17 April 2012: Orbital Vehicle 103, the Space Shuttle Discovery, mounted to NASA 905, a Boeing 747-100 Shuttle Carrier Aircraft, arrived at Dulles International Airport.
On 19 April, Discovery was placed on display at the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center of the Smithsonian Institution National Air and Space Museum.
© 2016, Bryan R. Swopes
17 April 1970: Apollo 13 splashed down in the Pacific Ocean at S. 21° 38′ 24″, W. 165° 21′ 42″, southwest of American Samoa. The landing was just 4 miles (6.4 kilometers) from the recovery ship, USS Iwo Jima (LPH-2).
With their spacecraft crippled by an internal explosion on 13 April, the planned lunar landing mission had to be aborted. Astronauts James A. Lovell, Jr., John L. Swigert, Fred W. Haise, Jr., worked continuously with engineers at Mission Control, Houston, Texas, to overcome a series of crises that threatened their lives.
© 2018, Bryan R. Swopes
17 April 1970: Because of the unusual configuration of the Apollo 13 Command Module, Service Module and Lunar Module “stack” during the coast from the Moon back to Earth, an additional, unplanned, Mid-Course Correction burn, MCC-7, had to be carried out. The damage to the Service Module prevented the use of its 21,900 pounds thrust (97.42 kilonewtons) Aerojet General Service Propulsion System engine. It was necessary to use the LM’s Space Technology Laboratories (TRW) VTR-10 Descent Propulsion System engine. The DPS engine produced 10,500 pounds of thrust (46.71 kilonewtons). The maneuver had to be carried out manually by the astronauts from the LM’s cockpit.
Mission Commander Lovell visually aligned the spacecraft with the LM’s Reaction Control System thrusters, by sighting the Earth in his window of the LM. Once aligned, LM pilot Fred Haise conducted the burn, which was timed by CM pilot Jack Swigert.
Swigert timed the burn using his NASA-issued Omega Speedmaster Professional Chronograph, a very accurate manual wristwatch.
The Mid Course Correction ignition commenced at T+137:39:51.5 and the engine was cutoff at T+137:40:13.0 (12:52:51–12:53.13 UTC), for a duration of 21.5 seconds.
MCC-7 was performed at EI-5 hours (137:39 GET). The same manual piloting technique used for MCC-5 was used for control during MCC-7. This was manual crew pitch and roll control with the TTCA and automatic yaw control by the AGS. MCC-7 was performed with LM RCS using the +X translation push button. It steepened the flight path angle at EI to -6.49 degrees. After MCC-7, the crew maneuvered the spacecraft to the SM separation attitude. The CM re-entry RCS system was activated and a firing test of the thrusters was successful.
—“Apollo 13 Guidance, Navigation, and Control Challenges” by John L. Goodman, United Space Alliance. American Institute of Astronautics AIAA 2009-6455 at Page 23.
The Omega Speedmaster Professional Chronograph is a manual-winding analog wrist watch produced by Omega, a luxury brand of Société Suisse pour l’Industrie Horlogère, (SSIH) and now a part of the SWATCH Group. The case is made of stainless steel and has a diameter of 48 millimeters (1.89 inches). The Speedmaster Professional, which is also known as the “Moon Watch,” or “Speedy” to watch collectors, features a stop watch function and three sub dials for recording hours, minutes and seconds. The chronograph has a black dial with tritium-painted hands and hour marks. The bezel has a tachymeter for calculating speed based on time. When fully wound, the Speedmaster can run for up to 48 hours. The chronograph is water resistant to a depth of 50 meters (164 feet).
The Speedmaster’s crystal is not glass, but “hesalite,” a clear, scratch-resistant plastic. There had been concern that if a crystal broke during a space flight, glass fragments could be scattered throughout the weightless environment of the spacecraft, presenting a danger to the astronauts.
NASA provided Omega Speedmaster Professional Chronographs to Gemini and Apollo Program astronauts. Each watch was engraved with NASA’s two-digit serial number, and could be equipped with an adjustable length Velcro strap which allowed the watch to be worn on the outside of the space suit. NASA also assigned an equipment part number.
Jack Swigert’s watch, p/n SEB12100039-002, was NASA’s number 69. It is in the collection of the Smithsonian Institution National Air and Space Museum, as Catalog Number 1977-1181.000. In 2016, the watch was on display at the University of Colorado.
© 2019, Bryan R. Swopes
19 March–17 April 1964: Geraldine Fredritz (“Jerrie”) Mock landed her 1953 Cessna 180, Spirit of Columbus, N1538C, at Columbus, Ohio, completing a circumnavigation of the Earth she had begun at 9:31 a.m., 19 March 1964. Mock was the first woman to complete a circumnavigation by air.¹ Her journey covered 23,103 miles (36,964 kilometers). The total elapsed time was 29 days, 11 hours, 59 minutes. The flight set a Fédération Aéronautique Internationale (FAI) World Record for Speed Around the World, Eastbound, of 52.75 kilometers per hour (32.78 miles per hour).²
Jerrie Mock held twenty-two FAI world records, set between 1964 and 1969.
Cessna 180 serial number 30238 was built by the Cessna Aircraft Company, Inc., Wichita, Kansas, in 1953, and registered N1538C, the first year of production for the model. It was the 238th of 640 Model 180s that were built during the first year of production. 6,193 were built by the time production came to an end in 1986. N1538C was purchased for Jerrie Mock in 1963, with a total of 990 hours on the engine and airframe. The passenger seats were removed and replaced with additional fuel tanks. Additional radios and instruments were installed.
The Cessna Model 180 is an all-metal, four-place, single-engine, high-wing monoplane with fixed landing gear. It is 25 feet, 6 inches (7.772 meters) long with a wingspan of 36 feet, 2 inches (11.024 meters) and height of 7 feet, 6 inches (2.286 meters). If the optional rotating beacon is installed, the height is increased to 7 feet, 9 inches (2.362 meters). The Cessna 180 has an approximate empty weight of 1,525 pounds (692 kilograms), depending on installed equipment, and the maximum gross weight is 2,800 pounds (1,270 kilograms).
Spirit of Columbus is powered by an air-cooled, normally-aspirated 471.239-cubic-inch-displacement (7.722 liter) Continental O-470-A horizontally-opposed six-cylinder overhead valve (OHV) direct-drive engine with a compression ratio of 7:1. This engine is rated at 225 horsepower at 2,600 r.p.m., burning 80/87 aviation gasoline, and turns a two-bladed constant speed propellerwith a diameter of 6 feet, 10 inches (2.083 meters).
The airplane has a cruise speed of 162 miles per hour (261 kilometers per hour) at 6,500 feet (1,981 meters), and its maximum speed is 170 miles per hour (274 kilometers per hour) at Sea Level. Its service ceiling is 19,600 feet (5,974 meters). The Cessna 180 has a maximum fuel capacity of 84 gallons (318 liters), giving it an optimum range of 1,215 miles (1,955 kilometers) at 10,000 feet (3,048 meters) and 121 miles per hour (195 kilometers per hour).
After her around the world flight, Jerrie Mock never flew Spirit of Columbus again. Cessna exchanged it for a new six-place P206 Super Skylane, N155JM. For many years N1538C was hanging over a production line at the Cessna factory. Today, Mock’s Cessna 180 is on display at the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center, Smithsonian Institution National Air and Space Museum.
On 4 May 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson presented Jerrie Mock with the Federal Aviation Agency Gold Medal for Distinguished Service, and the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale awarded her its Louis Blériot Silver Medal.
Geraldine Lois Fredritz was born 22 November 1925 at Newark, Ohio. She was the first of three daughters of Timothy J. Fredritz, a clerk for a power company, and Blanche M. Wright Fredritz. Jerrie Fredritz graduated from Newark High School in 1943, then studied aeronautical engineering at Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio. She was a member of the Phi Mu (ΦΜ) sorority.
Miss Fredritz married Russell Charles Mock, 21 March 1945, in Cook County, Illinois. They would have three children, Valerie, Roger and Gary.
Jerrie Mock wrote about her around-the-world flight in Three Eight Charlie, published by Lippincott, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 1970.
Geraldine Fredritz Mock died at Qunicy, Florida, Monday, 30 September 2014, at the age of 88 years. She had requested that her ashes be spread over the Gulf of Mexico.
¹ The international organization for flight records, the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale, requires that a circumnavigation cross all meridians in one direction and be at least the length of the Tropic of Cancer, 22,858.729 miles (36,787.559 kilometers).
² FAI Record File Number 3526
© 2019, Bryan R. Swopes
17 April 1956: Lockheed Aircraft Corporation rolled out the very first production F-104A Starfighter, 55-2956, at Air Force Plant 42, Palmdale, California. This airplane, one of the original seventeen pre-production YF-104As, incorporated many improvements over the XF-104 prototype, the most visible being a longer fuselage.
Once the configuration was finalized, 55-2956 was the first YF-104A converted to the F-104A production standard. In this photograph, the F-104’s secret engine intakes are covered by false fairings.
The Lockheed F-104A Starfighter was a single-place, single-engine supersonic interceptor. It was designed by a team lead by the legendary Clarence L. “Kelly” Johnson. The F-104A was 54 feet, 8 inches (16.662 meters) long with a wingspan of 21 feet, 9 inches (6.629 meters) and overall height of 13 feet, 5 inches (4.089 meters). It had an empty weight of 13,184 pounds (5,980.2 kilograms), combat weight of 17,988 pounds (8,159.2 kilograms), gross weight of 22,614 pounds (10,257.5 kilograms) and a maximum takeoff weight of 25,840 pounds (11,720.8 kilograms). Internal fuel capacity was 897 gallons (3,395.5 liters).
The F-104A was powered by a single General Electric J79-GE-3A engine, a single-spool axial-flow afterburning turbojet, which used a 17-stage compressor and 3-stage turbine. The J79-GE-3A is rated at 9,600 pounds of thrust (42.70 kilonewtons), and 15,000 pounds (66.72 kilonewtons) with afterburner. The engine is 17 feet, 3.5 inches (5.271 meters) long, 3 feet, 2.3 inches (0.973 meters) in diameter, and weighs 3,325 pounds (1,508 kilograms).
The F-104A had a maximum speed of 1,037 miles per hour (1,669 kilometers per hour) at 50,000 feet (15,240 meters). Its stall speed was 198 miles per hour (319 kilometers per hour). The Starfighter’s initial rate of climb was 60,395 feet per minute (306.8 meters per second) and its service ceiling was 64,795 feet (19,750 meters).
Armament was one General Electric M61 Vulcan six-barreled revolving cannon with 725 rounds of 20 mm ammunition. An AIM-9B Sidewinder heat-seeking air-to-air missile could be carried on each wing tip, or a jettisonable fuel tank with a capacity of 141.5 gallons (535.6 liters).
Lockheed built 153 of the F-104A Starfighter initial production version. A total of 2,578 F-104s of all variants were produced by Lockheed and its licensees, Canadair, Fiat, Fokker, MBB, Messerschmitt, Mitsubishi and SABCA. By 1969, the F-104A had been retired from service. The last Starfighter, an Aeritalia-built F-104S ASA/M of the Aeronautica Militare Italiana, was retired in October 2004.
This Starfighter, 55-2956, was converted to a JF-104A with specialized instrumentation. It was transferred to the U.S. Navy to test AIM-9 Sidewinder missiles at Naval Ordnance Test Station (NOTS) China Lake, approximately 55 miles (88 kilometers) north-northeast of Edwards Air Force Base in the high desert of Southern California. 55-2956 was damaged beyond repair when it lost power on takeoff and ran off the runway at Armitage Field, 15 June 1959.
©2019, Bryan R. Swopes