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Surveyor Program (NASA)
The Surveyor program was a NASA program that, from June 1966 through January 1968, sent seven robotic spacecraft to the surface of the Moon. Its primary goal was to demonstrate the feasibility of soft landings on the Moon. The Surveyor craft were the first American spacecraft to achieve soft landing on an extraterrestrial body. The missions called for the craft to travel directly to the Moon on an impact trajectory, a journey that lasted 63 to 65 hours, and ended with a deceleration of just over three minutes to a soft landing. The program was implemented by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) to prepare for the Apollo program, and started in 1960. JPL selected Hughes Aircraft in 1961 to develop the spacecraft system. The total cost of the Surveyor program was officially $469 million. Five of the Surveyor craft successfully soft-landed on the Moon, including the first one. The other two failed: Surveyor 2 crashed at high velocity after a failed mid-course correction, and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Apollo 12
Apollo 12 (November 14–24, 1969) was the sixth crewed flight in the United States Apollo program and the second to land on the Moon. It was launched on November 14, 1969, by NASA from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Commander Charles "Pete" Conrad and Lunar Module Pilot Alan L. Bean completed just over one day and seven hours of lunar surface activity while Command Module Pilot Richard F. Gordon remained in lunar orbit. Apollo 12 would have attempted the first lunar landing had Apollo 11 failed, but after the success of the earlier mission, Apollo 12 was postponed by two months, and other Apollo missions also put on a more relaxed schedule. More time was allotted for geologic training in preparation for Apollo 12 than for Apollo 11, Conrad and Bean making several geology field trips in preparation for their mission. Apollo 12's spacecraft and launch vehicle were almost identical to Apollo 11's. One addition was a set of hammocks, designed to provide Conrad and Bean ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hughes Aircraft Company
The Hughes Aircraft Company was a major American aerospace and defense contractor founded on February 14, 1934 by Howard Hughes in Glendale, California, as a division of the Hughes Tool Company. The company produced the Hughes H-4 Hercules aircraft, the atmospheric entry probe carried by the ''Galileo'' spacecraft, and the AIM-4 Falcon guided missile. Hughes Aircraft was founded to build Hughes' H-1 Racer world speed record aircraft, and later modified other aircraft for his transcontinental and global circumnavigation speed record flights. The company relocated to Culver City, California, in 1940 and began manufacturing aircraft parts as a subcontractor. Hughes attempted to mold it into a major military aircraft manufacturer during World War II. However, its early military projects ended in failure, with millions of dollars in U.S. government funds expended for only a handful of prototypes, resulting in a highly publicized U.S. Senate investigation into alleged mismanage ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Surveyor (crater)
Surveyor crater is a small crater in Oceanus Procellarum on the Moon. The name of the crater was formally adopted by the IAU in 1973. On April 20, 1967, the Surveyor 3 spacecraft landed within the crater near the east rim. Surveyor 3 was the third lander of the United States, American uncrewed Surveyor Program, Surveyor program sent to explore the surface of the Moon. The Apollo 12 astronauts Pete Conrad and Alan Bean landed the Apollo Lunar Module, Lunar Module (LM) ''Intrepid'' north of Surveyor crater on November 19, 1969, and eventually walked over to Surveyor 3. During their descent, Surveyor crater was a major landmark, and is the largest crater at the landing site. To the west of Surveyor is Head (crater), Head crater. To the southwest are Bench (crater), Bench crater and Sharp-Apollo (crater), Sharp crater (now called Sharp-Apollo). To the south is Halo (crater), Halo crater. A distinct crater on the northeast rim is called ''Block'' crater. Block crater was describ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Oceanus Procellarum
Oceanus Procellarum ( ; from ) is a vast lunar mare on the western edge of the near side of the Moon. It is the only one of the lunar maria to be called an "Oceanus" (ocean), due to its size: Oceanus Procellarum is the largest of the maria ("seas"), stretching more than across its north–south axis and covering roughly , accounting for 10.5% of the total lunar surface area. Characteristics Like all lunar maria, Oceanus Procellarum was formed by ancient volcanic eruptions resulting in basaltic floods that covered the region in a thick, nearly flat layer of solidified magma. Basalts in Oceanus Procellarum have been estimated to be as young as one billion years old. Unlike the other lunar maria, however, Oceanus Procellarum may or may not be contained within a single, well-defined impact basin. Around its edges lie many minor bays and seas, including Sinus Roris to the north, and Mare Nubium, Mare Humorum and to the south. To the northeast, Oceanus Procellarum is separated ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mare Cognitum
Mare Cognitum (Latin ''cognitum'', the "Sea that has Become Known") is a lunar mare located in a basin or large Impact crater, crater which sits in the second ring of Oceanus Procellarum. To the northwest of the mare is the Montes Riphaeus mountain range, part of the rim of the buried crater or basin containing the mare. Previously unnamed, the mare received its name in 1964 in reference to its selection as the target for the successful impact probe Ranger 7, the first American spacecraft to return closeup images of the Moon's surface. Origin The basin material is of the Pre-Nectarian epoch (geology), epoch, while most of the basaltic mare material is of the Upper Imbrian epoch. Exploration The Ranger 7 lunar probe impacted Mare Cognitum at the conclusion of its picture-taking mission. Surveyor 3 and Apollo 12 landed near its northern shore. The outcrop of the Fra Mauro formation, where Apollo 14 landed, is also located near Mare Cognitum. Statio Cognitum On November 19, 1969, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Surveyor 2
Surveyor 2 was to be the second lunar lander in the uncrewed American Surveyor program to explore the Moon. After launch on September 20, 1966, a mid-course correction failure resulted in the spacecraft losing control. Contact was lost with the spacecraft at 9:35 UTC, September 22. Background On February 3, 1966, the Luna 9 spacecraft was the first spacecraft to achieve a lunar soft landing and to transmit photographic data to Earth. On May 30, Surveyor 1 launched, landing on Oceanus Procellarum on June 2. This craft also transmitted photographic data back to Earth. This spacecraft was the second of a series designed to achieve a soft landing on the Moon and to return lunar surface photography for determining characteristics of the lunar terrain for Apollo program lunar landing missions. Besides transmitting photos, Surveyor 2 was planned to perform a 'bounce', to photograph underneath its own landing site. It was also equipped to return data on radar reflectivity of the lunar s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Video
Video is an Electronics, electronic medium for the recording, copying, playback, broadcasting, and display of moving picture, moving image, visual Media (communication), media. Video was first developed for mechanical television systems, which were quickly replaced by cathode-ray tube (CRT) systems, which, in turn, were replaced by flat-panel displays of several types. Video systems vary in display resolution, Display aspect ratio, aspect ratio, refresh rate, color capabilities, and other qualities. Analog and digital variants exist and can be carried on a variety of media, including radio broadcasts, magnetic tape, optical discs, Video file format, computer files, and Streaming media, network streaming. Etymology The word ''video'' comes from the Latin verb ''video,'' meaning to see or ''videre''. And as a noun, "that which is displayed on a (television) screen," History Analog video Video developed from facsimile systems developed in the mid-19th century. Early mecha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Flamsteed (crater)
Flamsteed is a small lunar impact crater located on the Oceanus Procellarum, which is named after British astronomer John Flamsteed. It lies almost due east of the dark-hued Grimaldi, and north-northwest of the flooded Letronne bay on the south edge of the mare. The rim of this crater is not circular in form, having a bulging rim to the southeast. The interior is relatively flat and undistinguished by impacts. The crater lies within the southern rim of a crater that has been almost completely submerged by the basaltic lava flows that formed the Oceanus Procellarum. All that remains of this feature designated Flamsteed P are some low ridges and hills arranged in a circular formation. Flamsteed is a crater of Eratosthenian age. |
Meter
The metre (or meter in US spelling; symbol: m) is the base unit of length in the International System of Units (SI). Since 2019, the metre has been defined as the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of of a second, where the second is defined by a hyperfine transition frequency of caesium. The metre was originally defined in 1791 by the French National Assembly as one ten-millionth of the distance from the equator to the North Pole along a great circle, so the Earth's polar circumference is approximately . In 1799, the metre was redefined in terms of a prototype metre bar. The bar used was changed in 1889, and in 1960 the metre was redefined in terms of a certain number of wavelengths of a certain emission line of krypton-86. The current definition was adopted in 1983 and modified slightly in 2002 to clarify that the metre is a measure of proper length. From 1983 until 2019, the metre was formally defined as the length of the path t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Retrorocket
A retrorocket (short for ''retrograde rocket'') is a rocket engine providing thrust opposing the motion of a vehicle, thereby causing it to decelerate. They have mostly been used in spacecraft, with more limited use in short-runway aircraft landing. New uses are emerging since 2010 for retro-thrust rockets in reusable launch systems. History Rockets were fitted to the nose of some models of the DFS 230, a World War II German Military glider. This enabled the aircraft to land in more confined areas than would otherwise be possible during an airborne assault. Another World War II development was the British Hajile project, initiated by the British Admiralty's Directorate of Miscellaneous Weapons Development. Originally a request from the British Army as a method to drop heavy equipment or vehicles from aircraft flying at high speeds and altitudes, the project turned out to be a disaster and was largely forgotten after the war. Although some of the tests turned out to be succe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Parking Orbit
A parking orbit is a temporary orbit used during the launch of a spacecraft. A launch vehicle follows a trajectory to the parking orbit, then coasts for a while, then engines fire again to enter the final desired trajectory. An alternative trajectory that is used on some missions is ''direct injection'', where the rocket fires continuously (except during staging) until its fuel is exhausted, ending with the payload on the final trajectory. This technique was first used by the Soviet Venera 1 mission to Venus in 1961. Reasons for use Geostationary spacecraft Geostationary spacecraft require an orbit in the plane of the equator. Getting there requires a geostationary transfer orbit with an apogee directly above the equator. Unless the launch site itself is quite close to the equator, it requires an impractically large amount of fuel to launch a spacecraft directly into such an orbit. Instead, the craft is placed with an upper stage in an inclined parking orbit. When the craft c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
