Apollo 8

And at 88 hours, 51 minutes, we show Loss of Signal with the spacecraft. Our next communications with Apollo 8 should come in about 37 minutes. We are now about 28 minutes prior to our Trans-Earth Injection maneuver. As the spacecraft went over the horizon, Capsule Communicator Ken Mattingly passed along, for the second time, the word that all systems are Go. And we got a very terse 'Roger' back from the spacecraft. At 88 hours, 52 minutes into the flight; this is Apollo Control, Houston.

This is Apollo Control, Houston at 89 hours, 19 minutes into the flight. We're now less than 30 seconds to the scheduled time of ignition for the maneuver to start Apollo 8 on its course back to Earth. In the last 15 seconds, prior to ignition, the crew will be burning their Service Propulsion System - rather the Reaction Control System engines to settle propellants. And here in Mission Control Center, we have just counted down to the burn. We should have ignition at this time. That will be a 3-minute and 18-second burn nominally. It will increase the spacecraft velocity by about 3,522 feet per second or some 2,395 miles per hour. Following the maneuver, The spacecraft should have a velocity of about 8,800 feet per second - some 6,000 miles per hour. And here in Mission Control, it is relatively quiet, as it has been since we lost communications with the spacecraft as they went over the Moon's horizon. At this point, flight controllers here in Mission Control, as with the rest of the world, they are waiting.

Coming up in just a few seconds now, we should have shutdown of the Service Propulsion System engine on the spacecraft. That should have occurred at 89 hours - or rather will be occurring at 89 hours, 22 minutes, 34 seconds. Actually, we are just a little less than a minute from that event. And the clock here in Mission Control Center that is counting down to the time when we will reacquire the spacecraft shows that we have 6 minutes, 30 seconds until reacquisition.

At this point, the SPS engine should be shut down and we will now be waiting for the spacecraft to come over the lunar horizon and give us a report on their status. We now show 5 minutes, 45 seconds until reacquistion.

This is Apollo Control, Houston at 89 hours, 26 minutes. Flight Director Milton Windler has just advised flight - his flight control team here in Mission Control Center that we have less than 3 minutes now until reacquisition of the spacecraft and he requested that they monitor their consoles, get prepared to reacquire and to get a status from the crew. [Pause.]

This is Apollo Control, Houston. We now show less than 30 seconds until reacquistion. We'll stand by for the first words from the Apollo 8 crew as they come over the lunar horizon, and into acquisition.

We have RF signal, and there's a little bit of a cheer going up from the flight controllers here. We should be hearing from the crew shortly.

Our station at Honeysuckle, Australia, reports that we do have a radio signal from the spacecraft. They're having a bit of trouble locking up at this point, to the point where we can get voice communication from the crew.

This is Mission Control, Houston. Our Flight Dynamics Officer says that burn is good.

This is Apollo Control. We continue to get a great deal of noise coming from our site at Honeysuckle, Australia. However, the pertinent information has been received, and that is that the maneuver, the Trans-Earth Injection maneuver, was very close to nominal. Flight Dynamics Officer expressed his pleasure with it and - stand by, here's a call to the crew.

This is Apollo Control at 89 hours, 51 minutes. And in here Mission Control Center, we're continuing to assess the effects of that maneuver, and we're just in the process now of playing back the tape data of the burn. Of course, that maneuver occurring on the back side of the Moon, we were unable to monitor as it occurred. We're now looking at the results that we would have seen had we been able to receive communications from the spacecraft as the burn occurred. We just put in a call to the crew. Here is that conversation.

This is Houston. Our capsule communicator in that last exchange was astronaut Donald K. Slayton, Chief of Flight Crew Operations here at the Manned Spacecraft Center.

Shortly after we acquired the spacecraft and established communications with the crew, here in the Control Center, our big display up in the front changed from a lunar map to an Earth map and the colors on it are red and green. We also had a Christmas tree brought in and it's now standing down in the front of the Control Center. It looks like it stands about 6 feet tall and it's decorated with lights and tinsel and with a big blue ornament up on top.

That rendition of The Night Before Christmas was read up to the crew by astronaut Harrison Schmitt - Jack Schmitt - who worked with Lovell quite extensively prior to the mission in going over the lunar sightings and the photography that he would do in lunar orbit. At 90 hours, 3 minutes into the flight; this is Apollo Control.

This is Apollo Control, Houston at 90 hours, 18 minutes. Our displays here in Mission Control are now beginning to show the effects of that Trans-Earth Injection maneuver. We show an altitude above the Moon at this time of 2,802 nautical miles [5,189 km]. Our spacecraft velocity is 6,050 feet per second [1,844 m/s], and slowing. And our weight following that maneuver is now 32,180 pounds [14,597 kg]. On board the spacecraft at the present time, the crew is finishing up some last minute activities connected with onboard navigation and then they plan to get a little bit of rest, Frank Borman is scheduled to be in a sleep period at this time. And we've had some indications from the crew that Lovell and Anders also hope to get a little bit of rest as soon as possible. We have some brief conversations with the crew that we've recorded since our previous report; we'll play those back for you now, and then stand by briefly for any live communications with the spacecraft.

This is Apollo Control, Houston at 90 hours, 50 minutes into the flight of Apollo 8. At the present time our spacecraft is at an altitude above the Moon of 4,504 nautical miles [8,341 km] and traveling at a speed of 5,645 feet per second [1,721 m/s]. We've heard very little from the crew since our last report. We do have a couple of brief exchanges on tape, and we'll play those back for you and then stand by for any conversation.

This is Apollo Control. We're expecting Capsule Communicator Ken Mattingly to put in a call to the crew shortly. While we wait for that, we'll pass along some information that we've been requested to gather, and also some additional information on the results of that Trans-Earth Injection maneuver. The Trans-Earth Injection burn occurred on time. It lasted for 3 minutes and 23 seconds. We had originally estimated that it would last about 3 minutes, 18 seconds. We obtained almost precisely the amount of velocity change from that burn that had been planned. The figure that we have at this point is a velocity change of 3,522.8 feet per second. We'd been shooting for 3,522.3 feet per second. So we would only have been off about 5/10 of a foot per second. As a result of that maneuver, our current figure is that splash will occur in the mid-Pacific at 147 hours, 4 minutes, 59 seconds. That's a very precise figure and I doubt it will continue to hold true through the coast phase and trajectory analysis that will be done en route back to Earth. We do anticipate that figure will change. Coming up at 100 hours, 47 minutes, 47 seconds Ground Elapsed Time, we'll be going through the change in the sphere of influence. This will be the point at which the Moon's gravity ceases to be the dominant influence on the spacecraft. That will also be the point at which the spacecraft will reach its minimum inertial velocity and then start to accelerate toward Earth. This will occur at an altitude above the Moon of 33,821 nautical miles [62,636 km] and at that point will be 175,528 [nautical] miles [325,078 km] from Earth. The velocity at that point will be 4,839 feet per second [1,475 m/s] with respect to the Moon. And it will be 4,176 feet per second [1,273 m/s] with respect to Earth. We also were requested to pass along some figures on altitude and velocity at the beginning of the Trans-Earth Injection maneuver and at the end of that maneuver. At the beginning of the maneuver, our velocity was about 5,350 feet per second [1,631 m/s], and following the maneuver, our velocity was 8,841 feet per second [2,695 m/s]. Our altitude at the beginning of the Trans-Earth Injection maneuver was 60 nautical miles [111.1 km] above the surface of the Moon. And at the conclusion of that maneuver, 3 minutes and 23 seconds later, it was 66.5 nautical miles [123.2 km]. At the present time our altitude above the Moon is 4,876 nautical miles [9,030 km] and our velocity is 5,587 feet per second [1,703 m/s] and continuing to decrease very gradually. We are still anticipating sometime in the near future a call to the crew and we'll pick back up again when that comes through. This is Apollo Control at 90 hours, 58 minutes into the flight of Apollo 8.

This is Apollo Control at 91 hours, 22 minutes. Since our last report, we've had a couple of brief conversations with the crew. They indicated that they were very tired and had perhaps gotten about 2 hours of sleep prior to the Trans-Earth Injections maneuver. Frank Borman advised that he and Jim Lovell were going to attempt to get some sleep shortly and that Bill Anders would stand watch while they were getting some sleep and then when one of them awoke, Bill would get some sleep. We'll play back that tape for you and then stand by as our Capsule Communicator puts in a call to the crew.

This is Mission Control, Houston at 91 hours, 31 minutes. Our spacecraft is at an altitude of 6,673 nautical miles [12,358 km] above the Moon and we're traveling at a speed of 5,375 feet per second [1,639 m/s]. Appears that we're going to have no further communication with the spacecraft at this time and we'll take the circuit down and come back up when next we reestablish contact or with a periodic status report.

This is Apollo Control at 92 hours, 8 minutes into the flight of Apollo 8. And at the present time our spacecraft is at an altitude of 8,545 nautical miles above the Moon, traveling at a speed of some 5,238 feet per second. It's been some time since we've heard from any of the crewmen. At about 91 hours, 25 minutes, we had a report from the spacecraft that Commander Frank Borman and Jim Lovell, Command Module Pilot, would be attempting to get some sleep. And Bill Anders was to stand watch. We do have a small amount of tape of previous conversations that we've had since our last report. We'll play that back for you now.