HT This Day: May 27, 1969 -- Apollo men are back: Pin-point landing in South Pacific

Hindustan Times

26-05-2025

Aboard USS Princeton: Climaxing a voyage of discovery, the Apollo-10 moon explorers came safely home from the heavens today blazing back through the earth's atmosphere to a bull's eye landing in the South Pacific within sight of the recovery ship Princeton.
America's newest space heroes ended man's greatest and most dangerous space adventure when their sturdy six-ton spaceship parachuted into the gently rolling seas about three miles (4.8 km) from the Princeton.
Air Force Col. Thomas P. Stafford and Navy Commdrs. John W. Young and Eugene A. Cernan landed at 16.52 GMT (10.22 p.m. IST). The touchdown was about 400 miles (643 km) east of Pago Pago just at dawn in this part of the world.
As the craft descended its tracking lights blinked in the semidarkness.
The pinpoint landing was a fitting climax to the near-flawless eight-day flight, a final dress rehearsal which cleared the way for two astronauts to walk on the moon in less than two months.
'We are in great shape.' Stafford radioed.
'We should be right on top of you if you're down there' Stafford radioed minutes before landing.
'I tell you this thing is beautiful,' Young exulted.
Television pictures, relayed through a communications satellite, enabled millions to share the triumphal return of the three astronauts.
Red carpet welcome
Viewers had a ringside seat as cameras focused on Apollo-10 floating down from space, dangling under three orange and white parachutes.
Hundreds of sailors wearing white dress, lined the deck of the Princeton and cheered as they watched the stirring sight.
Helicopters spotted the astronauts several minutes before the splashdown and were hovering overhead within minutes.
Within minutes, navy frogmen leaped from a helicopter. They attached a floatation collar and plugged in a telephone to talk with the astronauts. The recovery helicopter landed the moon-probe trio on the carrier Princeton only 12 minutes after the recovery.
A red carpet was rolled out for them.
All three emerged smiling and waving to their rescuers and to a world television audience.
The astronauts looked nearly as fresh as when they left the earth for their record eight-day flight.
Col. Thomas Stafford said: 'First of all it's great to be back on earth. We thank all on earth who helped our tremendous team effort and we hope we have added to man's knowledge.'
Commander Eugene Cernan hit a patriotic note when he told his welcomers and world listeners: 'It's great to come back to the greatest country in the world.'
Commander Young thanked 'a big part of the navy coming to pick up a small part of the navy.'
The astronauts walked briskly across the carrier's deck for a medical examination.
Commentators remarked: 'All the men look marvellous. Commander Young almost seemed to be skipping along instead of walking.'
All the navy welcomers agreed 'all the astronauts look great.'
They strode bouncingly and smiling-showing no signs of occasional wobbliness that afflicted some previous space returnees.
Fastest re-entry
To reach the Pacific, the astronauts survived man's fastest re-entry through the atmosphere.
The craft's heat shield protected the craft from burning up and the temperature inside the cabin remained a comfortable 70 deg. F.
Before entering the atmosphere Stafford, Young and Cernan jettisoned a service module attached to the command ship. The shedding of this equipment reduced Apollo-10's weight from 31, 500 to about 12, 000 lb.
During the hottest, fastest part of the re-entry, radio communications from the speeding vehicle were blacked out for about three minutes. An error of more than one degree either way in the angle of re-entry would have meant a fiery death for the three spacemen, or their being marooned permanently in space.
Right after the blackout ended, two recovery force planes and the Princeton reported radar contact with the spaceship.
Minutes later, the spacecraft, dangling under its parachutes, came within the view of the ship.
As the thickening atmosphere braked the spacecraft the men were subjected to a gravitational force seven times the normal. The braking speed made possible for three small parachutes to pop out and stabilize the spacecraft. Ships and planes quickly picked up the descending ship on radar.
At 10, 000 ft. the three main 83.5 ft. chutes blossomed majestically and Apollo-10 floated gently downward into the Pacific at a comparative snail's pace of 22 m.p.h.
Three hours before re-entry, the astronauts had fired thrusters for 6.6 seconds to make a slight course adjustment that zeroed them in on the landing site.
AFP, Reuter add:
At 10-07 p.m. (IST) Apollo-10 had crashed into the earth's atmosphere at 36, 310 feet per second or 24, 760 miles per hour.
The bell-shaped command capsule landed right side up about 192 hours and three minutes after the blast off from Cape Kennedy.
The astronauts skipped on the Princeton deck to prove to photographers that their legs were steady.
Later, the three men will be reporting on the 'brownish gray' seas and 'chalkish white' craters they saw from close-up on Thursday and Friday.
The live colour television shots they broadcast of the moon and earth-another space first time as the U.S. Congress has been showing signs of balking at freeing massive credits for future space programmes.
Dr Werner von Braun, Designer of the giant Saturn 5 booster which shot Apollo-10 into space a week ago on Sunday, has said that, funds permitting, NSSA could put men on Mars by 1985.
Congress has already approved four manned trips to the moon before the end of next year. Thanks to Apollo-10, it was expected today that Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin would step out of a lunar module on to the moon as planned on July 20.