![[June 20, 1970] Gemini Too (the two-week flight of <i>Soyuz 9</i>)](https://galacticjourney.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/700620launch-443x372.jpg)
by Gideon Marcus
There's big news on both sides of the pole regarding a pair of recently ended space flights: Apollo 13 and Soyuz 9…
Continue reading [June 20, 1970] Gemini Too (the two-week flight of Soyuz 9)
Tag Archives: science fact
![[June 4, 1970] Something old, something new (July-August 1970 <i>IF</i>)](https://galacticjourney.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/IF-1970-07-Cover-472x372.jpg)
[June 4, 1970] Something old, something new (July-August 1970 IF)
by David Levinson
Voyages into the known
Readers over 30 may remember Thor Heyerdahl and his Kon-Tiki expedition of 1947. He hoped to prove that the Pacific islands had been reached from South America before Polynesians got there from the west. The balsa log raft he built eventually ran aground in the Tuamotu archipelago in French Polynesia, demonstrating that such a voyage was at least possible. However, most archaeologists and anthropologists consider it far more likely that any contact between Polynesia and the Americas (there is some highly inconclusive evidence) was initiated by the Polynesian people, who have a proven track record of crossing vast distances into the unknown.
In any case, Heyerdahl has inspired a number of imitators hoping to travel farther, including some attempts to travel west to east. On May 29th, Spanish sailor Vital Alsar Ramirez started his second attempt to sail from Ecuador to Australia. The first attempt in 1966 failed after 143 days when the raft was rendered no longer seaworthy by teredo worms.
The new raft, dubbed La Balsa, has one major improvement over the Kon-Tiki: a moving keelboard. This will allow the raft to be steered toward more favorable currents, where Kon-Tiki could only drift with assistance from the simple square sail. Such keelboards are known to Ecuadoran natives and so are a perfectly reasonable addition. Best of luck to the four men aboard.
La Balsa puts to sea.
Speaking of Thor Heyerdahl, his current interest is in demonstrating that ancient Egyptians could have reached the Americas in reed boats. His first attempt last year aboard the Ra got within about 100 miles of the islands of the Caribbean before it became so waterlogged it began to break apart. Now he’s giving it another go.
The Ra II features a tether to keep the stern high, which should help keep the boat from suffering the fate of its predecessor. This is something the original ought to have had; such tethers are clearly visible in ancient Egyptian depictions of reed boats. The crew also plan to take marine samples along the way to study ocean pollution. The Ra II set out from Morocco on May 17th.
Of course, as with the Kon-Tiki, proving that such a voyage could have been made won’t prove that it was. The Egyptians were never great sailors, generally contracting ocean navigation out to more maritime cultures of the eastern Mediterranean. Still, best of luck to Heyerdahl and his crew as well.
The Ra II under way. Note the tether keeping the stern high.
Polishing the family silver
Science fiction has a lot of tried and true plots, some better than others. But good writing can occasionally make a hackneyed, sub-par plot something better, and bad writing can turn an intriguing concept into a slog. Fortunately, this month’s IF has a lot more of the former.
Suggested by “Time Piece”. Art by Gaughan
Continue reading [June 4, 1970] Something old, something new (July-August 1970 IF)
![[May 26, 1970] A Regrettable Case of Runaway Apophenia (Erich von Däniken's <i>Memories of the Future</i>)](https://galacticjourney.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Image-1-672x372.jpg)
[May 26, 1970] A Regrettable Case of Runaway Apophenia (Erich von Däniken's Memories of the Future)
by Arturo Serrano
When I was appointed, in recent weeks, as a cultural attaché of the Colombian embassy in Bonn, I was beside myself with excitement about the prospect of imbibing from the richness of Teutonic civilization, whose light was but briefly obscured during the war. I say this without intending in any manner to dismiss the graveness of the evil that merely one generation ago seared Europe, but not even an army of murderers can outweigh the numberless German generations possessed of extraordinary creativity that preceded them. With one glance at the poetry of Vogelweide or Eschenbach, one gives perpetual thanks for having studied the German tongue. And the pleasures aren't limited to the written word: I need only give two cardinal points, Bach and Strauss, and the mind delights in the long chain of beauty that extends between them. This is the proud nation that birthed Dürer, Gutenberg, Leibniz, Schiller, Humboldt, and that titan among titans, Goethe… And look at the Germany of today! Upon leaving the airplane, I nearly fainted as I realized I was setting foot on the land of Günter Grass, of Siegfried Lenz, of Heinrich Böll! I believe I could put you all to sleep reciting names long before I'm finished praising the inexhaustible wellspring of genius that is Germany.
Alas, the Fates judged it fit to make a mockery of my elation when it came time for me to experience my first taste of German culture in an official capacity as a foreign diplomat.
[May 14, 1970 Another Perfect Emergency (Saving Apollo-13)
[New to the Journey? Read this for a brief introduction!]
by Kaye Dee
On 5 May, the Apollo-13 crew visited the Grumman Aircraft Engineering Corporation factory in Bethpage, New York, to thank the company for its lifesaving Lunar Module, without which the recent lunar mission would have ended in disaster.
left to right: Apollo-13 astronauts Haise, Swigert, and Lovell during their visit to Grumman's Bethpage plant
The Grumman team’s contribution to the successful outcome of the mission – understanding the full capabilities of the vehicle they had designed so that it could be pressed into service as the astronauts’ lifeboat – is just one example of the innovativeness and dedication of the many NASA support teams working behind the scenes in the Apollo programme.
Today, I want to tell another behind-the-scenes story, one that comes “straight from the horse’s mouth”, as I’ve interviewed many of the personnel involved – the crucial role played by NASA’s space tracking networks, in particular the Manned Space Flight Network (MSFN) in Australia, in saving Apollo-13. I hope it will give you some insight into the complex technical and logistical operations that were required to respond to the emergency, and a feel for the urgency with which everyone was operating.
Continue reading [May 14, 1970 Another Perfect Emergency (Saving Apollo-13)
![[April 26, 1970] Red stars in space (Communist China and the USSR make leaps)](https://galacticjourney.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/700426dongfanghong1-672x372.jpg)
[April 26, 1970] Red stars in space (Communist China and the USSR make leaps)
by Gideon Marcus
It's likely you missed the other big news in space given how much the flight of Apollo 13 dominated the air waves. But while we were busy ensuring that Lovell, Swigert, and Haise made it back home, the ChiComs and the Russkies were accomplishing some space spectaculars of their own:
If you look up in the sky, you'll see nine new stars, all of them Red!
Continue reading [April 26, 1970] Red stars in space (Communist China and the USSR make leaps)
![[April 22, 1970] “Houston, We’ve had a Problem Here!” (Apollo-13 emergency in space)](https://galacticjourney.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/Apollo-13-13-672x372.jpg)
[April 22, 1970] “Houston, We’ve had a Problem Here!” (Apollo-13 emergency in space)
[New to the Journey? Read this for a brief introduction!]
by Kaye Dee
We all breathed a sigh of relief when the astronauts of Apollo-13 returned to Earth safely a few days ago, after the Apollo programmes’ first (and hopefully last) inflight emergency, but superstitious people are claiming that Apollo-13 was unlucky because of a prevalence of “13s”! After all, the mission was launched at 13:13 Houston time (but somewhere in the world there will always be a place where the time is 13: something!) and the explosion that caused its inflight emergency occurred on 13 April (but only in certain timezones – it was already 14 April in Australia and most of the world east of the United States).
Don’t tell me the Apollo-13 crew were “unlucky”; in fact, they were immensely lucky that when something did go wrong they were a team with the right skills for the situation. As seasoned test pilots, the crew were experienced at working in critical situations with their lives on the line, and their professional skills as astronauts were matched by the “tough and competent” (to quote Flight Director Mr. Gene Kranz) Mission Control teams, backed by highly trained engineers and scientists – all determined to “return them safely to the Earth”, just as President Kennedy committed NASA to do when he set the goal of a manned lunar landing by 1970!
Timeline of major mission events during Apollo-13
![[March 30, 1970] The Age of Explorer — the end of the Space Race](https://galacticjourney.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/700331nixon-672x372.jpg)
[March 30, 1970] The Age of Explorer — the end of the Space Race
by Gideon Marcus
In February 1958, just months before Galactic Journey took to press, Vice President Nixon visited Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He went personally congratulate the team that had built America's first artificial satellite, Explorer 1.
Vice President Richard Nixon and a model of the Explorer satellite with Dr. Lee DuBridge, left, president of Cal Tech, and Dr. William H. Pickering, right, director of the Cal Tech Jet Propulsion lab, during a news conference in Pasadena, Calif., Feb. 17, 1958.
Now it is 1970. President Nixon is presiding over a severe curtailing of our space program. Next month, Apollo 13 will head to the Moon, marking the end of the first stage of lunar reconnaissance. The original plan was for ten increasingly ambitious lunar landings, paving the way for long term exploration and exploitation. But it's looking now like Apollo 11 was more of a conclusion than a beginning. The Saturn V assembly line is shut down, Congress and the President are against any ambitious space endeavors, and even the three phases of Apollo flights are being cut down to two.
Continue reading [March 30, 1970] The Age of Explorer — the end of the Space Race
![[March 20, 1970] Here comes the sun (April 1970 <i>Fantasy and Science Fiction</i>)](https://galacticjourney.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/700320fsfcover-651x372.jpg)
[March 20, 1970] Here comes the sun (April 1970 Fantasy and Science Fiction)
by Gideon Marcus
Out, damn spot!
A couple of weeks ago, Victoria Silverwolf offered us a tidbit on the latest solar eclipse. I've since read a bit more about the scientific side of things and thought I'd share what I've learned with you.
It was the first total solar eclipse to be seen over heavily populated areas of U.S. since 1925, greeted by millions of viewers who crowded the beaches, towns, and islands where viewing was most favorable. The eclipse cut a nearly 100 mile wide swath through Mexico, Florida, Georgia, the Carolinas, Virginia, and Nantucket Island, Mass. It was 96% total in New York City and 95% in the nation's capital.
a clipping from Escondido's Times-Advocate
But ground viewing was only the beginning. NASA employed a flotilla of platforms to observe the eclipse from an unprecedented variety of vantages. A barrage of sounding rockets (suborbital science probes) were launched during the eclipse to take measurements of the Earth's atmosphere and ionosphere.
In space, radio signals from Mars probe Mariner 6, currently on the far side of Sun, were measured to determine how the eclipse affected communications and to study changes in charged particles in earth’s atmosphere.
Two Orbiting Solar Observatories, #5 and #6, pointed their instruments at the Sun to gather data on the solar atmosphere, while Advanced Test Satellite #3 took pictures of the Moon's shadow on the Earth from more than 20,000 miles above the surface. Three American-Canadian satellites, Alouette 1, Alouette 2, and Isis 1, all examined the change the eclipse caused in the Earth's ionosphere.
Earthside telescopes got into the mix, too: Observers from three universities and four NASA centers at sites in Virginia and Mexico not only got great shots of the solar corona, but also of faint comets normally washed out in the glare of the Sun.
I can't imagine anyone in 1925 but maybe Hugo Gernsback could have foreseen how much attention, and from how many angles such attention would be applied, during the 1970 eclipse. It's just one more example of how science fiction has become science.
Waiting for the dawn
The last two months of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction weren't too hot. Does the latest issue mark a return of the light or continued darkness? Let's find out…
cover by Chesley Bonestell
Continue reading [March 20, 1970] Here comes the sun (April 1970 Fantasy and Science Fiction)
![[February 20, 1970] Fun-nee enough… (<i>OSCAR 5</i> and the March 1970 <i>Fantasy and Science Fiction</i>)](https://galacticjourney.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/700220coverfsf-631x372.jpg)
[February 20, 1970] Fun-nee enough… (OSCAR 5 and the March 1970 Fantasy and Science Fiction)
[New to the Journey? Read this for a brief introduction!]
by Kaye Dee
Recently, The Traveller covered the launch of the TIROS-M weather satellite, noting that the rocket’s payload also included a small Australian-made ham radio satellite, OSCAR-5 (Orbiting Satellite Carrying Amateur Radio), also known as OSCAR-A.
Cover of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Centre's in-house magazine, marking the launch of ITOS-1/TIROS-M and Australis-OSCAR-5
A New Star in the Southern Cross
It was exciting to be in “Mission Control” at the University of Melbourne when the satellite was launched in the evening (Australian time) on 23 January. You should have heard the cheers! After all, Australis-OSCAR-5 (AO-5), as we call it, is Australia’s second satellite. It’s also the first amateur radio satellite built outside the United States and the first OSCAR satellite constructed by university students – in this case, members of the Melbourne University Astronautical Society (MUAS).
The MUAS student team with the engineering model of Australia's first amateur radio satellite
Radio Hams and Satellite Trackers
Commencing in 1961, the first OSCAR satellite was constructed by a group of American amateur radio enthusiasts. Cross-over membership between MUAS and the Melbourne University Radio Club (MURC) encouraged the students to begin tracking OSCAR satellites, moving quickly on to tracking and receiving signals from many other US and Soviet satellites.
Nimbus satellite image of the western half of Australia received by MUAS for the weather bureau
One of MUAS’ achievements was the first regular reception in Australia of images from TIROS and Nimbus meteorological satellites. By 1964, they were supplying satellite weather images daily to the Bureau of Meteorology, before it established its own receiving facilities.
"How Do We Build a Satellite?"
After tracking OSCARs 3 and 4 in 1965, the MUAS students decided to try building their own satellite. “No one told us it couldn’t be done, and we were too naive to realise how complex it would be to get the satellite launched!”, an AO-5 team member told me at the launch party. MUAS decided to build a small ‘beacon’ satellite which would transmit telemetry data back to Earth on fixed frequencies.
Even before Australia’s first-launched satellite, WRESAT-1, was on the drawing board, the Australis satellite project commenced in March 1966. Volunteers from MUAS, MURC and university staff worked together to design and build the satellite, with technical and financial assistance from the Wireless Institute of Australia and a tiny budget of $600. The Australian NASA representative also gave the project invaluable support. The students acquired electronic and other components through donations from suppliers where possible: the springs used to push the satellite away from the launcher were generously made by a mattress manufacturer in Melbourne. Any other expenses came out of their own pockets!
Carpenter's steel tape was used to make AO-5's flexible antennae, seen here folded in launch configuration. Notice the inch markings on the tape!
AO-5 is a fantastic example of Aussie ‘make-do’ ingenuity. A flexible steel measuring tape from a hardware shop was cut up to make the antennae. The oven at the share house of one team member served to test the satellite’s heat tolerance, and a freezer in the university's glaciology lab was unofficially used for the cold soak. Copper circuit boards were etched with a technique using nail varnish, and a rifle-sight was used to help tune the antennae! Various components, including the transmitters and command system, were flight-tested on the university’s high altitude research balloon flights.
A university lab freezer and hitching a ride with university experiments on US HiBal high altitude balloon flights in Australia used to test the ruggedness of AO-5 components
A Long Wait for Launch
Australis was completed and delivered to Project OSCAR headquarters in June 1967, well before WRESAT’s launch in November that year. Unfortunately, AO-5 then had to wait a few years for a launch to be arranged by the Amateur Radio Satellite Corporation (AMSAT), which now operates the OSCAR project. However, it is surely appropriate that, as OSCAR-5, it finally made it into orbit with a weather satellite.
After launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base, AO-5 was placed into a 115-minute orbit, varying in altitude between 880 – 910 miles. This means it will be in orbit for hundreds of years – unlike the short-lived WRESAT.
In Orbit at Last!
Battery-powered, Australis-OSCAR-5 weighs only 39 pounds and carries two transmitters, beaming out the same telemetry signal on the two-metre and 10-metre amateur radio bands. Its telemetry system is sophisticated but designed for simple decoding without expensive equipment. The start of a telemetry sequence is indicated by the letters HI in Morse code, followed by data on battery voltage, current, and the temperature of the satellite at two points as well as information on the satellite's orientation in space from three horizon sensors.
AO-5 includes the first use in an amateur satellite of innovations such as a passive magnetic attitude stabilisation system (which helps reduce signal fading), and a command system to switch it on and off to conserve power. Observations are recorded on special standardised reporting forms that are suitable for computer analysis.
Just 66 minutes after launch, the first signal was detected in Madagascar and soon other hams reported receiving both the two and 10-metre signals on the satellite's first orbit. At “Mission Control” in Melbourne, we were thrilled when MURC members managed to pick up the satellite’s signals! By the end of Australis’ first day of operation, AMSAT headquarters had already received more than 100 tracking, telemetry and reception reports.
A selection of local newspaper cuttings following AO-5's launch. There was plenty of interest here in Australia.
The two-metre signal failed on 14 February, but the 10-metre transmission continues for now. How much longer AO-5’s batteries will last is anybody’s guess, but the satellite has proven itself to be a successful demonstration of the MUAS students’ technical capabilities, and the team is already contemplating a more advanced follow-on satellite project.
This philatelic cover for the ITOS-1/TIROS-M launch, includes mention of AO-5, but the satellite depicted is actually OSCAR-1
by Gideon Marcus
Fantastic emanations on Earth
And now that you've had a chance to digest the latest space news, here's some less exciting (but no less necessary) coverage of the latest issue of F&SF.
by Ronald Walotsky
![[January 31, 1970] Both sides now (February 1970 <i>Analog</i>)](https://galacticjourney.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/700131analogcover-631x372.jpg)
[January 31, 1970] Both sides now (February 1970 Analog)
[New to the Journey? Read this for a brief introduction!]
by Gideon Marcus
Rows and floes of angel's hair
Woody Allen likes to quip that being "bi-sexual" (liking both men and women) doubles of your chance of getting a date on the weekend.
NASA has just doubled the amount of weather they can look at in a single launch. TIROS-M (does the "M" stand for "Mature"?) was launched from California on January 23rd into a two-hour orbit over the poles. 12 times a day, it circles the Earth, which rotates underneath. Unlike the last 19 TIROS satellites, TIROS-M can see in the dark. That means it gets and transmits a worldwide view of the weather twice a day rather than once.
More than that, the satellite is called the "space bus" because it carries a number of other experiments, measuring the heat of the Earth as well as solar proton radiation. Launched "pickaback" with TIROS-M was Oscar 5, an Aussie satellite that broadcasts on a couple of bands so ham radio fans can track signals from orbit. Maybe Kaye Dee will write more about that one in her next piece!
Clouds got in my way
If the distinctive feature of the Earth as viewed from space is its swaddling blanket of clouds, then perhaps the salient characteristic of this month's Analog is its conspicuous degree of padding. Almost all of the stories are longer than they need to be, at least if their purpose be readability and conveying of point. Of course, more words means more four-cent rate…
by Kelly Freas, illustrating "Birthright"
Continue reading [January 31, 1970] Both sides now (February 1970 Analog)