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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
-
Roger. Quad Able helium tank temperature has dropped very slightly and is looking pretty good to us now.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
-
Righto, and I've got a procedure for Jim I would like to read up. It involves bringing the LM and the CSM state vectors to the earth's sphere of influence. Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Oh, it's the summation of the opinions of all our experts down here. I got it from Mr. Colossus, Gunther Sabionski.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Yes, Merry Christmas up there, Jim. I've got a procedure when you are ready to copy.
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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Okay. I just got on my headset; just let me get a pencil and paper, and I will copy it.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Okay. The purpose is to bring the LM and the CSM state vectors to earth's sphere of influence. Step one: Verb 37 ENTER, 23 ENTER. Step two: At NOUN 70, at NOUN 70, load in register 1, 2, and 3 the following numbers. Register 1, 00002; register 2, five balls; register 3, 00210. Step 3: proceed on NOUN 70, NOUN 70. Step 4: proceed on NOUN 25, 25. Step 5: do not proceed on NOUN 18. Wait for 30 seconds; then do VERB 37 ENTER, 00 ENTER. End of procedure. Over.
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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Okay. As I understand that the reason for this procedure is to bring the LM and CSM state vectors back to the earth's sphere of influence; is that correct?
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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Okay. To do it we go VERB 37 ENTER, 23 ENTER; and at the NOUN 70, we'll load in register 1, four balls 2; register 2, all balls; and register 3, two balls 210. We'll proceed on NOUN 70 and proceed on NOUN 25. We'll not proceed on 18. We'll wait 30 seconds, and we'll do a VERB 37 ENTER, 00 ENTER.
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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I'm just kinda curious, Mike; I thought this was done for us. I thought the computer took care of this little problem.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. Normally, it is done automatically, Jim; and had you done the P23's exactly as scheduled, it would have been, but there was some doubt P23 was stopped about 7 minutes prior to the transition point and just to be absolutely sure, we included this procedure. Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Thank you, Jim. We copied your DSKY work there, and it's looking just fine to us now.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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You know, one thing you can pass on to the program office—something you might try working on right away is —
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Apollo 8, can you stand by? We'll try to get you a better antenna; you're just about unreadable.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Apollo 8, Houston. We are right in between antennas and if you can wait about 5 minutes with your message, we can have better COMM then.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Okay. You're loud and clear now, Frank. Go ahead and say what you were saying about the program office.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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They ought to get some moving out on some way to fix these windows. The three windows, the hatch window and the two side windows, really it's a shame, in fact, that they are almost totally unusable, because they got so gummed up.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. I sure agree. We copy so far on the windows that 2 and 4 are in excellent shape and 1 and 5 are sort of mediocre and 3 is just about totally unusable.
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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And, Mike, that sure puts the CMP in a bad light, you know, when you can't see where you are going.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Yes. And when you're sitting between two guys that won't tell you, too. (Laughter)
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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That's right. You think they will share a window? No soap. You might also note the optics are very good visibility; so far, no coating at all.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. We copy Jim doing a P52, and I'm standing by with a maneuver PAD for midcourse 5 any time at your convenience.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger, Jim. This is midcourse maneuver number 5, and it's a RCS/G&N, and it's 31700, not applicable, not applicable. Are you with me?
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Good. 103:59:52.86, minus 00050, plus all zeros, plus 00001 000 334 001 five zeros, plus 00190 00050 014 00050. Are you still with me? Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Good. 413020 183, Shaula, down 064, left 06, plus 0747, minus 16410 12988 36301 146:46:40; north set of stars, Sirius and Rigel, roll 308, pitch 209, yaw 357. Remarks: use high-speed procedure with minus MA. Over.
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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31700, NA, NA, 103:59:52.86, minus 00050, plus all zeros, plus 00001 000 334 001, all zeros, plus 00190 00050 014 0050 413020 183, Shaula, down 064, left 06, plus 0747, minus 16410 12988 36301 146:46:40; Sirius, Rigel, 308 209 357; use high-speed procedure with minus MA.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. And could you go to ACCEPT, please, and we're going to send you a P27 load consisting of a LM state vector and a target load for MCC 5.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. We'd like to dump your waste water tank down to 25 percent; we'd like to do it before the midcourse, for tracking reasons. So if it is convenient with you, if you'll start right now, we'll dump on down to 25.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. We got those loads in and verified; you can go back BLOCK at your computer. And George Low says he's working on that window problem at 6, or spacecraft 104. You just happen to have the wrong spacecraft.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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That's the wrong statement; we've got the right spacecraft. I'll clue you, if it keeps going this way for 2 more days, we've got not only the right spacecraft, but we've got the best spacecraft.
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Bill Anders (LMP)
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Roger. The LMP's PRD hasn't moved an inch since we took off. And that's the one the CMP did have, still 0.64. And I just had about 5-1/2 hours sleep, and I'm in the process of scarfing up a meal; and I've been drinking lots of water, feeling good, and that's about it.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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And the CDR: I got stuck with somebody else's, but mine reads now—my new one reads 2.02 rems. I don't know if there is a message there or not.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Yes. You should have hung on to the one you had. It sounded a little bit better. I copy left to right 2.02, 0.12, and 0.64. Over.
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Bill Anders (LMP)
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What have they measured in our—what have they measured on that, I guess you would call it the VABABR, or VABD?
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Bill Anders (LMP)
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You ought to give those guys a chance to go back to sleep and calibrate those things.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Apollo 8, Houston. We've just passed 25 percent and you can terminate your waste water dump, please.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Yes. We are going to switch antennas from Madrid to Goldstone in about 3 minutes. You should hear the glitch.
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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Roger. Just for information, would the perigee reading and NOUN 42 be such a big minus number for such a small burn? We are reading minus 03137 now.
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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Roger. We are going to PROGRAM 30 after you give us the target load, and I didn't think there would be that much of a change for such a small burn.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger, Frank. We don't think there's any problem or any funnies in this perigee prediction of minus 03137. It's a Keplerian prediction, and it's not very accurate. Now we have taken your vector from the downlink and run it through a make-believe external DELTA-V maneuver down here, and we get precisely the correct answer. Over.
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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Roger. Understand that you figure just because of the conics solution that it comes up.
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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Okay. I was just kind of curious. I could see differences when we were talking about LOI burns, but this being such a short one, I thought it wouldn't be that much difference. I understand.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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You are monitoring and seeing if we get any inadvertent engine firing all the time, aren't you?
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Well, we can't tell when you're in low bit rate. When you're in high bit rate, that's right.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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Okay. If we crank up high bit rate and just have you take a checkout look at them?
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. Since you're on OMNI D (Dog) at this time, we're sort of 180 out of phase for the high-gain lock antennas. As soon as we can get high-gain lock, then we'll —
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger, Frank. We've done some more checking, and we confirm that that is the correct Keplerian prediction on NOUN 42 minus 03137, just like you said.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. We are going to be doing a ranging sequence; if we can eliminate voice for a couple of minutes, we would appreciate it.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. Our ranging is complete, and we have been monitoring your thruster firings, and they show what appears to be very normal damp activities. Over.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Frank, we've got about 2-1/2 minutes to ignition, and we're still showing some of your SCS switches not set up as per checklist; specifically, rate LOW, deadband MINIMUM, and your BMAG mode at attitude one, rate two.
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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Roger. We burned on time, 14 seconds, attitude nominal. Our residuals were plus 2 in VGX, minus 1 in VGY nothing in VGZ. Our EMS stopped about 6.2 and continued counting after the burn.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. Understand 14 seconds, burn on time, nominal attitude, two-tenths X, one-tenth Y, and nothing—minus one-tenth Y, and nothing Z; and you put 6.2 on the EMS, and it continued to count after the burn. Is that affirmative?
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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No. We put the burn—we put the burn DELTA-V in the EMS, and after the burn, it was still counting.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger, Jim. Thank you, and I still don't understand you on this EMS. Counted down from 5 to zero normally and then continued through zero in a negative way, and now it's reading minus 6.2? Is that affirmative?
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
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Roger. That's right. It was counting up when we shut it off. Last time I saw it, it was 6.9. Now Frank just put it on AUTO again with the DELTA-V function switch in DELTA-V, and it jumped six-tenths. Then he tried the second time, and it stayed at zero so we really don't know what the story is.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
-
We'd like you to resume the PTC attitude, pitch 010, yaw 045; and then come out of it again for your P23 that you're scheduled for about another hour and 10 minutes, in another hour and 10 minutes.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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How's it going with the TV, Frank? Are we—can the networks count on having it on schedule? Over.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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Yes, we can have it on schedule. We don't have much to do, but we'll perform for you.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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Well, we're just going to have to just do it inside today because there are no good shots of the moon or the earth; the sun's too darn bright.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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Roger. On this EMS, when I put it in DELTA-V, it was reading zero; then I switched to AUTO. Sometimes it will count to 19 or 20 feet per second. I guess that is what happened.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. Understand when you put it to AUTO, it maybe will keep counting up to as much as 19 to 20 feet per second.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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Just when you put it to AUTO; it will start counting on some occasion, by itself.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
-
We don't seem to have much luck today, but don't call for a repairman yet. It may be our camera here.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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Key moment TV broadcast 5: life onboard Apollo 8: Okay. We've had it on for a while. Are you getting our FM okay?
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Okay, Frank. There, we got it. It's coming in loud and clear. We look like we're looking at your hat and now the MDC.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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Okay. Well, good afternoon. This is the Apollo 8 crew. And how is it focusing now, Houston?
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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It's looking good. If you can hold the thing still, there's sort of a time delay. Any motion at all there ruins our picture.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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Okay. That's right. That's Jim Lovell. What we thought we'd do today was just show you a little bit about life inside Apollo 8. We've shown you the scenes of the moon, the scenes of the earth, and we thought we'd invite you into our home. It's been our home at least for 4 days as you can see on the instrument panel. We mark off each day on the instrument panel. We're four down, and we're working on the fifth day. Of course, we're all looking forward to the landing on Friday. Down here in the part of the spacecraft that we call the lower equipment bay, we have the President's adviser on physical fitness, Captain Jim Lovell, about to undergo an exercise program that we do every day. You notice that he floats around very freely. He just bumped his head on the optics, used for our navigating. He's working with an exercise device that's designed to keep the muscles in shape. Now another very important function of our spacecraft is the computer, and I thought you might be interested in seeing what we have here, the displays that give us all the information about our burn, about navigating, and about the velocity that we use during entry and retrofire on earth-orbital missions. You can see it's controlled by a DSKY, or similar to a typewriter keyboard, and the things that go in and out of that are absolutely miraculous. It's done a fantastic job for us, and Jim Lovell has done an excellent job operating it. Now another very important thing whether you're in space or the ground is eating, and I've asked Bill Anders to show you how we eat up here in the flight. Pardon the picture while we move around here and change cameras. The food that we use is all dehydrated; it comes prepackaged in vacuum-sealed bags. You notice that all Bill has to do to keep it in one place is let go of it. Except for the air currents in the spacecraft, it would stay perfectly still. He gets out his handy, dandy scissors and cuts the bag. The food is varied, generally pretty good. If that doesn't sound like a rousing endorsement, it isn't, but nevertheless, it's pretty good food. You can see that Bill is very clever. He does things swiftly. Actually, those food bags are stuck together because they've been vacuum packed in plastic.
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Bill Anders (LMP)
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Well, here we have some cocoa; should be good. I'll be adding about 5 ounces of hot water to that. These are little sugar cookies, some orange juice, corn chowder, chicken and gravy, and a little napkin to wipe your hands when you're done. I'll prepare some orange juice here.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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Okay. You can see that he's taking his scissors and cutting the plastic end off a little nozzle that he's going to insert the water gun into. The water gun dispenses a half-ounce burst of water per click. Here we go; Bill has it in now, and the water is going in. I hope that you all had better Christmas dinners today than us, but nevertheless, we thought you might be interested in how we eat.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Roger. I haven't heard any complaints down here, Frank. We'll bring you up to speed on your food when you get back.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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Ordinarily, we let these drinks settle for 5 or 10 minutes, but Bill's going to drink it right now. Then, to get on with the program, he cuts open another flap, and you'll see a little tube comes out —
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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— and he drinks his delicious orange drink. Maybe I should say he drinks his orange drink. He's usually not that fast. Bill is really in a hurry today. Well, that's what we eat. Now another very important part of the spacecraft is the navigation station or the optics panel. And we—just a minute; Bill wants to say something.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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Okay. Now if you'll let me have the camera, Jim, I'll show the people where you do most of your work. Okay. Bill, can you explain it?
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Jim Lovell (CMP)
-
If I can clean up some of Bill's food around here, and have it away—Down in this area is called the LEB or the lower equipment bay, and we have our optics positioning equipment right here. We do all our navigation down here by sighting on stars and on horizons of either the moon or the earth. And this is where we find out exactly where we are in space, what direction, and how fast we are traveling. And our computer, as Frank has mentioned, takes information and tells us how to maneuver to get home safely. I work with the scanning telescope and the sextant, and occasionally, if I get too busy, I just sort of float out of sight and go up into the tunnel which is the tunnel to the hatch of the lunar module which we don't have onboard, of course.
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Frank Borman (CDR)
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Now that's about all we have for today. I—each and every one of us wish each and every one of you a very Merry Christmas. And, I guess we'll see you tomorrow, and we'll be landing early Friday morning. Merry Christmas from Apollo 8.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
-
Roger. Merry Christmas from the ground, Apollo 8, and thank you very much for the guided tour. We really enjoyed it.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
-
We're suggesting attitude deadband MAX and rate HIGH.
Expand selection down Contract selection up -
Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
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Oh, the longer we track, the smarter we'll get; but stand by one for a pertinent answer.
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Mike Collins (CAPCOM)
-
Tentatively, midcourse correction at 122 hours is zero; and in about an hour and a half, we'll have some track data to confirm that.
Spoken on Dec. 25, 1968, 7:21 p.m. UTC (55 years, 9 months ago). Link to this transcript range is: Tweet
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