From Cape Canaveral, Florida, Apollo 16, the fifth of six U.S.
lunar landing missions,was successfully launched (above)
on its 238,000-mile journey to the moon.
The prime crew of the Apollo 16 lunar landing mission. From
left to right: Thomas K. Mattingly II, Command Module pilot; John W. Young, Commander; and Charles M. Duke Jr., Lunar Module pilot.
On April 11, 1970, Apollo 13, the third lunar landing mission, was successfully launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida, carrying
astronauts James A. Lovell, John L. Swigert and Fred W. Haise.
The spacecraft’s destination was the Fra Mauro highlands of the
moon, where the astronauts were to explore the Imbrium Basin
and conduct geological experiments.
After an oxygen tank exploded just over 200,000 miles from Earth
on the evening of April 13, however, the new mission objective
became to get the Apollo 13 crew home alive. The landing mission
was aborted.
The crew: Jim Lovell, John L. Swigert, and Fred Haise.
The Apollo 13 service module showing explosion damage. (NASA)
The mighty USS Constitution, arguably the most famous warship
in American history — a testament to dauntless courage at sea
in the nation’s infancy — was launched in Boston on this day in
history.
The mighty warship, 225 years old today, is the world’s oldest commissioned warship and is still afloat in Boston’s Charlestown
Navy Yard.
This watercolor and gouache painting, attributed to Michele Felice Corné and completed about 1803, is the earliest
known depiction of USS Constitution.
On this day in 1957, the Soviet Union inaugurated the "Space Age"
with its launch of Sputnik, the world’s first artificial satellite. The spacecraft, named Sputnik after the Russian word for "satellite,"
was launched at 10:29 p.m. Moscow time from the Tyuratam launch
base in the Kazakh Republic. Sputnik had a diameter of 22 inches
and weighed 184 pounds and circled Earth once every hour and 36 minutes. Traveling at 18,000 miles an hour, its elliptical orbit had
an apogee (farthest point from Earth) of 584 miles and a perigee
(nearest point) of 143 miles.
Visible with binoculars before sunrise or after sunset, Sputnik transmitted radio signals back to Earth strong enough to be
picked up by amateur radio operators. Those in the United States
with access to such equipment tuned in and listened in awe as the
beeping Soviet spacecraft passed over America several times a day.
CAMILLE BOHANNON
Voyager 2 launched by a Titan-Centaur rocket.
