Skylab 2

Pete Conrad, Paul Weitz and Joe Kerwin have a big job to do before Skylab can open up for business

 

Prime Crew: Charles "Pete" Conrad, Jr. (Commander)

Paul J. Weitz (Pilot)

Dr. Joseph P. Kerwin (Science Pilot)

Backup Crew: Russell L. "Rusty" Schweickart (Commander)

Bruce McCandless II (Pilot)

Dr. Franklin Story Musgrave (Science Pilot)

May 25, 1973

Mission Duration: 28 days 49 minutes

404 Orbits

Spacecraft: Apollo CSM-116

 

 

Although the mission was officially known as Skylab 2, since it was the first manned mission of the program, it was often publicly referred to as Skylab 1, as can be seen on this mission patch. This practice was continued on the two following missions, but for our purposes we will use the official NASA designations for these missions. NASA Image.

 

The prime crew of Skylab 2, the first manned Skylab mission. L-R: Science Pilot Dr. Joe Kerwin, Commander Pete Conrad, and Pilot Paul Weitz. The crews for all three Skylab missions had been announced well in advance of the launch of the OWS and the first mission. Joe Kerwin was one of the 1965 Scientist-Astronaut group, and was the second of his group to fly, after Harrison Schmitt went to the Moon on Apollo 17. He was the first medical doctor to fly in space; given the many unknowns still evident in long-duration spaceflight, he was a natural for Skylab. Pete Conrad, of course, as one of the New 9, had two Gemini missions and a trip to the Moon and moonwalks aboard Apollo 12 under his belt. He had been hoping to go back to the Moon, perhaps on Apollo 19 or 20 (his Gemini 11 and Apollo 12 crewmate Dick Gordon had been set to command Apollo 18), but when these missions were cancelled in 1970, he set his sights on the next big assignment in NASA-command of the first Skylab mission. Paul Weitz came from Erie, Pennsylvania, and served as a Naval Aviator from 1956 until his astronaut selection as one of the Original 19 in 1966. As Joe Kerwin had been a Navy flight surgeon and later a Naval Aviator as well, this was an "all-Navy" crew. (The only non-Navy astronaut Pete Conrad ever flew with was Air Force officer Gordo Cooper on Gemini 5!) NASA Photo.

 

As with the Saturn V and S-IVB equipment used for the unmanned Skylab 1 launch, the manned Skylab missions would make the most out of existing Apollo/Saturn equipment. The manned missions would use Saturn IB launch vehicles that had been scheduled for the early manned Apollo missions that were cancelled after the Apollo 1 fire. The CSMs would have been used on the Apollo missions that were cancelled after Apollo 13. (Reverting to the pre-Apollo 9 policy, they wouldn't be named.) The launches would utilize the Crawlers, Mobile Launch Platforms (MLPs), and Launch Umbilicle Towers (LUTs) originally intended for Saturn V operations. As can be seen here, the MLPs had to be modified with towering scaffold-supported launch platforms, in order to mate the smaller Saturn IBs to the LUTs that were built for the much larger Saturn V; this was deemed the easiest way to bring the Command Module up to the level of the LUT's "White Room" and crew access arm, and other swing arms. Here, Skylab 2 is shown at Pad 39B (most recently used for Apollo 10 in May of 1969) during the May 3, 1973 Countdown Demonstration Test. The vehicle had been rolled out in January for facilities verification, to make sure everything worked on the modified pad, MLP, and LUT, and then returned to the VAB for finishing. It was rolled out again on February 26. Note the emergency crew-egress slide wires angling down from the LUT. NASA Photo.

 

Pete, Joe, and Paul had been training for this first manned Skylab mission for many months, of course, just like any other space mission. They had been training for the expected chores associated with setting up the Orbital Workshop and the equipment, and the long list of medical and scientific experiments which were, after all, the whole reason for Skylab to exist in the first place. But when the Skylab station incurred damage just over one minute after launch, they suddenly had a whole new mission-and just 11 days to train for it!

Not only that, but NASA had to figure out how to fix what went wrong-and what to take along to do that. NASA and the contractors had just a few days to design and manufacture makeshift replacement parts for the solar/meteoroid shield that had sheared off, and they had to train the crew to deploy it. They also had to prepare Pete and Joe for what promised to be a difficult spacewalk, during which they would have to clear the remaining solar panel "wing" of debris and deploy it in order to furnish the troubled space station with adequate solar power.

Joe Kerwin and Paul Weitz were rookies; Pete Conrad, on the other hand, had two Gemini missions (but no spacewalks) and one Apollo Moon-landing mission under his belt-but Skylab would probably be his biggest challenge yet....

 

After the solar wing and solar/meteoroid shield parted company during the launch of the OWS, NASA and the contractors worked frantically to fashion replacements. Here, employees Dale Gentry, Elizabeth Gauldin, Alyene Baker, and James H. Barnett Jr. work on fabricating the replacement sunshade in the GE Building across the street from the Johnson Space Center in Houston. The shield was composed of a top layer of aluminized mylar, a middle layer of laminated nylon ripstop, and a thin bottom layer of nylon. NASA Photo. 

 

Skylab 2 lifts off from Pad 39B on May 25, 1973, carrying Pete Conrad, Paul Weitz, Joe Kerwin, and a lot of tools and spare parts. NASA Photo.

 

Upon reaching orbit, Skylab 2 caught up with the damaged OWS over the Pacific, after 8 hours and 5 orbits. Pete Conrad took the controls, and maneuvered the Apollo CSM around the station to carry out a flyaround inspection, which was broadcast during 15 minutes of live TV coverage. It was during this inspection that they discovered that one solar panel "wing" was completely missing. The bare, brassy-looking section on the top side of the OWS is where the solar/meteoroid shield used to be. On the lower righthand side of the frame, you can see the stuck solar panel wing support-the long, white bar-with the folded solar panels themselves still accordioned underneath it. The inspection revealed that the wing panel was being held down by a narrow metal strap and some other debris. The astronauts also noted that areas of the OWS paint were blistering from solar heating in the unusual attitude the station was flying in, an attitude neccessary to provide solar power via the Apollo Telescope Mount solar array. The ATM and array can be seen here above the OWS cylinder, at the top of the frame. NASA Photo.

 

Skylab 2 soft-docked with the station for a little under an hour while the crew ate dinner, and the flight controllers and technicians put their heads together to try and figure out a fix. (A little space dinner conversation with Pete Conrad: "Dinner's going pretty good, except that Paul found another one of those tree trunks in the asparagus. I had stewed tomatoes for lunch. It turned out that even as goopy as they are, they were real simple to handle, and the same way with turkey and gravy.") They decided to have them undock and have Paul Weitz perform a standup EVA through the hatch, trying to free the stuck solar panel with a long pole-sort of a spacegoing boathook-while Joe Kerwin held onto his legs, and Pete worked the CSM controls.

The crew donned their suits, and undocked at 6:45 PM EDT to give the standup EVA a go. Pete flew the CSM around and maneuvered within a few feet of the stuck panel. They opened the hatch. Paul grabbed the pole, and with Joe holding onto him, drifted outside.

It didn't take long to realize that this wasn't going to work. The strap holding the panel down was too strong. Each time Paul tugged on it with the pole, it pulled the CSM closer to the station. Pete would try to back the ship away with the thrusters, and this would upset Skylab's guidance system, causing the station's own thrusters to fire to hold it in place. It wasn't going to work. Paul was getting tired, they were heading around into the night side of the orbit, and they were wasting both Skylab's and the Apollo's RCS fuel. Paul floated back inside and they called it off. It was decided to hard-dock with Skylab and get the internal chores done, and do a spacewalk from the station to free the panel later.

So Pete flew the CSM around to the docking module-and more trouble arose. They couldn't achieve a hard dock with the station, because the docking latches wouldn't engage. Pete tried several times; no luck. The crew and controllers thought back to Stu Roosa's problems during the transposition/LM extraction phase of Apollo 14, when a similar problem occurred. They decided to try one of the fixes contemplated for that mission: Pete, Paul, and Joe put their helmets back on, opened the docking hatch, and removed the docking probe. After a few fixes, they reinstalled it, closed the hatch, and tried again. This time, the familiar BANG-BANG-BANG-BANG-BANG-BANG signalled that the latches closed, and they had a successful hard-dock. At the end of a long day, Pete, Paul, and Joe settled in for a sleep period; they had a long day ahead....

 

CONTINUED....