Year-by-Year Marshall Highlights - Marshall Highlights for 1968

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Marshall Highlights for 1968

(Source Note: The following information is presented here as published in a news release issued in late 1968 by the Marshall Center Public Affairs Office.)

Two manned Saturn launchings were among the most significant events of 1968 for the Marshall Center.

Both the Saturn V and Saturn IB launch vehicles were manned for the first time in 1968. The giant Saturn V for the Apollo 8 mission and the Saturn IB vehicle that launched the Apollo 7 spacecraft were designed and developed by the Marshall Center and its contractors.

The Saturn V performed flawlessly on Dec. 21 when it sent Astronauts Frank Borman, James, Lovell and William Anders on a flight which reached moon orbit on Christmas Eve. The three-stage rocket was launched on schedule at the Kennedy Space Center. The third stage engine was ignited a second time in earth orbit to speed the three astronauts to more than 24,000 miles an hour-the fastest speed man has ever achieved.

A Saturn IB vehicle had placed the first manned Apollo spacecraft into earth orbit on Oct. 11. Astronauts Walter Schirra, Donn Eisele and Walter Cunningham, spent almost 11 days in space on the Apollo 7 mission.

Two other Saturn vehicles were sent into space in a busy and eventful 1968. The Apollo 5 mission was launched on Jan. 22 when a Saturn IB carried an unmanned lunar module spacecraft into orbit for its first space test. An unmanned Saturn V, the Apollo 6 mission, was launched on April 4. This was a vehicle and spacecraft development test in which the spacecraft made a simulated translunar coast ellipse.

During the Apollo 6 flight, two problems arose involving vehicle propulsions but both were solved before the Apollo 8 flight and that vehicle did not experience either difficulty.

Apollo Applications Program Work increased during 1968 and is expected to continue in the coming year. NASA reassigned management responsibility for the Saturn I Workshop airlock and the modified lunar ascent stage for the Apollo Telescope Mount to the Marshall Center in September. The Manned Spacecraft Center formerly managed these projects.

The realignment was made to establish a satisfactory balance between Apollo Applications and Apollo programs and places AAP design integration responsibilities under a single NASA center.

The Marshall Center already had design responsibility for the Saturn I Workshop, conversion of an S-IVB into a space station, and the Apollo Telescope Mount rack and experiments. ATM will be used as a manned orbiting solar observatory.

The AAP payloads are expected to fly aboard Saturn IB launch vehicles early in the l970's.

NASA announced in December that the remaining Saturn IB launch vehicles in the fleet of 14 vehicles will be stored and kept in readiness by their respective manufacturers until they are needed.

The Saturn IB launch vehicle has a record of five successful flights in as many launches. It has completed its mission in Project Apollo. The vehicles will be stored until the beginning of the launch phase of Apollo Applications Program sometime in 1971.

Plans for a major reorganization were announced at the Marshall Center in early December. Several appointments were made then subject to review and approval by NASA Headquarters.

The changes would include the appointment of Dr. William R. Lucas, formerly director of Propulsion and Vehicle Engineering Lab, as director for Program Development; David Newby, associate deputy director, administrative, to director of Center Operations; and Dr. Ernst Stuhlinger, former director of the Space Sciences Lab, to MSFC Associate Director for Science.

Research and Development Operations has become Science and Engineering. Hermann K. Weidner is the director. Industrial Operations is now Program Management and E. F. O'Connor is the director.

Two other major changes anticipate the appointment of Karl Heimburg, former Test Lab director, as new director of Propulsion and Vehicle Engineering Lab, and Lee B. James, Saturn V Program manager, as manager of the newly created Saturn Program Office. The new organization contains the Saturn IB and Saturn V program offices.

The Center's civil service personnel strength dropped in 1968 by 700 people. There were 7,000 permanent civil service workers at the start of the year and there are presently about 6,300 on the payroll. The MSFC payroll in 1968 totaled $82.9 million.

The Center has a ceiling of 5,981 personnel to be met by July 1, 1969, through normal attrition. This decrease in personnel is being caused by cutbacks in the budget.

The number of direct support contractors at the Marshall Center during the year has decreased approximately 1,200 workers. There are now about 2,700 support contractor workers employed on MSFC projects at Redstone Arsenal.