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Viking Checkup
| title |
Viking Checkup |
| date |
05.20.1971 |
| description |
A technician checks the soil sampler on an earlier generation of Mars lander - Viking - in this 1971 photo. Viking 1 became the first spacecraft to land safely on Mars on July 20, 1976. The robotic arm scooped samples of the Martian soil, emptied it into a hopper on the lander, which analyzed it with three scientific instruments. NASA's Viking Lander was designed, fabricated, and tested by the Martin Marietta Corp. of Denver, Colorado, under the direction of the Viking Progect Office at Langley Research Center, Hampton, Virginia. The lander drew heavily on the experience gained from the Ranger, Surveyor and the Apollo Programs in the areas of radar, altimeters, facsimile, cameras, soil samplers and landing gear. *Image Credit*: NASA |
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Mariner 1
| title |
Mariner 1 |
| date |
01.22.1962 |
| description |
After approval by NASA Headquarters in September 1961, JPL prepared three spacecraft based on the design of the Ranger Block I series (therefore named Mariner R) to fly by Venus in late 1962. Each spacecraft carried a modest suite (9 kilograms) of scientific instrumentation but had no imaging capability. The spacecraft included 54,000 components and was designed to maintain contact with Earth for 2,500 hours -- an ambitious goal given that the (still unsuccessful) Ranger was designed for only 65 hours of contact. Mariner 1 would have flown by Venus at a range of 29,000 kilometers on 8 December 1962, but due to an incorrect trajectory during launch, range safety had to destroy the booster and its payload at T+290 seconds. |
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Ranger 4 Preparations
| title |
Ranger 4 Preparations |
| date |
03.06.1962 |
| description |
Technicians prepare the Ranger 4 spacecraft for launch. An impact absorbing sphere made of balsa wood sits atop the spacecraft, painted with a saw-tooth pattern to maintain thermal balance during its mission to the Moon. The sphere contained a lunar seismometer, which was to rough land just south of the equator on the rim of the Ocean of Storms and measure "lunarquakes." The master clock in Ranger 4's computer failed during flight and the spacecraft did not respond to commands. It crashed into the far side of the Moon on April 26, 1962. Despite the failure to return information, the use of balsa wood was an important precursor in the design of other rough landings on extraterrestrial bodies, particularly Mars. Aerobraking, gliding, impact absorption, parachuting, and retro rockets have all been considered. *Image Credit*: Jet Propulsion Laboratory |
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The Ranger Spacecraft
| title |
The Ranger Spacecraft |
| description |
The Ranger fleet of spacecraft launched in the mid-sixties provided for the first time live television transmissions of the Moon from lunar orbit. These transmissions resolved surface features as small as 10 inches across and provided over 17,000 images of the lunar surface. These detailed photographs allowed scientists and engineers to study the Moon in greater detail than ever before thus allowing for the design of a spacecraft that would one day land men of Earth on its surface. *Image Credit*: NASA |
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JPL Space Flight Control Cen
…
| title |
JPL Space Flight Control Center Readied for Ranger 5 |
| description |
JPL Space Flight Control Center Readied for Ranger 5. (Patrick Rygh is Stated at the Center Console.) *Image Credit*: NASA |
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Listening to Ranger 6
| title |
Listening to Ranger 6 |
| date |
02.02.1964 |
| description |
An audience at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory listens to a description of the final moments of Ranger 6 in 1964. Ranger 6 impacted the Moon as planned on Feb. 2, 1964, but a malfunction disabled its camera system. *Image Credit*: NASA |
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Ranger 1
| title |
Ranger 1 |
| description |
Ranger 1 was a spacecraft whose primary mission was to test the performance of those functions and parts necessary for carrying out subsequent lunar and planetary missions using essentially the same spacecraft design. A secondary objective was to study the nature of particles and fields in interplanetary space. *Image Credit*: NASA |
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Ranger 3
| title |
Ranger 3 |
| date |
01.26.1962 |
| description |
Ranger 3 was designed to transmit pictures of the lunar surface to Earth stations during a period of 10 minutes of flight prior to impacting on the Moon, to rough-land a seismometer capsule on the Moon, to collect gamma-ray data in flight, to study radar reflectivity of the lunar surface, and to continue testing of the Ranger program for development of lunar and interplanetary spacecraft. Due to a series of malfunctions the spacecraft missed the Moon. *Image Credit*: NASA |
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Ranger 8
| title |
Ranger 8 |
| date |
02.17.1965 |
| description |
Ranger 8 was designed to achieve a lunar impact trajectory and to transmit high-resolution photographs of the lunar surface during the final minutes of flight up to impact. The spacecraft carried six television vidicon cameras, 2 wide angle (channel F, cameras A and B) and 4 narrow angle (channel P) to accomplish these objectives. The cameras were arranged in two separate chains, or channels, each self-contained with separate power supplies, timers, and transmitters so as to afford the greatest reliability and probability of obtaining high-quality video pictures. No other experiments were carried on the spacecraft. *Image Credit*: NASA |
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First Ranger 9 Image
| title |
First Ranger 9 Image |
| date |
03.24.1965 |
| description |
The first Ranger 9 image of the Moon, taken with the A camera from a distance of 2378 km. The image is centered on the Mare Nubium region of the Moon, which extends to the bottom of the image. At upper left is southeastern Oceanus Procellarum. The two craters with the central peaks at right are Alphonsus, diameter 108 km, and below it Arzachel, diameter 96 km. The crater near the center at about 8:00 is 60 km Bullialdus. The frame is approximately 1050 km across and north is at 12:30. The final impact point of Ranger 9 is in the Alphonsus crater, midway between the central peak and rim at about 1:30. (Ranger 9, A001) *Image Credit*: NASA |
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First Picture of the Moon Ta
…
| title |
First Picture of the Moon Taken by Ranger 8 |
| date |
02.20.1965 |
| description |
First full-frame image of the Moon taken by the Ranger 8 camera A from a distance of 2,573 km. The image was taken on 20 Feb. 1965 at 09:34 UT with the spacecraft at an altitude of 2510 km. The central reticle is at 10.65 degrees south latitude, 22.4 degrees west longitude, in the Mare Cognitum area of the Moon. North is up, and the picture extends 1200 km across, from about 5 N to 30 S latitude, and from 5 W to 45 W longitude. The craters Campanus and Mercator are visible at the bottom center. Gassandi crater (101 km diameter) is the bright circle near the edge of the frame at 8:00. The Apollo 12 landing site is near top center and Apollo 14 slightly to the right of that. (Ranger 8, A001) *Image Credit*: NASA |
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First U.S. Image of the Moon
| title |
First U.S. Image of the Moon |
| date |
07.31.1964 |
| description |
Ranger 7 took this image, the first picture of the Moon by a U.S. spacecraft, on July 31, 1964 at 13:09 UT (9:09 AM EDT) about 17 minutes before impacting the lunar surface. The area photographed is centered at 13 S, 10 W and covers about 360 km from top to bottom. The large crater at center right is the 108 km diameter Alphonsus. Above it is Ptolemaeus and below it Arzachel. The terminator is at the bottom right corner. Mare Nubium is at center and left. North is at about 11:00 at the center of the frame. The Ranger 7 impact site is off the frame, to the left of the upper left corner. (Ranger 7, B001) The Ranger series of spacecraft were designed solely to take high-quality pictures of the Moon and transmit them back to Earth in real time. The images were to be used for scientific study, as well as selecting landing sites for the Apollo Moon missions. Ranger 7 was the first of the Ranger series to be entirely successful. It transmitted 4,308 high-quality images over the last 17 minutes of flight, the final image having a resolution of 0.5 meter/pixel. Ranger 7 was launched July 28, 1964 and arrived at the Moon on July 31, 1964. *Image Credit*: NASA |
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Ranger 4
| title |
Ranger 4 |
| date |
04.23.1962 |
| description |
Ranger 4 was designed to transmit pictures of the lunar surface to Earth stations during a period of 10 minutes of flight prior to impacting on the Moon, to rough-land a seismometer capsule on the Moon, to collect gamma-ray data in flight, to study radar reflectivity of the lunar surface, and to continue testing of the Ranger program for development of lunar and interplanetary spacecraft. An onboard computer failure caused failure of the deployment of the solar panels and navigation systems, the spacecraft impacted on the far side of the Moon without returning any scientific data. *Image Credit*: NASA |
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Ranger 9
| title |
Ranger 9 |
| date |
03.21.1965 |
| description |
Ranger 9 was designed to achieve a lunar impact trajectory and to transmit high-resolution photographs of the lunar surface during the final minutes of flight up to impact. The spacecraft carried six television vidicon cameras, 2 wide angle (channel F, cameras A and B) and 4 narrow angle (channel P) to accomplish these objectives. The cameras were arranged in two separate chains, or channels, each self-contained with separate power supplies, timers, and transmitters so as to afford the greatest reliability and probability of obtaining high-quality video pictures. No other experiments were carried on the spacecraft. *Image Credit*: NASA |
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The Ranger Spacecraft
| Title |
The Ranger Spacecraft |
| Full Description |
The Ranger fleet of spacecraft launched in the mid-sixties provided for the first time live television transmissions of the Moon from lunar orbit. These transmissions resolved surface features as small as 10 inches across and provided over 17,000 images of the lunar surface. These detailed photographs allowed scientists and engineers to study the Moon in greater detail than ever before thus allowing for the design of a spacecraft that would one day land men of Earth on its surface. |
| Date |
01/01/1961 |
| NASA Center |
Jet Propulsion Laboratory |
|
JPL's Space Flight Operation
…
| Title |
JPL's Space Flight Operations Facility |
| Full Description |
In May 1964, a ceremony was held to dedicate the new Space Flight Operations Facility, which used state-of-the-art equipment for mission operations and communications with JPL's unmanned spacecraft. One of the first missions to use the facility was Ranger 7, which went to the Moon in July 1964. The Space Flight Operations Facility collected the tracking and scientific information for the Deep Space Network. In 1985, the Space Flight Operations Facility was designated as a National Historic Landmark. It is still in use. |
| Date |
UNKNOWN |
| NASA Center |
Jet Propulsion Laboratory |
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First Image of the Moon take
…
| Title |
First Image of the Moon taken by a U.S. Spacecraft |
| Description |
Ranger 7 took this image, the first picture of the Moon by aU.S. spacecraft, on 31 July 1964 at 13:09 UT (9:09 AM EDT)about 17 minutes before impacting the lunar surface. The area photographed is centered at 13 S, 10 W and covers about 360 km from top to bottom. The large crater at center right is the 108 km diameter Alphonsus. Above it is Ptolemaeus and below it Arzachel. The terminator is at the bottom right corner. Mare Nubium is at center and left. Nor this at about 11:00 at the center of the frame. The Ranger 7impact site is off the frame, to the left of the upper left corner. (Ranger 7, B001) The Ranger series of spacecraft were designed solely to take high-quality pictures of the Moon and transmit them back to Earth in real time. The images were to be used for scientific study, as well as selecting landing sites for the Apollo Moon missions. Ranger 7 was the first of the Ranger series to be entirely successful. It transmitted 4,308high-quality images over the last 17 minutes of flight, the final image having a resolution of 0.5 meter/pixel. Ranger 7 was launched July 28, 1964 and arrived at the Moon on July 31, 1964. |
| Date |
07.31.1964 |
|
Guericke Crater as seen by R
…
| Title |
Guericke Crater as seen by Ranger 7 |
| Description |
Ranger 7 B-camera image of Guericke crater (11.5 S, 14.1 W, diameter 63 km) taken from a distance of 1335 km. The dark flat floor of Mare Nubium dominates most of the image, which was taken 8.5 minutes before Ranger 7 impacted the Moon on 31 July 1964. The frame is about 230 km across and north is at 12:30. The impact site is off the frame to the left. (Ranger 7, B100) The Ranger series of spacecraft were designed solely to take high-quality pictures of the Moon and transmit them back to Earth in real time. The images were to be used for scientific study, as well as selecting landing sites for the Apollo Moon missions. Ranger 7 was the first of the Ranger series to be entirely successful. It transmitted 4,308high-quality images over the last 17 minutes of flight, the final image having a resolution of 0.5 meter/pixel. Ranger 7 was launched July 28, 1964 and arrived at the Moon on July 31, 1964. |
| Date |
07.31.1964 |
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