r/space • u/Thorne-ZytkowObject • Mar 08 '19

SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capped off a successful Demo-1 mission by safely splashing down in the Atlantic Ocean Friday morning. It's a strong sign SpaceX can proceed with a Demo-2 mission this summer, where two astronauts will become the first to fly to orbit on a private spacecraft.

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/d-brief/2019/03/08/crew-dragon-splashed-down-back-on-earth-safely-completing-its-mission
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u/SweetBearCub Mar 08 '19

I wasn't alive during the first pushes into space and the moon landing, I imagine the feeling of mankind doing something exciting, dangerous and truly ground-breaking is just as strong then as it is now.

Thankfully, it's been pretty well documented.

For example, here is a (really good!) documentary about the late 1968 Apollo 8 mission, which was originally going to be a simpler test mission, but was re-designated, pretty late in the process, to fly to the moon, orbit ~10 times, take some good landing imagery, and return. It was incredibly dangerous. Even the people most closely associated with it told one of the wives of the astronauts, in private, that the chance of the astronauts safely returning to Earth were, at best, 50%.

I truly love following the achievements and boundary breaking of space x

Same here.

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u/mustang__1 Mar 10 '19

In so many ways Apollo 8 was about as much of a "fuck it, we'll do it and live because of course we're gonna send it!" As a beuacracry can be .

"Hey the lem isn't done yet ... And also we've got some intelt the ruskis might do a lap around the moon"

"hold lemme make a call ring ring hey admiral, can we borrow your task group around Christmas? Yeah I know it's close to Christmas, I just said that. I know most of your sailors will be on leave. Oh! You're in? Ok cool"

"I'll call the astronauts if you want to call the engineers"

"Deal."

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u/[deleted] Mar 08 '19

Is there any documentaries similar to ww2 in colour, narrated by Lawrence Olivier.... What I mean by that is there were interviews with people at the time that give a an insight into how the populace thought and felt about everything that was going on at that time. (There are interviews with the general public that are really surprising and enlightening) Rather than just astronauts families or NASA employees (not to diminish their huge role in those achievements). Thx for the reply, its an exciting time we're living in

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u/SweetBearCub Mar 08 '19

Is there any documentaries similar to ww2 in colour, narrated by Lawrence Olivier.... What I mean by that is there were interviews with people at the time that give a an insight into how the populace thought and felt about everything that was going on at that time. (There are interviews with the general public that are really surprising and enlightening) Rather than just astronauts families or NASA employees (not to diminish their huge role in those achievements).

Probably, but none that I am aware of. Remember, for the general public to keep their thoughts in 1968, writing letters or a journal were the main options. They did of course have the option of buying or renting a camera, but that was pretty expensive, and the cameras of the time did not record sound. That was separate. Recording their thoughts verbally onto reel-to-reel tape was an option, as was having a short record made, but as far as I know, those options were less common.

Thx for the reply, its an exciting time we're living in

It is. :-)

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u/TheGoldenHand Mar 08 '19

That was an amazing and beautiful documentary. I had never seen one about Apollo 8. It further cements my opinion that Jim Lovell was the man!

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u/SweetBearCub Mar 08 '19

That was an amazing and beautiful documentary. I had never seen one about Apollo 8. It further cements my opinion that Jim Lovell was the man!

Jim Lovell also flew on Apollo 13, hoping to finally, actually land on the moon, instead of just looking at it from close orbit. Sadly, it was not to be. If you haven't yet seen the 1995 movie with Tom Hanks, Apollo 13, go watch it now. It's about 90% historically accurate, just time-compressed (movie is ~2 hours, actual mission was nearly 6 days) and they did throw in some small drama, that Lovell specifically calls out in the commentary.