Apollo 13

[Echnaton]

Hence, given the past problems with NASA's document repository and the ongoing government hiatus, I think I will devote as much disk space as I can spare at the facility to mirroring as much of the relevant document library as I can that pertains to Apollo.

Yay!! I would be happy to contribute my own Apollo archive, which at the moment tallies to 118 GB.

I suppose that hosting all that on a home cloud NAS server would run afoul of the ISP's ToS.  And probably the too many initials and jargon police too. 

[allancw]

From reply # 172 we have this, referring to the VARB:

'...As I said, the whole thing is a dynamic system. The relative positions of the Earth, Sun and moon, the time of day, the solar wind, all combine to produce a system that is not fixed and simple to work with but needs to be modelled and worked out for each launch.' WORKED OUT FOR EACH LAUNCH

Sounds like they needed to calculate a specific 'VARB launch window' for each flight. Which has been said several times here. Yet no one can come up with a document showing what each flight's 'VARB launch window' was. Or one flight's. 'Hurry up' (through VARB) is not enough, guys.

ONE MORE TIME: Show me. Just saying you showed me isn't quite enough. You have to actually do it.

[ka9q]

From reply # 172 we have this, referring to the VARB:

'...As I said, the whole thing is a dynamic system. The relative positions of the Earth, Sun and moon, the time of day, the solar wind, all combine to produce a system that is not fixed and simple to work with but needs to be modelled and worked out for each launch.' WORKED OUT FOR EACH LAUNCH

Sounds like they needed to calculate a specific 'VARB launch window' for each flight.

No, it doesn't. The radiation doses were measured for each mission, and they varied somewhat unpredictably. But even the highest was far below the safe limits, so there was no need to do mission-specific planning or determine a "launch window". As I explained, there is no launch window associated with avoiding the VABs as they turn with the earth.

[Andromeda]

From reply # 172 we have this, referring to the VARB:

'...As I said, the whole thing is a dynamic system. The relative positions of the Earth, Sun and moon, the time of day, the solar wind, all combine to produce a system that is not fixed and simple to work with but needs to be modelled and worked out for each launch.' WORKED OUT FOR EACH LAUNCH

Sounds like they needed to calculate a specific 'VARB launch window' for each flight. Which has been said several times here. Yet no one can come up with a document showing what each flight's 'VARB launch window' was.

Wrong!  You can get launch window information here: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Apollo-Definitive-Sourcebook-Springer-Exploration/dp/0387300430

Don't forget to check out the references and tables at the back.

Or one flight's. 'Hurry up' (through VARB) is not enough, guys.

Um, yes it is.  If you think it isn't, then supply data that proves it.  The burden of proof is on you.  You've seen the letter from Dr van Allen - so it is up to you to refute it with facts and proof.  We need absorption data, radiation type, flux density, shielding, timings... Go ahead.

ONE MORE TIME: Show me. Just saying you showed me isn't quite enough. You have to actually do it.

We did.  Now will you acknowledge that you have received the information you have asked for, in several different forms and from several places, but failed to read them? (Ha ha, silly me!)

For pity's sake, stop shouting.

[ka9q]

I suppose that hosting all that on a home cloud NAS server would run afoul of the ISP's ToS. 

Depends on the service; some permit servers and unlimited traffic.

But it's really not necessary to run it out of a home given how cheap commercial hosting services have become. My own is only $9/mo and it doesn't limit disk space or network traffic.

[ka9q]

Wrong!  You can get launch window information here: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Apollo-Definitive-Sourcebook-Springer-Exploration/dp/0387300430

Since he probably won't bother checking, I should point out here that while every Apollo mission had a launch window, they were not determined by a need to avoid the Van Allen belts. Apollo lunar launch windows were determined mainly by lighting conditions at the landing site; every landing took place shortly after local sunrise. This limited the window to a few days each month. Then the moon had to pass through the plane of the parking and transfer orbit, which limited the window to a couple of hours each day (by allowing for some variability in the orbit plane with exact launch time.)

[Andromeda]

Wrong!  You can get launch window information here: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Apollo-Definitive-Sourcebook-Springer-Exploration/dp/0387300430

Since he probably won't bother checking, I should point out here that while every Apollo mission had a launch window, they were not determined by a need to avoid the Van Allen belts. Apollo lunar launch windows were determined mainly by lighting conditions at the landing site; every landing took place shortly after local sunrise. This limited the window to a few days each month. Then the moon had to pass through the plane of the parking and transfer orbit, which limited the window to a couple of hours each day (by allowing for some variability in the orbit plane with exact launch time.)

Yes, I know, but that book includes the appropriate launch window calculations for the mission as a whole - so pretty much everything that could reasonably be asked for.  As you pointed out earlier, the "move through the edge and fast" method works just fine with the VAB.  I'm waiting (with baited breath!) for our friend to prove us wrong 

[Zakalwe]

ONE MORE TIME: Show me. Just saying you showed me isn't quite enough. You have to actually do it.

Stop shifting the goalposts.
You originally said that the "proof" of the hoax was that there were no contemporaneous documents. You have been given copious documents.

Again, are you going to answer this?

Given that you have now got the information that you requested, it seems that a retraction of the above statement is required. I am personally happy to give you a little time to verify the documents (say a day), just so you don't have to accept anything on face value. Will you then retract the assertion that the missions were hoaxes?

[JayUtah]

Sounds like they needed...

And here you go again, pretending to be an expert in something you know nothing about, ignorantly supposing what "must" be done, and then trying to hold professional practitioners accountable to your made-up nonsense.

Yet no one can come up with a document...

Simply false.

...showing what each flight's 'VARB launch window' was.

And here's the part where you move the goalposts in order to ensure that "no documents exist" for the thing you (now) say must be absolutely crucial.

ONE MORE TIME: Show me.

You've been shown.

No one has any reason to jump further through your contrived hoops.  You set up the rhetorical trap on the premise that no one could find what you are asking for.  And as we've seen, you'll just keep changing the notion of what you're asking for so that your premise remains true.  It's not as if you're actually reading and trying to understand any of this.  The list Sts60 gave you should have taken you several days to read and absorb.  But you suddenly conclude that none of them is what you're asking for, and suddenly you need something else to satisfy you.

Who do you think you're fooling?

[Zakalwe]

Who do you think you're fooling?

Himself

[Jason Thompson]

Sounds like they needed to calculate a specific 'VARB launch window' for each flight.

Nope. That reply was specifically in reference to the limitations of my diagram in terms of how good a representation of the belts it was. They do change shape somewhat. Does this affect the Apollo launch? No. It was preplanned to miss the vast majority of the belts anyway, and slight distortions in the shape of the belts would have negligible impact. I did not say that any specific launch window needed to be calculated.

Which has been said several times here.

Only by you.

Yet no one can come up with a document showing what each flight's 'VARB launch window' was. Or one flight's.

Because no such launch window is needed. A trajectory to avoid most of them yes, a specific launch window, no.

'Hurry up' (through VARB) is not enough, guys.

Says who? You? You've already told us you have no relevant qualifications in aerospace engineering or space flight planninjg, so why are you not listening to the people in this conversation who do? Why are you not reading the documents you have been given? The sheer volume of reference material already suggested to you is not something you could possibly have read and understood in the time this conversation has been going on.

ONE MORE TIME: Show me. Just saying you showed me isn't quite enough. You have to actually do it.

One more time, what do you have to say about your earlier claims about the photo being lit from the left and the ability of astronauts to see stars? Your continued refusal to respond to this question is tiresome.

[JayUtah]

...every Apollo mission had a launch window, they were not determined by a need to avoid the Van Allen belts.

Indeed, the obsession over the radiation hazard is a disproportionate emphasis that exists mostly in allancw's mind and is not as grave an issue for actual spacefarers.  As many other laymen do, he's convinced via the notion of some Radiation Boogey Man that the principal and overriding hazard to the astronauts was the trapped radiation belt, and therefore it ought to have been a major cause for concern at NASA and a major driver for determining launch windows.

He has also pooh-poohed the most obvious solution:  that a transfer orbit of particular inclination and eccentricity will skirt the Van Allen belts no matter when it is executed.  Sadly he's latched onto the prospect that the geometry and ferocity of the trapped radiation vary, and wrongly supposed that they vary to such an extent that no one-size-fits-all orbit can avoid them.  Of course that's entirely his supposition based on nothing more profound than his intuition.  And this has been his approach throughout:  whatever he imagines, that must necessarily be case without further argument.  Sadly he doesn't recognize this approach as inappropriately hubristic and, frankly, ignorant.

As we've all noticed before, people speculating outside their fields of expertise tend to surmise that problems are more difficult to solve than they really are, and that solutions to them must fall into certain intuitive, brute-force categories rather than capitalizing on innovation and simplicity.  The design of the translunar trajectory simply and elegantly solves the radiation exposure in the most straightforward and uncomplicated way.  Allancw seems miffed that the real solution doesn't resemble what he thought it would be.

[ajv]

That reminds me, I haven't checked out Bob Andrepont's massive collection of space-related documents lately.

Thanks, sts60!

I hadn't visited there for a while either. But on your prompt I checked out his Apollo section again and found the Apollo Recovery Operational Procedures Manual which contained information on something I had been wondering about for the A9 Flight Journal: how to decode the Apollo 9 Block Data recovery area codes e.g. 10-CC, 33-1A etc.

So, 10-CC means on revolution 10, recovery will be in contingency sector C (Western Pacific) which will have support level C (aircraft with locating and pararescue capability). 33-1A means on revolution 33, recovery zone 1 (West Atlantic - USS Guadacanal) with support level A (recovery ship at or near target point).

Thanks again.

[smartcooky]

Of course that's entirely his supposition based on nothing more profound than his intuition.

As we've all noticed before, people speculating outside their fields of expertise tend to surmise that problems are more difficult to solve than they really are, and that solutions to them must fall into certain intuitive, brute-force categories rather than capitalizing on innovation and simplicity.

Jay, I have seen this before (I can't remember exactly where) in trying to understand the power of lift.

Consider a fully fuelled and laden Boeing 747-400. Depending on the model, its all-up weight is around 900,000 lbs (around 400 tons)

On the face of it, if you know nothing about lift, and going purely on intuition, it just cannot fly. Even if you had lift explained to you, it seems totally counter-intuitive, that the fact that the only reason this behemoth can get in the air and stay there is because the airflow around the wings can create near a million pounds of upwards force. It just doesn't seem possible, yet, it is.

Yet, people don't say that lift is a hoax, or that flight doesn't really happen, even if they don't understand it. They are prepared to get on board passenger aircraft in their millions every year without having the foggiest understanding of exactly how this 400 ton monster flies. They take it on faith, and on observational experience that it works.

Spaceflight, and flight to the Moon however, don't seem to get the same trust.

[raven]

I guess because the 747 has entered into the realm of everyday magic.
The same with modern computers and even a typical car. Most of us don't know how they work, they just do. If going to the moon was as common as jumbo jets, there probably would not be nearly as many conspiracy theorists going off about this, if at all.