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Bill Anders (LMP)
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Just a rough estimate. And also, have you seen any more hints on that sensor problem on fuel cell 2?
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Bill, there is nothing new on fuel cell number 2. We don't think there is anything at all wrong with the fuel cell. It's some sort of a sensor problem, but we don't have any new information on it.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Well, I've got a TLI plus 35 hour update, and then I have an update to Jim's checklist.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Okay. This—when you get your maneuver PAD book out—the last maneuver PAD we gave you for the flyby PAD still remains valid. We would just like to remark that the entry angle, the Gamma, is slightly steeper than we consider ideal, but it's within our—sort of the noise level of our ability to predict at this time. So that flyby maneuver PAD remains valid. Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Okay. Now on that page with the flyby maneuver, under your north set of stars, I have some new numbers for you because we've changed those stars from Navi and Polaris. As you recall, we changed to Sirius and Rigel, so—And that also, by the way, is the checklist update which I will give you later—but on that maneuver PAD, I have got three new angles for you using Sirius and Rigel when you are ready to copy those.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger, Apollo 8. Houston. You are loud and clear now. We had a lot of background noise there for a few minutes. How are you reading me?
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Bill Anders (LMP)
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Roger. I'm reading you okay, Mike, and I read you the last time you asked me that, so I guess maybe I wasn't getting through to you.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Okay. Well, did you copy on this flyby maneuver PAD? We've got three new angles. Are you ready to copy those?
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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That's affirmative, and I have the TLI plus 35 hour PAD when you are ready for it.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. TLI plus 35 hours, SPS/G&N, 63023 minus 162 plus 129. Are you with me so far?
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Good. 037:56:51.38, plus 00068, plus 00000, plus 46420 178 134 001, not applicable, plus 00202 46420 547 46211. Are you with me? Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Good. 12 1383 327 023 up 172 left 22, plus 1293, minus 16500, 12905 36180 074:11:16. Comments: on your stars Sirius and Rigel, roll 010, pitch 294, yaw 320, no ullage. Other: one, fast return P37, DELTA-V equals 7821, for mid-Pacific landing for MTL; two, high speed procedures not required. Over.
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Bill Anders (LMP)
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TLI plus 35, SPS/G&N 63023, minus 162, plus 129 037:56:51.38, plus 00068, plus 00000, plus 46420 178 134 000, NA. Are you with me?
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Bill Anders (LMP)
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Roger. Y 001, NA, plus 00202 46420 547 46211 12 1383 327 023 up 172 left 22, plus 1293, minus 16500, plus 12905, plus 36180 074:11:16, Sirius, Rigel: 010 294 320, no ullage, fast return P37, 7821 mid-PAC; high speed not required. Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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That's about the size of it. You're getting pretty good at this thing, Bill, for a rookie.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. Hey, I've got a flight plan update for Jim. It's on page G, George, 82 Able of his checklist. Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Okay. It's simply changing these north set of stars around. For Navi substitute Sirius, which is number 15, and for Rigel—correction—for Polaris substitute Rigel, number 12.
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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Roger. Substitute Rigel for Polaris and Sirius for Navi. How about shaft and trunnion; remain the same?
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Your shaft and trunnions remain the same. Sirius remains on the 50-degree line just like Navi used to be. Rigel is down 1.3 degrees from your horizontal, from your M-line. Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Okay. And let me know when it gets to be breakfast time. I've got a newspaper to read up to you and a few other things.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Okay. I've got a Haney special here for you. The Interstellar Times latest edition says the flight to the moon is occupying prime space on both paper and television; it's THE news story. The headlines of the Post says “Moon, here they come”. We understand that Bill Anders will be in private conversation or communication today with an old man who wears a red suit and lives at the North Pole. A suspect in the Miami kidnapping was captured late yesterday, and the 11 GI's that have been detained 5 months in Cambodia were released yesterday and will make it home in time for Christmas.
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Bill Anders (LMP)
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Roger. With reference to the first, we saw him earlier this morning, and he was heading your way.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. We'll pass the word along. David Eisenhower and Julie Nixon were married yesterday in New York. He was described as “nervous”.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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The Browns took Dallas apart yesterday 31 to 20. We're sort of curious, who do you like today, Baltimore or Minnesota? Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. Understand. Oh, I've got another score for you when you are ready to copy. Are you ready to copy?
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Bill Anders (LMP)
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You are very garbled; Houston; I'm unable to read. Will call you back in another year.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Okay. We also notice the University of Houston lost their first home basketball game in 3-1/2 years last night. Illinois edged them out 97 to 84. And some really big news: the State Department announced only a few minutes ago that the Pueblo crew will be released at 9 p.m. tonight.
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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Sounds good. Outboard calculations indicate that Apollo 8 at 25 hours is 104 000 miles from home.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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We're showing about 104 800 miles, and we're guessing another 8 to 10 hours on your battery charge.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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This is a mighty nice view we have down there today. A little bit more than a half earth. Looks like Africa and the Red Sea is visible; we're not quite sure as there is quite a bit of cloud cover; but even through the hazy windows, it's mighty nice.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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The rendezvous windows are good. The others are all about the same as they were when we last reported. One and five have a slight haze and a little fog on the inside.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. Just as a matter of curiosity for Bill, we can say a few words about the heaters for the cryo tanks, and also for the fans. We've noticed that the heaters are doing their thing normally, cycling on and off; and as time goes by, this cycle rate increases, indicating a little bit of stratification in the tanks. And then when we've been turning the fans on every 4 hours for a couple of minutes, this stirs things up and the heaters then cycling on and off again more slowly for awhile, until again a little bit of stratification occurs, and the cycling becomes slightly more rapid. This is, of course, normal; we just point it out as a curiosity to you. Over.
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Bill Anders (LMP)
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Roger. I haven't really been following it that close. One thing I have noticed is when you turn the fans on you get a glitch in the quantity, which might correspond to a glitch in AC. Maybe the next time we'll look at the AC volts and see what happens.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Our experts say that's not the reason for the glitch. They say the stratification fakes out the capacitance sensor there for a second.
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Bill Anders (LMP)
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I'm reading you loud and clear. I'll go ahead and dump this. You might want to listen to it in real time to evaluate the voice.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Do you want to dump it by your command, or would you like us to command the dump on it? Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. Understand, Bill. You promised me you would wait 3 days before you started doing this, Bill.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger, Bill. We've got your dump, and the voice quality is very good. We we going to take about 20 minutes or so to get it back to Houston to play it.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger, Bill. We are reading you loud and clear now. We had an antenna problem down here. We had an unexpected switch of antenna, which probably caused your high gain to quit.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger, Jim. When we lost our antenna down here, we interrupted your tape dump, so we are in the process of doing some rewinding and continuing the dump, in case Bill is wondering what is going on with the tape recorder.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. At 26 hours GET, we'll be switching our antennas back again at Madrid, and you can expect a glitch on your COMM system.
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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I noticed that you skipped the IMU alignment for about 26 hours because we were still asleep. Do you want to include that again, or do you think it is required?
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger, Jim. We think it is going to be required prior to the next set of P23 sightings, and we're suggesting that it be put in at 27:45. We'll have a flight plan—a more complete flight plan update in here shortly.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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The tape dumps are complete; it's rewound. You can go ahead and record in low bit rate if you …
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger, Jim. We would like to take control of the tape for a few minutes to make sure that we got all that last dump. Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Okay, Bill. This will be on page 2 dash 22 of your flight plan. For the command module pilot—I've already mentioned it to him—but at the top of the page, at about 27:45, actually, we would like him to do a P52, an IMU alignment, and then the P23 should be done as scheduled. Those four stars, Procyon, Regulus, Alphard, and Spica: we realize Alphard may not be too good a star, Regulus is about 3 degrees above the horizon, and Spica is at a 48-degree trunnion angle; so I guess what we are saying is if Jim has difficulty doing one set on each of those four stars, we suggest that he omit whichever one he is having difficulty with and pick it up by doing two sets on some other star that he likes. Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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All right. In the lower right hand corner of page 2-22, the passive thermal control attitude should read “pitch 224 degrees, yaw 020.”
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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And on the next page, at about 29 hours, you can resume the normal flight plan. We would like to make one addition; at 29:30, add a waste water dump. Even though one is not really required at that time, we would like to get the dump out of the way so we can track you uninterruptedly without any dumping, you know, as we are coming up on midcourse correction number 3. Over.
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Bill Anders (LMP)
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No, it looks pretty good. We've been saving up some water of our own to dump here, so that will work out all right.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. We would like P00 in ACCEPT, please. We would like to send you up a P27. It's a LM state vector, going into the LM slot only, and we do not want you to transfer it over to the CSM.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Okay. We got it. We're sending you a LM state vector, and we would like you not to transfer that vector over to the CSM slot.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Stand by one, Bill. Bill, negative. Now that midcourse correction number 2 has been cancelled. Its magnitude was less than 1 foot per second, so we decided not to do it. Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Apollo 8, Houston. Your 6910 pericynthian is still good plus or minus a minute, and we will get it down to a fine map measurement …
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Okay, Bill. We just got your readout on your voice tape, and we will be back with you on it shortly. Over.
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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Houston, I'm going to be doing my alignment at this time. I'm in a good position for viewing the stars.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Oh, good. Reading you loud and clear. One, two, three, four, five, five, four, three, two, one. Am I cutting in and out still? Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Apollo 8, Houston. We are going to switch antennas at 28:20. Stand by for our blitz.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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Roger, Houston. And we will start passing thermal control, and we are maneuvering to P23.
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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Roger. Cislunar NAV accomplished. We did two sets on star 16, two sets on 22, and one set on 21.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger, Bill. The one that we updated an hour or so ago, (i.e., pitch 224, yaw 020) is a good one.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Apollo 8, Houston. We will change antennas in about 2 minutes. You can expect a glitch in your COMM.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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Roger. We are dumping some water we collected here, and we are ready to dump the waste water down to 25 percent. Do you concur?
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. We are getting geared up down here to do the first of the COMM checks. We will be doing an OMNI COMM check, which is on your flight plan, listed mode 7.8, and we will let you know when we are ready to proceed.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Well, did you get the intergalactic news summary we sent up to you a couple of hours ago? It might have been during your rest period. We gave you a couple of football scores. One of them in particular was—I don't know if you copied that—Army 21, Navy 14. Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. The Cowboys were destroyed by the Cleveland Browns yesterday. The Pueblo crew is expected to be released. And I now hear our air-to-ground has got a lot of background noise. Stand by; we are going to go through these COMM test modes on page 223 of the flight plan. Over.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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Houston, be advised that it looks like your Quindars are clipping your voice during your transmission.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger, Understand. Are we still experiencing this intermittent condition that was there a few minutes ago?
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Apollo 8, this is Houston. Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Apollo 8, Houston. We understand you are copying us. While we are trying to reestablish contact with you, would you put your optics switch to zero? We show you are drifting off in trunnion and request that you zero your optics.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Apollo 8, Houston. We copy your optics zeroed, and how are you reading us now? Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Apollo 8, Houston. We are down to 25 percent on your waste water dump and ready to terminate. Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger, Our next COMM test is ranging only test. I have four switches I would like you to throw, which will cause you to lose voice communications for approximately 3 minutes. Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Alright. The first one is S-band NORMAL mode voice, OFF; the second, S-band NORMAL mode PCM, OFF; the third, S-band NORMAL mode RANGING switch to RANGING; and fourth, the S-baud AUX tape switch, OFF. Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Apollo 8, Houston. Request S-band NORMAL mode RANGING to OFF and S-band NORMAL mode PCM to PCM. I say again. S-band NORMAL mode RANGING, OFF; S-band NORMAL mode PCM to PCM.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Apollo 8, Houston. Three communication switch positions. First, S-band AUX tape to DOWN-VOICE BACKUP; S-band NORMAL mode PCM, OFF; TELEMETRY INPUTS PCM, HIGH. I say again, S-band AUX tape to DOWN-VOICE BACKUP; S-band NORMAL mode PCM to OFF; TELEMETRY INPUTS PCM to HIGH.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Apollo 8. Houston. Unable to copy. After about a minute of this configuration, we're going to return to normal voice, and at that time we should be able to hear you better.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Apollo 8, Houston. Three switch positions. TELEMETRY INPUTS PCM switch to LOW; S-band NORMAL mode VOICE to VOICE; S-band NORMAL mode PCM to PCM. I say again, TELEMETRY INPUTS PCM switch, LOW; S-band NORMAL mode VOICE to VOICE; S-band NORMAL mode PCM to PCM. Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Apollo 8, Houston. Requesting S-band NORMAL mode ranging to RANGING. I say again. S-band NORMAL mode ranging to RANGE. Over.
Spoken on Dec. 22, 1968, 1:52 p.m. UTC (55 years, 10 months ago). Link to this transcript range is: Tweet
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