptune.
00:30:17The real star of the Uranus encounter was that the planet has quite a significant magnetic field.
00:30:32And the structure of this magnetic field is very unusual.
00:30:36It has a corkscrew shape, something that isn't seen in any of the other planets.
00:30:41And this is one of the most important discoveries of Voyager in terms of the planet itself.
00:30:48Voyager 2 has its final planetary encounter with Neptune in 1989, the outermost of the gas giants, and the most distant planet in our solar system.
00:30:59Neptune came as a complete surprise.
00:31:02The atmosphere was found to be very dynamic.
00:31:04It had this glorious blue color which had been hinted at in telescopic observations from the Earth.
00:31:11What really wasn't expected was the amount of activity in the atmosphere, the existence of a dark blue storm, very similar to the great red spot of Jupiter.
00:31:22The existence of auroral features on Neptune.
00:31:26The existence of nitrogen geysers on Neptune's largest moon, Triton, which has a surface that is the coldest surface anywhere in the solar system.
00:31:38But Voyager's farewell to the planets isn't the end of their mission.
00:31:43On their trajectories, it was only a matter of time before both Voyager spacecraft would leave our solar system.
00:31:51And in August 2012, 35 years after it launched, Voyager 1 becomes the first space probe to pass into the region between the stars known as interstellar space.
00:32:03Voyager 1 and 2 are now leaving the solar system.
00:32:07They're the two man-made things that are the furthest away from Earth of anything that we've ever made.
00:32:12They're literally going through the boundaries of the solar system into interstellar space, which doesn't sound like a big thing when you're used to Star Trek or Star Wars or whatever, but to actually leave the sphere of influence of the sun.
00:32:23Leave the place we live in that way is actually a fantastic achievement, and it's the beginnings of us exploring the rest of the universe.
00:32:34That, to me, is iconic. It's a major step.
00:32:37The Voyager program has given us a deeper understanding of our place within and what exists beyond our solar system.
00:32:47And in the 40 years since its launch in 1977, it continues to explore and enrich our understanding of our place among the stars.
00:32:57Coming up, the revolutionary telescope that changes our understanding of astronomy forever.
00:33:04Never even knew that these planets existed when Hubble was launched.
00:33:22It's inconceivable that one mechanical marvel could change our understanding of the cosmos.
00:33:28But that's exactly what happens with NASA's next innovation.
00:33:34Named for the great American astronomer Edwin Hubble, the Hubble Space Telescope is one of the largest and most versatile scientific instruments in space.
00:33:45NASA dreams up this pioneering piece of engineering in the late 1960s with the goal of answering one of the biggest questions in astronomy.
00:33:54The Hubble Space Telescope is a unique instrument. It had some particular science goals, and one of the major ones was to learn more about how far away distant galaxies are, and as a result of that, work out more accurately how old the universe was.
00:34:11By placing the telescope into Earth's orbit, Hubble overcomes many of the limitations of ground astronomy and peers deeper into the universe than ever before.
00:34:23The telescope was built because of this need to try to get instruments outside the Earth's atmosphere to improve our view of the universe.
00:34:31It's very difficult to do observations that are very precise from the ground because the atmosphere gets in the way.
00:34:37Movement in the atmosphere makes images less sharp than they would be if you could view things from space.
00:34:43So being up above the atmosphere gives you this absolutely unrestricted view, but also the atmosphere blocks some of the important radiation that astronomers like to use, such as ultraviolet light and infrared light.
00:34:57So Hubble gives us access to a much broader spectrum of light than we can see from the surface of the Earth.
00:35:03Beginning in 1978, NASA leads an international collaboration with the European Space Agency to design and construct the most sophisticated space telescope ever built.
00:35:17Complete with 400,000 components and 26,000 miles of wiring, Hubble is carried into orbit by a space shuttle in 1990.
00:35:27Close and lock your visors and you all have a good trip.
00:35:29We are go for main engine start. Five, four, three, two, one.
00:35:43And liftoff of the space shuttle Discovery with the Hubble Space Telescope, our window on the universe.
00:35:51Roll program. Roger roll, Discovery.
00:35:54The telescope is deployed at an altitude of 380 miles, the space shuttle's highest orbit to that date.
00:36:04You got to go for HST deploy ops.
00:36:07That's outstanding. Thank you.
00:36:09First glimpse of the space telescope. Looks like it's in great shape.
00:36:13Roger that. Thank you.
00:36:14Now, outside the distortion of Earth's atmosphere, Hubble will unlock secrets to the universe no one could have imagined.
00:36:23Hubble has rewritten the astronomical textbooks in so many ways.
00:36:37We've all seen the spectacular images that have been sent back.
00:36:41We've seen areas where stars are being created.
00:36:46The pillars of creation image in the Eagle Nebula.
00:36:51We've seen what happens at the end of star's life when we look at the supernova remnants.
00:36:57And we've seen wonderful images of entire galaxies, you know, island universes, collections of billions of stars.
00:37:04And you ask a hundred different astronomers and you get a hundred different favorite Hubble images.
00:37:10The Hubble Space Telescope has been incredibly successful.
00:37:14It was designed for seven years of life and here we are more than three times past its design life.
00:37:19Hubble is the only space telescope designed to be serviced by astronauts while in orbit.
00:37:24Between 1993 and 2009, five space shuttle missions repair and upgrade the telescope to keep it equipped with cutting edge technology.
00:37:37Because of the shuttle's ability to go up to Hubble and fix it but also take up new technology,
00:37:44it's been possible to convert Hubble into a 1970s designed spacecraft and telescope into a 1990s 2000 designed spacecraft.
00:37:57So one very good example of that is that there is a small patch of sky where when Hubble was launched there wasn't a single star visible.
00:38:05Seven years later they took up a new camera to Hubble and they looked again at that area of space to see if they could find any stars.
00:38:15Known as the Hubble Deep Field, the image that is captured is perhaps the most significant of Hubble's career.
00:38:23The Hubble Deep Field is a very, very long exposure.
00:38:27And the Deep Field was the first attempt to look as far out into the distant reaches of the universe as it's possible to go.
00:38:35Hubble was tasked with looking at what seemed to be a blank field of sky.
00:38:39It was in the constellation of Fornax and in terms of size, this was a size of sky smaller than a one millimetre by one millimetre square drawn on your thumb and held out at arm's length.
00:38:53What Hubble did on more than 800 orbits is look at that same patch of sky again and again and again, catching more and more photons.
00:39:03And it was an exposure time of nearly a million seconds. What emerges are 10,000 dots.
00:39:10But those objects weren't stars. They were all galaxies. And a typical galaxy has 200 billion stars.
00:39:15For me, this is the most mind-blowing image that's ever been taken in astronomy.
00:39:22The impact of the Deep Field is particularly remarkable because you can see all these faint smudges of light that are galaxies that were being born before our own solar system and galaxy ever existed.
00:39:32The Hubble Telescope is responsible for capturing some of the most detailed deep space images ever taken, with many observations leading to breakthroughs in astrophysics.
00:39:47It's hard to quantify the contribution that Hubble has made. In particular, it's helped us learn about the age of the universe.
00:39:53We didn't know that very precisely before Hubble was launched, and now we can say the universe is about 14 billion years old, give or take a little bit.
00:40:03And that's a major advance, but it hasn't just given us information on that.
00:40:08We can now study planets orbiting other stars and even examine their atmospheres using the instrumentation that's on board Hubble.
00:40:16We never even knew that these planets existed when Hubble was launched.
00:40:21The biggest contribution of Hubble, I think, has been to inspire and light up the public imagination as to what lies out there, how exciting it is, how wonderful astronomy is, how beautiful the universe is, how extraordinary humbling it is.
00:40:40How extraordinary humbling it is to sit and look at pictures from light years away of objects and structures light years across.
00:40:51And in a world that's struck with its own deeply incisive and divisive concerns and difficulties, lifting our spirits to the wonders of the heavens can be a greatly satisfying pastime.
00:41:07And something to turn to that just lights up a whole new understanding about what we are as human beings.
00:41:14Whether meeting manned space flight milestones, or spearheading deep space research, NASA pushes our technological and intellectual boundaries with each of its monumental achievements.
00:41:44But the greatest of them all must surely be visiting another world.
00:41:49The Eagle has landed.
00:41:51In its top five achievements, NASA continues to blow our minds and expand the edges of innovation.
00:42:11As it boldly leads mankind into the future.
00:42:19Apollo 8 is NASA's first mission, with the explicit goal of taking humans to the moon and back.
00:42:26Originally intended to be a standard Earth orbit mission, this becomes the boldest decision in the history of human exploration.
00:42:34Rumor had it that the Russians were preparing their cosmonauts for a lunar mission.
00:42:40So NASA opts to send the three-man crew of Apollo 8 across the vast ocean of space, orbit the moon, and hopefully return safely to the Earth.
00:42:50Apollo 8 was the most audacious human space flight mission in history.
00:42:57This mission was going to go hundreds of times further in distance than what had been achieved until then in low Earth orbit.
00:43:05Although they had tested out all of the hardware and the systems in Earth orbit, they had never left Earth orbit with humans.
00:43:12So it was a big risk.
00:43:14It really was starting human exploration of deep space.
00:43:20With its new lunar objective, Apollo 8 would not only keep the US ahead in the space race, but also set record-breaking technological benchmarks.
00:43:29The importance of Apollo 8 for the program was that we needed to demonstrate that we could operate the Apollo spacecraft in an environment that no man's spacecraft had ever worked before.
00:43:43Between Earth and Moon, where there was continuous sunlight 24 hours a day, and that the thermal control and that the communications at those great distances could operate in this completely new environment.
00:43:54And that the rocket motors could fire into and out of lunar orbit.
00:43:59Essential for a landing.
00:44:03The Apollo 8 astronauts become the first human beings to harness the brute force of the mighty Saturn V rocket.
00:44:11The most powerful machine ever built by man.
00:44:17It was the first time that a human crew had ridden a Saturn V rocket.
00:44:22NASA took this audacious risk of not only putting a human crew on board, but also sending them on a mission way beyond high Earth orbit, only a few thousand miles away.
00:44:36This mission was going to go a quarter of a million miles.
00:44:40NASA's revised mission leaves Apollo 8 astronauts Frank Borman, Jim Lovell, and Bill Anders, preparing for a launch nearly three months ahead of schedule.
00:44:54And in December 1968, Apollo 8, Apollo 8 is ready to make history.
00:45:08Vehicle now is completely pressurized.
00:45:1045 seconds, final reports coming from Frank Borman aboard the spacecraft.
00:45:14T-minus 15, 14, 13, 12, 11, 10, 9.
00:45:27We have ignition sequence start.
00:45:29The engines are armed.
00:45:324, 3, 2, 1.
00:45:354, 3, 2, 1.
00:45:36We have liftoff.
00:45:38We have liftoff.
00:45:45Liftoff, the clock is running.
00:45:47Clock is clear.
00:45:48Clock started, Frank.
00:45:49Magic clock.
00:45:56The tower is clear.
00:46:01Tower 8, you're looking good.
00:46:02Roger.
00:46:07The weight of a warship lifting into the air.
00:46:11It was just an enormous machine.
00:46:13It was a phenomenal thing to watch.
00:46:18Apollo 8, Houston.
00:46:19Your trajectory and guidance are go, over.
00:46:22Thank you, Michael.
00:46:24Yeah, you're looking real good, Frank.
00:46:32Apollo 8, Houston.
00:46:33You are go for staging, over.
00:46:35Thank you, Houston.
00:46:36Apollo 8.
00:46:39Stage.
00:46:40So, first stage was very smooth, and this one is smoother.
00:46:48Apollo 8, you are go for T-L-I, over.
00:46:51We're go for T-L-I.
00:46:52Here we were, leaving Earth and breaking that bond with our home planet to place men within the gravitational grip of another world in space.
00:47:05It was awesome.
00:47:07Astronauts Bormen, Lovell, and Anders become the first humans to travel beyond low Earth orbit.
00:47:16After three days, Apollo 8 arrives at the moon and enters lunar orbit.
00:47:24This is Apollo Control, Houston.
00:47:27There's a cheer in this room.
00:47:28We've got it.
00:47:29We've got it.
00:47:30To Apollo 8 now in lunar orbit.
00:47:33Apollo 8, Houston.
00:47:35What does the old moon look like from 60 miles over?
00:47:39The moon is essentially gray.
00:47:42No color.
00:47:44I think you see quite a bit of detail.
00:47:46The craters are all rounded off.
00:47:48There's quite a few of them.
00:47:49Roger, understand.
00:47:52One of the mission's primary goals is to photograph planned landing sites for future Apollo missions.
00:48:01And over the next 20 hours, the crew collects 700 images of the lunar surface in unprecedented detail.
00:48:08On their ninth orbit of the moon, the crew sends a Christmas Eve message back to Earth, which is watched by the largest global television audience in history.
00:48:26For all the people back on Earth, the crew of Apollo 8 has a message that we would like to send to you.
00:48:36In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth.
00:48:41And the earth was without form, and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep.
00:48:47And God said, let there be light.
00:48:51And there was light.
00:48:53This was no longer a nation fulfilling its national aspirations, but it was a world collectively represented by three humans traveling in orbit around another world and invoking a spiritual sense of identity that rose above the petty bickering.
00:49:12It made people realize there was something bigger, grander, and even more meaningful to the human spirit.
00:49:22And from the crew of Apollo 8, we close with good night, good luck, a merry Christmas, and God bless all of you, all of you on the good Earth.
00:49:34Another memento of the Apollo 8 mission is a never-before-seen view of our home planet.
00:49:45Known as Earthrise, this photograph is snapped by astronaut Bill Anders and is believed to be the most reproduced image in human history.
00:49:55The pictures of Earth from space mobilized an environmental movement in the United States that we have an Earth that's very fragile.
00:50:05If we continue to rampage through its resources, consuming them at a prodigious and profligate rate, that we will soon have a dry and dusty bowl such as that that we see in the world we went to visit, the Moon, and saw an Earth that was so different, so beautiful, so full of life, but so fragile.
00:50:27Apollo 8's successful first flight to the Moon paves the way for the lunar landings to follow and allows NASA to achieve President Kennedy's goal of placing a man on the Moon by the end of the 1960s.
00:50:41Perhaps Apollo 8's greatest legacy is that in our quest to study the Moon, humanity truly discovers the Earth.
00:50:51And only by leaving our planet behind can we look and see, for the first time, our whole world.
00:51:01Coming up, a space plane right out of a sci-fi novel.
00:51:05Two, one, zero, and liftoff!
00:51:22As we celebrate NASA's greatest achievements, the groundbreaking shuttle is heralded as the first foray into sustainable space flight.
00:51:35NASA's space shuttle is the first in a new breed of spacecraft, based on a radically new approach to space travel.
00:51:45The goal, to replace the existing method of launching costly manned capsules on expendable rocket boosters with a reusable spacecraft.
00:51:55Not only would such a vehicle reduce the cost of space exploration, increasing America's access to Earth's orbit,
00:52:02but it could also support NASA's ambitious future of permanently manned space stations.
00:52:09The shuttle was conceived as a reusable launch vehicle when it was obvious that throwing these rockets away after only one use was going to be unsustainable.
00:52:20If the flight rates went up and up and up, it would bankrupt the space program.
00:52:25The design of the space shuttle resembles a conventional aircraft, with two wings and a tail.
00:52:31In this configuration, the shuttle is more like a space plane that can glide back to Earth, land on a runway, and be ready for its next mission.
00:52:40A unique feature of the shuttle design is its large cargo bay, allowing the vehicle to ferry a wide variety of scientific payloads into orbit.
00:52:55This would enable NASA to easily deploy satellites, and for the first time, capture and return payloads back to Earth.
00:53:03The shuttle was really meant to be a multifaceted tool. It was a logical thing to do, a logical step.
00:53:10In particular, you're looking for a tool that you could use to mend spacecraft, a tool that you could use to service an international space station, for example, or any space station.
00:53:20You could launch things from it.
00:53:22After nearly a decade of development and testing, NASA's space shuttle fleet finally goes into service in April 1981, and launches a new era of manned space exploration.
00:53:37Firing chain is armed. Go for main engine start.
00:53:40OTC-TOT APU pre-starts complete. Three great objects.
00:53:43Thank you, Joey.
00:53:44We're ready to go. Copy that.
00:53:46On my mark.
00:53:47Three, two, one, mark.
00:53:51Two, one, zero, and liftoff!
00:54:04On the shoulders of the space shuttle, America will continue the dream.
00:54:09The space shuttle spreads its wings for this journey into history.
00:54:13Roll program.
00:54:19Roger, roll, Discovery.
00:54:22Roll program complete. Four and a half million pounds of hardware in humans.
00:54:26Heads down, wings level on the proper alignment for its eight and a half minute ride to orbit.
00:54:31Go with throttle up.
00:54:33Roger, go with throttle up.
00:54:36The space shuttle's traveling almost 2,600 miles an hour at 21 miles in altitude, 24 miles down range, standing by for solid rocket booster separation.
00:54:51The good solid rocket booster separation, the main engine steering the shuttle on a pinpoint path to its preliminary orbit.
00:55:01Between 1981 and 2011, NASA's fleet of five space shuttle flies a total of 135 missions.
00:55:13During their 30 years of service, the shuttles carry more than 350 astronauts to and from orbit, and allow mankind to push the boundaries of humanity's space exploration.
00:55:25The shuttles launch and repair hundreds of satellites, act as orbital science laboratories, and assist in the construction of the International Space Station, the largest and most complex structure assembled in space.
00:55:42The shuttle's main objective was, of course, as a routine ferry back and forth between the surface of the Earth and near space.
00:55:52But clearly, no other vehicle, at the time on the drawing board or conceived, could possibly have assembled the 400-ton International Space Station that has been permanently manned since the year 2000,
00:56:05and may very well have at least three decades of life for scientists from all over the world.
00:56:27Originally billed as a vehicle that would launch twice a month, in reality, shuttle missions average four a year.
00:56:35And the operational costs of the program are higher than anticipated, due to the extensive maintenance required to keep a reusable spacecraft in service.
00:56:46The safety of the vehicle is also questioned, following the tragic losses of space shuttles Challenger and Columbia, and their respective crews.
00:56:55But inquiries into both incidents revealed that management problems at NASA were to blame, rather than flight engineer complacency, or the reliability of the shuttle hardware, concluding that tragically, both disasters could have been avoided.
00:57:12Sometimes the failings of the shuttle overshadow its achievements, but make no mistake, this experimental space plane sets a staggering benchmark for the future of reusable spacecraft.
00:57:30I think the lasting legacy for shuttle is that it is possible to both bring the vehicle back and astronauts back in the same vehicle that they went up on,
00:57:39and that there is at least now the practical possibility of reducing cost to orbit, but there's still a long way to go yet.
00:57:45What started as a truly space-age concept evolves into an iconic vehicle like no machine ever built.
00:57:55The space shuttle is a gateway to Earth orbit, that for millions around the world symbolizes the adventure and spirit of exploration.
00:58:05You have to sort of stand to one side and not ignore the fact that a huge amount has been achieved by this general purpose tool that has allowed us to do a huge amount that a lot of us have benefited from in terms of the machinery we can get up there, machinery we can maintain.
00:58:21Even if it's from people understanding the universe because they can see the images from Hubble that was launched with the shuttle and managed through shuttle missions.
00:58:28Just bringing people together that can only be good for mankind.
00:58:35The shuttle played a huge part in that and we should never forget it.
00:58:41Retiring in 2011, NASA's space shuttle fleet haves the way for the vital next step in manned space flight
00:58:49and enables the technological world we now enjoy and should be forever heralded as one of NASA's greatest achievements.
00:59:02The end of a historic journey and to the ship that has led the way time and time again, we say farewell discovery.
00:59:11Coming up, a home in space like we've never seen before.
00:59:19You cannot now put the genie back in the bottle. A precedent has been set. This is the way forward.
00:59:25This is the way forward.
00:59:37As we count down NASA's all-time greatest achievements, the International Space Station redefines what we call home.
00:59:45Undoubtedly, the greatest international collaboration in the history of human space exploration, the International Space Station,
00:59:58is a habitable science laboratory parked in low Earth orbit.
01:00:02Home to a multinational crew of six astronauts who live and work in space, the ISS advances our long-duration space flight capabilities.
01:00:22But despite being the blueprint for global space cooperation, the International Space Station was born of the Cold War.
01:00:30Back in the 1980s, relations between the Soviet Union and the United States were still pretty much in a deep freeze.
01:00:40Now, NASA had plans for its own space station, Freedom, but the budgets were ballooning.
01:00:46And NASA realized that its aspirations for having a long-duration capability for space flight
01:00:52were going to be pretty much on the shelf for as long as the shuttle program was going on.
01:00:57At the same time, the Soviet Union had spectacularly built up human space flight experience through the series of Salyut space stations culminating in the Mir program.
01:01:09NASA had done nothing like this since Skylab in the early 1970s.
01:01:14Although the Skylab program had been a resounding success for NASA,
01:01:18the agency is in desperate need of space station freedom to advance its orbital operations.
01:01:26When the Soviet Union collapses at the beginning of the 1990s,
01:01:30it gives NASA a golden opportunity to support and collaborate with the new Russian space agency.
01:01:36And in 1993, plans for space station freedom are merged with Russia's proposed Mir-2 project
01:01:45to form the first international space station program.
01:01:49A global partnership of 15 nations works together, despite differences in language, politics and manufacturing styles,
01:02:02to plan and complete the greatest engineering project in history.
01:02:06You should think of the space station as a gigantic Lego set where bits and pieces are launched into space
01:02:21and then bolted together actually in orbit.
01:02:23It's far too big to be launched from the ground,
01:02:26and we actually don't have a launch vehicle that's physically capable of taking that whole structure into space on its own.
01:02:34So you have to launch it in pieces and assemble it in orbit.
01:02:38The modular design of the International Space Station allows different bays and components
01:02:43to be engineered and manufactured by five different space agencies around the world.
01:02:49This unprecedented technological and political partnership
01:02:52sees Russian, Japanese, European and Canadian space agencies working alongside NASA to operate and service the ISS.
01:03:04The international nature of the space station is probably the greatest success as a program,
01:03:11rather than an individual mission or event, that NASA has ever achieved
01:03:16to bring together the nations of the world to what is now the full International Space Station.
01:03:23The International Space Station is a unique scientific platform
01:03:27where research into biology, physics and astronomy converges with technological developments and innovation.
01:03:35In this orbiting laboratory, crew members conduct advanced experiments that would not be possible on Earth,
01:03:41with the unified goal of sharing breakthroughs in knowledge for the betterment of humanity.
01:03:48The ISS truly is humanity's orbital space science outpost.
01:03:54The research that's being done on board is giving us new insights into so many different areas,
01:03:59from material science to fundamental physics,
01:04:02because some of the insights gained from instruments on the station are giving us new ideas
01:04:08about the structure and possible future fate of the universe.
01:04:15In 2005, the station's sophisticated facilities opened up to institutes and scientists outside of government agencies,
01:04:25leading to economic, medical and environmental innovations for Earth.
01:04:29With all eyes on mankind's next giant leap in space exploration,
01:04:37the station is paving the way for future missions to the Moon, Mars and beyond.
01:04:44A mountain mission to Mars is going to be a very difficult thing to do.
01:04:48Although we have the basic technology, it's going to take at least seven or eight months to send people to Mars,
01:04:54then they have to stay there for about a year before they can come back, which is another seven or eight months.
01:04:59So we're really talking about a round trip that lasts more than two years.
01:05:04The difficult logistic point is to work out how to survive for that length of time.
01:05:09Not just from a physical point of view, but actually, if you're going on a long journey,
01:05:13you might have to learn how to grow food.
01:05:15And one of the things that Space Station is a good platform for is learning how to grow things in low-gravity conditions.
01:05:22What we have learnt is how multiple agencies from different parts of the world can collaborate even when there are political differences.
01:05:32And if we are to go to Mars, in my mind, it's almost guaranteed to be an international mission.
01:05:39The International Space Station is the largest and most complex construction ever assembled in space.
01:05:46A project which, after a decade of success, has proven its worth as an out-of-this-world science lab.
01:05:55Pioneering techniques for building and maintaining equipment in orbit.
01:06:00Perhaps the station's greatest accomplishment is its blueprint for achieving goals together that single nations alone could not accomplish.
01:06:08The ISS program from the start was politically driven, but what's emerged from it has been a fantastic tribute to cooperation between so many space agencies around the world.
01:06:30You cannot now put the genie back in the bottle. A precedent has been set. This is the way forward, and it's a great way for settling political difficulties.
01:06:43Sleeves rolled up, working together.
01:06:45Just two decades since the end of the Cold War, the International Space Station embodies what global cooperation can achieve.
01:06:54The ISS is humanity's first firm foothold for life in space.
01:07:01Our springboard for visiting destinations beyond Earth's orbit.
01:07:09And another giant leap in mankind's quest to explore the final frontier.
01:07:20Coming up, NASA conducts a life-saving mission.
01:07:24All right, Houston, we've had a problem.
01:07:25Stand by, they've got a problem.
01:07:26We've got more than a problem.
01:07:27Okay, listen to you guys.
01:07:31The Apollo Lunar Space Program is cemented in time for the scale of its ambition and accomplishments.
01:07:45But one of the greatest moments in NASA's history is nearly its worst.
01:07:56In April 1970, the Apollo program is in full swing.
01:08:01The last 16 months has seen 12 men fly to the moon and four walk on its surface.
01:08:08Astronauts Fred Hayes and Jack Swigert train alongside Apollo 13 commander and veteran astronaut Jim Lovell for NASA's most ambitious mission yet.
01:08:18Apollo 13 was in the moon's first flight.
01:08:19The Apollo 13 really went to take a step further than the previous two Apollo's that had been on the moon.
01:08:27They had landed in areas called mare, these sort of flat plains.
01:08:31And so you only looked at the rocks that were right on the surface.
01:08:34And there's a lot of interest in what's happening down below the surface of those mares.
01:08:39So Apollo 13's aim was to go to an impact crater
01:08:42where some huge collision had happened with an asteroid.
01:08:45That impact had thrown material out and it dug it up from lower regions of the crust.
01:08:50And Apollo 13 was targeted to try and get to rocks
01:08:54that were characteristic of a different age of the moon compared to Apollo 12.
01:09:01Apollo 13 launches to explore the moon
01:09:04and follow in the successful lunar footprints of Apollos 11 and 12.
01:09:09But just 56 hours into the mission,
01:09:11the spacecraft suffers a devastating malfunction.
01:09:16Apollo 13, Houston, we'd like you to stir up your cryo tanks.
01:09:19Okay, stand by.
01:09:24About 56 hours, all three of us heard a rather large bang.
01:09:29Just one bang.
01:09:34Okay, Houston, we've had a problem here.
01:09:36This is Houston, say again, please.
01:09:38Houston, we've had a problem.
01:09:39Stand by, they've got a problem.
01:09:40We've got more than a problem.
01:09:41Okay, listen to you guys.
01:09:42Fuel cells one and three are offline.
01:09:46All right.
01:09:46That's what we're reading.
01:09:48When an onboard oxygen tank ruptures,
01:09:51two of the spacecraft's three fuel cells begin bleeding precious power.
01:09:55We've got to get a pressure readout on that thing.
01:09:58O2 quantity number two is zero.
01:10:00That's the end right there.
01:10:01I can't believe that.
01:10:04The moot in mission control was immediately one of disbelief.
01:10:07I have absolutely no clue what happened.
01:10:09Something happened to the fuel cells in the oxygen tank.
01:10:12And when I looked up and saw both oxygen pressures,
01:10:15one absolutely zero and the other one going down,
01:10:18it dawned on me, and I'm sure Jack and Fred about the same time,
01:10:21that we were indeed in serious trouble.
01:10:25And it looks to me that we are venting something out into space.
01:10:29It's a gas of some sort.
01:10:31Roger, we copy your venting.
01:10:32Not only is oxygen vital to keeping the crew alive,
01:10:37but the spacecraft's three fuel cells cannot generate power without it.
01:10:41It was quite apparent to me that it was just a question of time
01:10:44that the command module was going to be dead.
01:10:46We're still 70 to 80 hours away from the Earth.
01:10:50Without power, the spacecraft would shut down.
01:10:53Communication systems would die,
01:10:56and the crew would be stranded in space.
01:10:58Within two hours, the third fuel cell had to be shut down.
01:11:01That's the only means of electrical power
01:11:05for everything needed to get the crew back to Earth alive.
01:11:10200,000 miles from Earth and trapped in a dying spacecraft,
01:11:15the crew of Apollo 13 faces a life-and-death crisis.
01:11:19NASA has just one chance to bring their men safely home.
01:11:24We knew that the command module was going to lose power.
01:11:27The only way to survive the situation
01:11:29was to transfer to the lunar module,
01:11:32and we started going through procedures to get power on.
01:11:36The initial reaction was stabilization,
01:11:39to get the whole mission stable
01:11:40so that we could at least buy a bit of time,
01:11:44assign people to study how we keep the crew alive
01:11:47and how we keep our options open.
01:11:51With its own independent life support,
01:11:54power and communication systems,
01:11:56the lunar module acts as a lifeboat.
01:11:59But with a limited 45-hour lifespan
01:12:01intended for a two-man crew,
01:12:03NASA ground teams work around the clock
01:12:06to keep three men alive for the 90-hour flight back to Earth.
01:12:09The main difficulty that the astronauts had
01:12:15is they were losing power all the time,
01:12:17and they had to find a way of maintaining power
01:12:20for the whole duration of the flight.
01:12:23To support three men for three and a half days,
01:12:27the whole way in which it was operated had to change.
01:12:31To combat the astronauts' dwindling consumables,
01:12:36NASA instructs the crew to power down the lunar module,
01:12:39preserving the spacecraft's limited water and electrical supply.
01:12:43However, the crew suffers serious dehydration,
01:12:47and the temperature inside the lunar module plummets.
01:12:51It was sort of a chilling coldness.
01:12:53The walls were perspiring,
01:12:55the windows were completely wet,
01:12:57and it wasn't too healthy.
01:12:58I recall that it was like reaching into the freezer for the food.
01:13:03There was ice forming on the inside of the windows.
01:13:06The crew were beginning to suffer
01:13:08under those appalling conditions.
01:13:10It was a dire state.
01:13:12It was a real, real emergency situation.
01:13:28The Apollo Lunar Space Programme is one of NASA's most ambitious accomplishments,
01:13:35but the Apollo 13 mission nearly becomes a disaster.
01:13:40Surviving on the minimal power reserves of the lunar module,
01:13:44the crew is further jeopardized
01:13:45by the carbon dioxide buildup on board the spacecraft.
01:13:49When you breathe oxygen, you exhale carbon dioxide,
01:13:55and that carbon dioxide, if you don't do anything about it,
01:14:00builds up in the sealed environment of the space capsule
01:14:04and becomes a poison.
01:14:07Lithium hydroxide canisters scrub the air supply of carbon dioxide,
01:14:11but with the command module powered down,
01:14:15the lunar module's scrubbing system is overworked,
01:14:18designed to just support two men for two days,
01:14:21not three men for four days.
01:14:24It wasn't possible to take the lithium hydroxide crystals
01:14:27from the command module and place them in the lunar module
01:14:30because the shapes were different.
01:14:32The command module canisters were square cross-section,
01:14:36and believe it or not, the ones in the LEM were round cross-section.
01:14:40This was a very serious problem.
01:14:41I mean, it could easily have been the end of the rescue mission
01:14:45had they not solved it.
01:14:47NASA has mere hours to engineer a system
01:14:50that patches the square canisters
01:14:52into the lunar module life support system
01:14:55using only what the astronauts have available to them.
01:14:58Ground Redis up a procedure
01:15:00in order to adapt some of the canisters,
01:15:02and as they read this thing up,
01:15:04Jim and I constructed one of these things.
01:15:07Cut a piece of tape this long, put it up there,
01:15:09do this, do that.
01:15:09It worked to treat, you know.
01:15:11Within an hour of switching it on,
01:15:13the carbon dioxide levels were way down,
01:15:15and they were through that really serious consumable problem.
01:15:20There were moments when I didn't know
01:15:21how much consumables we had,
01:15:23whether we could make it back or not,
01:15:24but in a situation like that,
01:15:26there's only one thing you can do.
01:15:28You just keep going,
01:15:28and you just keep thinking up
01:15:31where you can get more consumables.
01:15:33And so that's exactly what we did.
01:15:37It is without question
01:15:39that one of NASA's greatest triumphs
01:15:41during the Apollo 13 rescue
01:15:43was the way mission control
01:15:45successfully stretched out
01:15:47the dwindling life support consumables.
01:15:50Had those consumables
01:15:51not been monitored and economized as accurately,
01:15:54the mission and the crew
01:15:56would have been lost.
01:15:59In the entire history of human spaceflight
01:16:02dating back to 1961,
01:16:05Apollo 13 was the most dangerous episode
01:16:08in which the crew has successfully survived.
01:16:10What happened in mission control
01:16:26and by the crew themselves
01:16:28showed that the NASA spirit at the time
01:16:31was absolutely up to the challenge,
01:16:33not only of getting human beings to the moon,
01:16:36but returning them to Earth safely
01:16:38when you've got multiple emergencies coming up
01:16:41that are threatening your crew's survival
01:16:43again and again and again.
01:16:47Extremely loud applause
01:16:48as Apollo 13 comes through loud and clear
01:16:51on the television display here.
01:16:52I regard Apollo 13
01:16:56as an immensely impressive example of engineering.
01:17:01The systems engineering,
01:17:02the organizational engineering
01:17:03was so solid, was so intelligent,
01:17:06was so well structured
01:17:07that when the accident happened,
01:17:09the organization was found
01:17:11totally capable of dealing with it.
01:17:13And I can't imagine why anybody
01:17:14would want to be anything other than an engineer.
01:17:18One of the most important points
01:17:19that can be made of this flight
01:17:20is the initiative that people have
01:17:22when suddenly faced
01:17:23with an unusual situation.
01:17:26I think it's amazing the way
01:17:28that people can respond so fast
01:17:29to get this job done.
01:17:32The safe return of the Apollo 13 crew
01:17:35is a testament to the caliber
01:17:37and dedication of the engineers
01:17:39and astronauts of the Apollo lunar program
01:17:42and is universally regarded
01:17:44as NASA's finest hour.
01:17:48Coming up,
01:17:49an unimaginable task
01:17:52with an impossible deadline.
01:17:53For a magical moment,
01:17:55humanity was united as one.
01:17:59NASA pushes our technological
01:18:00and intellectual boundaries
01:18:01with each of its monumental achievements.
01:18:07NASA pushes our technological and intellectual boundaries with each of its monumental achievements.
01:18:17But the greatest of them all must surely be visiting another world.
01:18:24I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal before this decade is out of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth.
01:18:43No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind or more important for the long-range exploration of space.
01:18:54And none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish.
01:19:00On the 25th of May 1961, President John F. Kennedy challenges the United States to put a man on the moon by the end of the decade.
01:19:10We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard.
01:19:19And perhaps the greatest engineering challenge in the history of mankind, NASA has a mere eight years to pioneer the technology to shoot men into deep space and return them safely to the earth.
01:19:33But in 1961, rocket technology isn't powerful enough to reach the moon.
01:19:39A lunar lander hasn't been designed.
01:19:42Spacesuit technology is in its infancy.
01:19:45And we don't even know if humans can survive in the vacuum of space.
01:19:50In 1961, walking on the moon is science fiction.
01:19:54But by 1970, it must be science fact.
01:20:01And in July 1969, Apollo 11 makes history as Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin become the first of 12 astronauts to walk on the moon.
01:20:12Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed.
01:20:16We copy you down, Eagle. You got a bunch of guys about to turn blue. We're breathing again. Thanks a lot.
01:20:21I'm at the foot of the ladder. That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.
01:20:37The six Apollo lunar landing missions demonstrated the most audacious attempt to challenge humans on the technological frontiers of the 20th century that could ever have been put before a single group of people.
01:20:51For a magical moment, humanity was united as one.
01:20:57People were saying, you did it for us.
01:21:04It wasn't seen that the United States had set foot on the moon.
01:21:08It was the human race.
01:21:11And so for me, that's the magic of Apollo 11 and all of those subsequent missions.
01:21:16In the afterglow of Apollo 11, NASA lands five more exploration missions on the surface of the moon, each more advanced and ambitious than the last.
01:21:31Of the six Apollo lunar landing missions, the last three were incredibly productive scientifically because they built on the previous flights in a very big way.
01:21:41They had a lunar module that could stay three full working days on the surface.
01:21:46It had a lunar roving vehicle that could carry the crew miles to different sites of geological and scientific interest.
01:21:55It carried a much larger suite of experiments to operate for nearly ten years after the crew returned, sending information back to scientists all over the world.
01:22:06That prodigious outpouring of data was really one of the greatest achievements of the whole Apollo program and transformed it from a political objective in getting to the surface ahead of the Russians into a very, very major scientific endeavor.
01:22:21This unprecedented scientific yield unlocks the history and evolution of our planet and the solar system.
01:22:30And the benefits of NASA's Apollo program are even far more wide-reaching for us all.
01:22:37Sending human beings to the moon laid the groundwork for exploration of the rest of our solar system.
01:22:42So sending robotic explorers off to Mars, Venus.
01:22:45But they also laid the way for international collaboration.
01:22:48Sending people up to the International Space Station working together for a common cause would not have been possible without the technology developed through the Apollo missions.
01:22:56Hopefully, although it's NASA's greatest achievement to date, there's going to be plenty more equally exciting achievements down the line for exploring the solar system.
01:23:06Between 1968 and 1972, 24 men fly to the moon and 12 walk upon its surface for the benefit of all mankind.
01:23:19The flags and footprints symbolize not only NASA's greatest achievement, but the achievement of an entire generation and the promise of mankind's future in space.
01:23:34It's the world taking the next steps.
01:23:36It's not just NASA, and NASA's been fantastic and led the way.
01:23:40But all these voyages in space, we're all doing this together.
01:23:44Whatever the future may hold for space exploration, it's clear that what NASA has achieved in just a few decades has forever defined how we live on our home planet.
01:23:57And how we will explore our future in space.
01:24:01I personally like to think the greatest achievement of NASA is that it is a civilian-based agency, actually international in its aspirations to draw in a world community of scientists and researchers.
01:24:16And to inspire the next generation of students, scientists and engineers to literally go where no one else has gone before and be the representational catalyst for all spacefaring nations to follow it to the exploration of the solar system and beyond.
01:24:39NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology
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