THE APOLLO 5 MISSION NASA APOLLO PROGRAM LUNAR MODULE FILM 77444

Video from the channel PeriscopeFilm about Apollo program, linked on its Above Ten Thousand entry. Duration: 16:40. Language: English. Video type: Archive footage.

NASA film about Apollo 5, the first uncrewed test flight of the LM-1 lunar module, the last major piece of the Apollo hardware still awaiting testing. The module is shown under its fairing atop a Saturn IB, along with the launch bunker teams at Cape Kennedy and the controllers in Houston. Astronauts Jim McDivitt and Rusty Schweickart, assigned to the module's first crewed flight, appear, as do Frank Borman and Bill Anders, who explain its purpose: a descent stage with a throttleable engine for landing on the Moon, and an ascent stage with the cabin for lifting off and rejoining the command module.

It was filmed around the time of the mission, spanning Pad 37 at Cape Kennedy, Houston mission control, and the tracking network: Carnarvon in Australia, Hawaii, White Sands, and the ship Coastal Sentry Quebec. The rocket had been on the pad for more than a year. It had been intended for the first Apollo crew, before the January 1967 tragedy.

After orbit insertion and separation, the first descent engine burn — the first engine designed to throttle its thrust — was cut off at 4 seconds because the onboard computer did not tolerate a small deviation. Flight director Gene Kranz opted for an alternate plan: a shorter descent engine burn and the "fire in the hole" test, which involves igniting the ascent stage while still attached to the descent stage, as in a landing abort. A shortage of attitude-control propellant forced the final ascent engine burn over Hawaii. Within two minutes, the module was spinning out of control, but its systems held up. The LM-1 was left in a decaying orbit until it broke up in the atmosphere.