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The Newsletter of the Barnard-Seyfert Astronomical Society

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The Newsletter of the Barnard-Seyfert Astronomical Society June TheECLIPSE 2020 The Newsletter of the Barnard-Seyfert Astronomical Society From the President It’s been another long, strange month. Lots of things have been happening that aren’t in the Next Membership Meeting: realm of astronomy and I have been distracted by Stay tuned to the BSAS Google Group it all. As you know, we haven’t had a meeting in a or Night Sky Network email for couple of months, and I am really starting to miss information about future meetings. the meetings. It is nice to get out of the house and socialize with people that share a common interest. Hopefully this month is the month that we can come together as a group and get back into a new normal routine. Watch for emails and Facebook updates regarding the monthly meeting. Last month did have a big space event with the In this Issue: launch of the SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule to the Happy Birthday Pete Conrad ISS late in the month. It marks a return to U.S. byRobinByrne 3 spaceflight and NASA working with private corporations to get astronauts into space. I hope Summer Triangle Corner: Vega you had a chance to watch the launch on TV or by David Prosper and VivianWhite 8 the Internet, it was very exciting to see. I have not been around long enough to remember the Apollo BSAS Board Minutes launch days, but it did bring back memories of the May6,2020 10 shuttle launches for me. I hope this gets America excited about space travel again and brings back Membership Information 13 talk of getting people to the moon. Like I said earlier, I missed the Apollo days and having another set of moon launches would be spectacular. Jupiter and Saturn are continuing their close dance getting ready for their conjunction at year end. Tiny Pluto is also near the two gas giants, just over one degree southwest of Jupiter. It is a challenging object to find and one that I have only confirmed by comparing images over multiple BSASNashville.com Continued on page 11 TheECLIPSE-June2020 2 Officers Keith Rainey President [email protected] Tom Beckermann Vice President [email protected] Bud Hamblen Secretary [email protected] Theo Wellington Treasurer [email protected] Gary Eaton Ex-officio [email protected] Directors at Large Chip Crossman [email protected] A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket soars upward after lifting off from historic Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Thomas Gaudin May 30, 2020, carrying NASA astronauts Robert Behnken and Douglas [email protected] Hurley to the International Space Station in a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule for the agency’s SpaceX Demo-2 mission. Liftoff occurred at Drew Gilmore 3:22 p.m. EDT. Behnken and Hurley are the first astronauts to launch [email protected] from U.S. soil to the space station since the end of the Space Shuttle K.C. Katalbas Program in 2011. Part of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, this will be [email protected] SpaceX’s final flight test, paving the way for the agency to certify the crew transportation system for regular, crewed flights to the orbiting Andy Reeves laboratory. Credit:NASA/Tony Gray and Tim Powers [email protected] Kathy Underwood [email protected] NM F Q FM L Q June 21 June 28 June 5 June 13 July 20 July 27 July 4 July 12 TheECLIPSE-June2020 3 Happy Birthday Pete Conrad by Robin Byrne This month we honor the life of a man who made several contributions to the space program - all with a wicked sense of humor. Charles Peter “Pete” Conrad, Jr. was born June 2, 1930 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. His family was well-off, but had a reversal of fortune due to the Great Depression. They lost their house, and moved into a small cottage, paid for by his mother’s brother. Pete’s father was so devastated by his failure, he left his family. As a schoolboy, Pete was considered to be smart, but he always struggled in his classes. It turns out that he suffered from dyslexia, a condition barely understood at the time. Pete attended a private school, which several generations of his family had attended. After his family lost their money, his uncle continued to pay for his tuition. Sadly, because of his struggles with dyslexia, Pete failed his Junior year of High School and was expelled. Pete’s mother believed in him and found a school that was able to teach Pete techniques to cope with his disability. Armed with his new coping skills, Pete finished school with honors, and was awarded a full Navy ROTC scholarship to attend Princeton University. When Pete was only 15 years old, he got a job at the Paoli Airfield, asking to be paid not with cash, but with time in their airplanes and flight lessons. He started doing odd jobs around the airfield, but soon was working on the planes, doing basic maintenance work. When he was 16, one of the flight instructors had to make an emergency landing 100 miles away. Pete drove out to him and was able to repair the plane. From that point on, the flight instructor gave Pete the flight lessons needed to earn his pilot’s license. While in college, majoring in Aeronautical Engineering, Conrad continued to fly. It was while at Princeton that Conrad met and began dating Jane DuBose, who was attending nearby Bryn Mawr. It was Jane’s father who dubbed him “Pete” (his family had always called him Peter). In 1953, Conrad graduated with a B.S. degree and was immediately commissioned as an Ensign in the Navy. Also in that year, Pete and Jane got married. They would have four sons over the next seven years. Continued on next page TheECLIPSE-June2020 4 Pete Conrad, continued Conrad’s first stop in the Navy was Pensacola, Florida for flight training. By 1954, Conrad was a Naval Aviator and became a fighter pilot. He served in many capacities, including as a flight instructor. Then Conrad was accepted to the Naval Test Pilot School in Maryland. Among his classmates were two other future astronauts: Wally Schirra and Jim Lovell. In 1958, Conrad graduated and was named as a Project Test Pilot. Over the course of his career, Conrad logged over 6500 hours of flight time, with over 5000 hours in jets. Conrad was almost one of the original Mercury astronauts. In 1958, he was asked to participate in the selection process. Many of the tests the original astronauts had to endure were fairly outrageous, and Conrad’s rebellious sense of humor took over. Part of the screening included looking at ink blots and describing what they saw. For one of the ink blots, Conrad described in great detail a lurid sex scene that he “saw.” In another test, he was given a blank white sheet and asked to describe what image was on it. He turned it over and said, “It’s upside down.” To deliver a requested stool sample, Conrad put it in a box tied up with a ribbon. When he had reached his limit with the tests, Conrad made his statement in no unconditional terms - he dropped a full enema bag on the commanding officer’s desk and then walked out. Not too surprisingly, Conrad’s application was denied. Included with the rejection was a note saying “not suitable for long duration flight.” That would ultimately be proven to be very wrong. Four years later, after the success of the Mercury Program, and in response to Kennedy’s goal of landing a man on the Moon before the end of the decade, Project Gemini was about to begin. That meant needing a new batch of astronauts. Conrad’s friend Al Shepard, America’s first man in space, suggested Conrad should apply again. The tests they were put through this time were much more reasonable, so Conrad was more cooperative. On September 17, 1962, Pete Conrad became a member of the “New Nine” astronauts. Among the training the new astronauts endured were: jungle survival, geology lessons, water egress from the spacecraft, physicals, and endless hours in flight simulators. Conrad was considered one of the best pilots in his group, so it wasn’t surprising that he would be given one of the first Gemini flights. His first mission was in 1965 aboard Gemini 5 as the Pilot, with one of the original Mercury astronauts, Gordon Cooper, as the Commander. During their flight, they set an endurance record of eight days, which beat the Russian record at the time of five days. Eight days was considered the minimum amount of time for a mission to the Moon, so they proved a Moon mission was possible, at least in terms of the health of the astronauts. This flight was the first to use fuel cells as the power source. They also tested the radar guidance system, as Continued on next page TheECLIPSE-June2020 5 Pete Conrad, continued well as taking photographs of the Earth. All in all, the mission was a complete success. Conrad’s next mission, in 1966, would be as the Commander of Gemini 11, with Dick Gordon as the Pilot. During the mission, they successfully docked with an Aegena Target Vehicle. Docking in space was a key milestone needed to be met before we could send people to the Moon. After the docking, they used the Aegena rocket to boost their orbit to a higher altitude from Earth. This mission still holds the record of being the highest of any orbital mission, at an apogee (farthest point from Earth) of 851 miles.
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