History in the First Person: Building the Mercury Capsule

Рет қаралды 54,980

10 жыл бұрын

HEC-TV's “History in the First Person: Is an instructional/educational series that brings history alive taught by those who witnessed history, lived history and/or made history. For this episode, “Building the Mercury Capsule”, we partnered with the St. Louis Science Center, NASA and The Missouri Aviation Historical Society. Viewers get the rare opportunity to learn about the genius that launched NASA. Through the first hand accounts from the Mercury Mission engineers, Illustrated by historical NASA film footage and rare still images, we find out how out how these engineering pioneers designed, built and launched the first manned spacecraft using a slide ruler. The year was 1963, fifty years before advanced computer technology, as we know it today. It was an era of the Space Race between the United States and Russia. It was and exciting time in history, the birth of space exploration. Fifty years later, we get a once in a lifetime opportunity to witness the engineer’s raw emotion as they share their feelings about viewing the historical real-time footage of the Mercury Capsule’s risky launch and it’s successful re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere. This program offers an engaging interactive classroom experience for STEM studies with HEC-TV's free teacher curriculum materials and suggested classroom activities that are posted at www.hectv.org to accompany this episode, “History in the First Person: Building the Mercury Capsule.” Hosted by Tim Gore.

Пікірлер: 67

@petercyr3508 3 жыл бұрын

Used a slide rule in high school till 1974. HP calculator at Ga Tech 1975 on. Been an aerospace engineer 41 years now.

@aceventura4892 3 жыл бұрын

Not so subtle brag.

@tarful58 7 жыл бұрын

Wow!! So awesome to meet and hear the engineers talk about the history and building of the Mercury Space Capsule!! Brilliant men!!!!!!!

@dodo1opps 5 жыл бұрын

While I was in graduate school at Wichita State University, I had the good fortune to read a paper John Glenn wrote on the Mercury capsule. It was called "Seven Miles of Wire and a swizzle stick."

@BumKnuckle 3 жыл бұрын

My dad went to Wichita State.

@jmjaxson Жыл бұрын

How How How I love this stuff. IT's wonderful hearing from the people who were behind the spotlights.

@Strelnikov10 4 жыл бұрын

I thought movies like "Apollo 13", "First Man", and "The Right Stuff" were excellent movies... but I sure wish they'd make more movies about guys like this. I think the engineering feats achieved from the late 50's to late 60's were absolutely worthy of a major motion picture. These were the true adventurers. I think it would really aid in inspiring the youth as well.

@jeffgordon9103 3 жыл бұрын

I was 1 when this all went down. I always tell my my mother you lived through the most patriotic and exciting post war time Era.

@jeffgordon9103 3 жыл бұрын

You are wonderful men . Thank you .

@GeoffBernard 7 жыл бұрын

The host of this show is amazing. Perfect mix of advanced questions with explanations. This was a great video explaining the history of this groundbreaking spacecraft presented for the modern times. My daughter went to a STEM Academy and it's made all the difference for her. Thank you for sharing this.

@kennethbutler1343 5 жыл бұрын

Ha! Those are EL 34 vacuum tubes; that's what my Marshall (guitar) amp uses in the power amp section! Almost 60 years later they're still in use...

@RWBHere 5 жыл бұрын

EL34's were built like bricks. I've even seen them used in radio transmitters, in conjunction with PL 504's - which were designed as TV line output valves.

@TheMaineSurveyor 5 жыл бұрын

Right on, Kenneth! Can't beat the sound of an amp that uses tubes and a wooden cabinet! If it ain't broke, don't fix it!

@IncurZeAwperator 4 жыл бұрын

I bought a dsl40c a bit ago

@guitarman4242 3 жыл бұрын

In my Deluxe Reverb Amp as well I believe

@paulw176 4 жыл бұрын

when i was 5/6 YO I watched the Mercury shots on TV. I couldn't believe anyone was brave enough to ride those big bullets into space -

@sblack48 Жыл бұрын

Guitar players know all about vacuum tubes. We still use ‘em!

@alimcmellon7130 3 жыл бұрын

Wish this guy would let his guests talk more

@thetreblerebel 3 жыл бұрын

I've loved the ST LOUIS Science Center since I was a boy... Especially the space and sci Fi exhibits they had. Including a Gemini or Mercury capsule.

@AZAce1064 3 жыл бұрын

Thank you❤️👍🇺🇸

@RWBHere 5 жыл бұрын

Thanks for a fascinating insight into the history of the Mercury missions. They made the Space Race viable.

@JacquiPoor 3 жыл бұрын

You're welcome and we'll share your comment with them.

@tanthiennguyen713 3 жыл бұрын

Vielen Dank allen Opas + Omas....Vätern & Müttern.....Inkekn + Tanten.....Brüdern & Schwestern Mission Erfogt haben......Ich lerne immer noch......

@wiz-of-gnosis5242 3 жыл бұрын

Small correction - the red stone rocket was not an icbm it was an intermediate range ballistic missile..

@JeffreyOrnstein 5 жыл бұрын

This is great, thanks!

@paulw176 4 жыл бұрын

i used to swim around the old BDA tracking station when we landed at NAS Bermuda for our alerts during the early 80's Cold War. Very cool old stuff - abandoned for the most part -

@w9gb 3 жыл бұрын

SpaceX and NASA (for Antares/Cygnus launches from Wallops) have reactivated/updated Bermuda tracking. ESA is actually using, as well, for Polar launches from French Guiana.

@seumasnatuaighe 5 жыл бұрын

My slide rule could do a lot more than multiply and divide but it was German. BTW, the English had a vacuum tube computer called Colossus in WW2 for Lorenz decryption. The Soviets were still using Lorenz up to the 1960s.

@martinda7446 7 жыл бұрын

Fascinating, thanks.

@katiemetzger3286 3 жыл бұрын

How did the astronaut take a dump in the Mercury space craft?

@SuperBowser87 8 жыл бұрын

Brilliant

@JacquiPoor 7 жыл бұрын

Thank you Tom. Appreciate the feedback.

@rpcomms1 8 жыл бұрын

Awesome program thanks

@JacquiPoor 7 жыл бұрын

You're certainly welcome. We're glad you enjoyed it. We appreciate your comment..

@rpcomms1 7 жыл бұрын

Its just a shame all that work now has of in one way been put to one side on that capsule design. I would love to see a updated capsule for civillian space,for low cost space a revamp mercury or gemini to just get up there,take what you've already done and just improve the engineering slightly to bring up to date.The russians have been doing engineering that way for years,keeps cost low and tooling a space capsule lower cost. They got all the data on this design still? Great programme was nice to actually see the engineers involved finally.

@dcb1138 7 жыл бұрын

Space X-Dragon

@lelonfurr4583 4 жыл бұрын

was stve yr old and i have watched every merc gem and apo lift off broadcast live mom even let me stay home to watch them from school

@patton303 3 жыл бұрын

She perhaps should have made you go to school, bro.

@laynegraham1258 3 жыл бұрын

The host of the show, Tim Gore, starts right off with an error when he says, “May 1961, Alan Shepard sits in a Mercury capsule atop an ICBM rocket …” The Redstone wasn’t an ICBM. ICBM stands for “Intercontinental Ballistic Missile,” and the Redstone didn’t have enough power to have intercontinental range. It was classified as an SRBM, or “Short Range Ballistic Missile.” The Atlas rocket that launched the Mercury orbital flights was an ICBM.

@JacquiPoor 3 жыл бұрын

Thank you for the correction Layne.

@danielneuenschwander7381 3 жыл бұрын

I almost want to say to the host, but this is now years after, "that sir is a spacecraft!"

@nicholasmaude6906 3 жыл бұрын

I wonder how many of these engineers are still alive as it has been seven years since this video was posted and the last Mercury flight was 58 years ago.

@JacquiPoor 3 жыл бұрын

All three of these brilliant and sweet men on this program are still alive.

@InterdimensionalWiz 2 жыл бұрын

WHAT SIZE AND SPEED WAS THE COMPUTER ON BOARD?

@5Andysalive 6 жыл бұрын

Amazing to realise there weren't trackign stations that just forwarded the com from mission control. They all had their own little team of eecom and capcom and they had to deal with problems themselves. Only connected with main mission control via something called teletype which manged about 20 words per minute. And sometimes getting to these remote sites for a Mercury flight was quite an adventure. When we think about shiny hi-tech Nasa we don't imagine at what almost primitive level they operated in these early days. How evyerythign was new and unknown and nothing could be taken for granted. That also ridicules conspiracy theories. The idea that NAsa in it's absolute technical infancy was able to hide and cover up things is plain silly. They just about managed the actual program. Nasa was founded, organised and grew parallel to MErcury. And that doesn't really change towards Apollo. The missions and programs always remained at the absolute upper limit of what they were capable to do. NAsa grew ahead of these programs but just about. There simply was not the time, organisation, technology or capacity to run several things at once. And frankyl not the perfect organisation to run a second, hidden space program (which it effectibely would have to be). And back to the initial point, even with growing com infrastructure towards Apollo, the communication technology was (just about) good enough for the missions. It was ironically not good enough for faking a moon landing. You need a massive amount of millenials tech "logic" if you want to imagine a possible way to even fool the general public for 5 minutes. And that's on top of whole mountain ranges of thechnical and physical contradictions.

@RWBHere 5 жыл бұрын

Mechanical Teletype machines could run reliably over radio links at up to about 150 baud. That equated to about 360 wpm for 5-bit code, and 257 wpm for 7-bit code. With spaces, that's about 217 wpm; a very fast talking speed.. Even at the slowest teleprinter speed, 45.45 baud, which was prevalent at the time, that gives about 78 words per minute if 7-bit code is used. A word is defined as an average of 5 characters. Allowing for 1 character spaces, that 78 drops to a minimum of about 65 wpm. That's a steady talking speed, about the same as a long distance phone call at the time. Thank goodness for the improvements in communications since then! We can get faster data speeds from Mars today. I watched the live stream of the Apollo 11 landing, some of it direct from Parkes, when at school in Sydney, N.S.W. Their feed was significantly better than the signals sent to NASA's communications HQ, and then streamed worldwide. I never saw a recording which was anything close to the (not brilliant) quality of the live event. In no way could any of that have been faked. The technology at the time was simply not good enough to fool anyone. Video recordings were pretty poor, compared to the technology of even ten years later.

@jshepard152 6 жыл бұрын

2:45 Start here.

@lylewyant3356 3 жыл бұрын

my first experience was during Gemini. Was not even in kindergarten...

@katiemetzger3286 3 жыл бұрын

How did the astronaut take a dump in the Mercury space craft?

@MrShobar 5 жыл бұрын

Pure oxygen in the cabin environment WAS NOT hazardous. It was only pressurized to the partial pressure of oxygen at sea level. About 3 psi.

@jimhallibm 5 жыл бұрын

Pure Oxygen is flammable as gasoline

@LoneKharnivore 4 жыл бұрын

Tell that to the Apollo 1 crew.

@MrShobar 4 жыл бұрын

That pure oxygen cabin was pressurized to 15 psi, not 3 psi (the partial pressure of oxygen at sea level).

@mikem5043 6 ай бұрын

Oxygen is not flammable @@jimhallibm

@jimhallibm 6 ай бұрын

Yes Pure Oxygen is flammable as it feed the fire . Without oxygen there is no fire

@tanthiennguyen713 3 жыл бұрын

Während in 2 - 3 klasse....Wann die Helikopter in der Schule landet.....? Die Kinders würden sicher Toller gefühlt haben.......

@BogeyDopeYT Ай бұрын

Interviewer needs to let the guests talk more, and not ask such obvious questions like, “ you guys had to test everything, right?”. Duh.

@BumKnuckle 3 жыл бұрын

The chimps went to a zoo in Independence, Kansas to live out their days.

@PacificCoastMaps 2 жыл бұрын

Wish the interviewer would spend a bit more time on a subject, and not just jump rapid fire from subject to subject to subject . . .

@donaldparlettjr3295 5 жыл бұрын

Proof that computers have made us dummies. Back then school made you think what is the answer while today you learn to the test given.

@leprechaunbutreallyjustamidget 4 жыл бұрын

Peak boomer

@jason60chev 5 жыл бұрын

How did the astronaut take a dump in the Mercury space craft?

@pictobloxer5412 4 жыл бұрын

They didn't?

@albclean 4 жыл бұрын

Dont think they were in orbit long enough.

@LoneKharnivore 4 жыл бұрын

They didn't. They ate a special diet for a while beforehand to minimise the need to defecate whike on orbit.

@Animalwon 3 жыл бұрын

I forget who the astronaut was, but I think it was John Glenn, who got into his full space suit and was the first to ask "How does a guy take a Piss in this outfit? The German engineers just looked at each other and then looked at him when suddenly he said "Never mind, I figured it out!" My point is they never thought about it!