Apollo: The Race Against Time

Cool -- thanks, Bob!

Thanks for the heads up, Bob. Will be sure to tune in.

Yikes! That sucks.

I caught the show, and it was well worth watching. It features the interviews with Gene Kranz, Buzz Aldrin, and Eugene Cernan. Personally, I found it quite informative and entertaining. It's quite remarkable to think that a behemoth such as the Saturn V could endure punishment of launching into space, but that father time and Mother nature could wreak such havoc upon it. Particularly fascinating, however, was how they dwell upon the fact that these machines were designed and built by HAND, not with the benefit of computer aided engineering and other such technology that is so prevalent in today's space program.

Mother Nature and Father Time raise mountain ranges and then grind them to dust. A Saturn V doesn't stand a chance against them.

Mario

I was struck by the hand work too, but that may be because we're used to items that are mass produced. Designing a custom robot to weld fenders on 150,000 Chevys doesn't scale down to building 15 disposable moon rockets.

For a fun exercise, someone should figure out how much design time went into the B-2 bomber. With production cut to only 21 planes, I'll bet it's more hours than the entire fleet will ever spend in the air...

The B-2 is a national treasure. It is hard to believe that they would ever put such a treasure in harms way.

I missed it! Anyone know if there's any scheduled re-broadcasts soon?

No, You missed it twice!

Three times.

Once last night in prime time, again at midnight, then again early this morning.

David Erbas-White

As further follow-up, there will be a show (two hours) called "Failure is Not An Option II" at 9PM tonight -- a sequel to "Failure is Not An Option".

David Erbas-White

"Failure is Not An Option" is on right now.

Oops, I failed to catch this show too!

Similar to a "legend" I had read, regarding the Eastern DC-3 in the National Air and Space Museum. Supposedly, as they were lifting it to its present place aloft, inside the museum, it broke loose, falling about 20' to the floor below. Surprisingly, this was supposedly no more tragic than a typical hard landing, for such an aircraft. Is there any truth to this anecdote?

Huh? It's a firggin bomber.

Phil,

Did you even GO to school?

Or are you still in grade school?

I have to agree with Phil on this one. The B2 is a workhorse, the B2 is a bomber, the B2 is part of our national defense, it was designed that way. The 5-8 remaining B-17s are national treasures (mostly because our govnernment only saw them as scrap) Fifi is a national treasure......the B2s have a job to do. We'll get sentimental when they are retired for the B-8. Of course the CAF will have a really tough time keeping one B2 in the air if/when they are ever awarded one, for scrap prices.

Chuck

Appaently not by your standards.

So when a bomber is used to attack another country, it is in harms way. WOuldn't you expect another country that is being attacked by a B2 to try to fight back? You said they shouldn't be put in harms way. Gravity combined with the earth's surface will break one. Maybe they shouldn't even be flown. Who's a bone head?

You are, bonehead.

You can't even spell THAT correctly, let alone "firggin". Let alone "appaently".

If you want your views taken seriously, learn how to express them correctly, you firggin moron.

Gus

Gus