The Apollo Program | Behind the Wings on PBS

Video from the channel Wings Over the Rockies Air & Space Museum about Apollo program, linked on its Above Ten Thousand entry. Duration: 26:40. Language: English. Video type: Documentary.

Episode of the "Behind the Wings" program, from the Wings Over the Rockies museum, dedicated to the Apollo Program on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11. Host Matthew Burchette talks with Gene Kranz, NASA flight director on nine Apollo missions, including Apollo 11; visits Neil Armstrong's childhood home in Wapakoneta, Ohio; and tours NASA's Glenn Research Center in Cleveland and its Plum Brook facility in Sandusky.

An initial overview places Apollo after the Mercury project, which put the first American in space in 1961, and Gemini, which between 1965 and 1966 tested rendezvous, docking and reentry across ten missions. It recalls the Apollo 1 fire during a launch rehearsal in 1967, which killed its three crew members and halted crewed flights for 20 months; Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin's Moon landing on July 20, 1969, with Michael Collins in orbit; and the subsequent missions through Apollo 17 in December 1972, of which only Apollo 13 failed to land. In total, twelve astronauts walked on the Moon. Kranz recalls the pace of a mission every two or three months, the youth of his controllers, and compares Apollo 11 to the Panama Canal: where the canal joined two oceans, Apollo 11 joined Earth with deep space. He argues for returning to the Moon with permanent stations before taking the leap to Mars.

The Glenn center, called Lewis until 1999, contributed to Apollo through its work on hydrogen fuels and took part in earlier probes such as Ranger and Lunar Orbiter. Its specialist John Oldham shows a backup A7L suit belonging to William Anders, command module pilot of Apollo 8, and explains the pressure helmet beneath the LEVA visor; he also displays lunar samples from Apollo 15, collected by Jim Irwin, and from Apollo 16, an anorthosite about 4.2 billion years old, noting that the rocks brought back contain around 40% oxygen by weight. The episode tours labs for lunar rover testing, astronaut exercise, and xenon electric propulsion. Astronaut Janet Kavandi, a veteran of missions STS-91, STS-99 and STS-104, details Glenn's role in Orion's service module, built by Airbus in Bremen, and General David Stringer presents at Plum Brook the world's largest thermal vacuum chamber, where the Orion stack would be tested.