View from onboard Apollo 3's Saturn 1B rocket

http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/space

View from onboard the top of the second stage (S-II) of Apollo 3's Saturn 1B rocket watching the third stage S-IVB J-2 engine burn to carry the third stage and the unmanned Apollo Command and Service Modules into high Earth orbit for subsequent re-entry tests.

As the third stage disappears out of view the second stage starts to fall back towards the Earth - revealing a view of the planet from 200,000 feet high. The camera ejection moment is caught in the last few frames of the film.

----

Between 1966 and 1972 NASA collected around 22 hours of 16mm film footage shot in space and on the surface of the Moon during the Apollo missions.

For the last forty years this unique collection has been kept in very cold storage at the Johnson Space Centre in Houston. The film rolls have only been brought out of storage a handful of times to transfer onto new tape formats, and only brief portions from a few of the most popular clips have ever been used in documentary films.

In a unique collaboration with the online archive film company Footagevault, visitors to the Science Museum, London, get the exclusive opportunity to see the entire Apollo film archive for free in high definition. The screenings will take place daily from now until 31 August 2009.

http://www.footagevault.com

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• space
• nasa
• science
• museum
• london
• apollo
• saturn
• 1b
• moon
• footage

[don312000]

@ApolloWasReal Didn't know that! Thanks!!!!! Learn something new everyday:)

[ApolloWasReal]

@don312000 Right, though the S-IVBs were not identical between the Saturn IB and V. The IB version shown here had 3 ullage rockets and lacked a restart capability, as its entire delta V was needed just to achieve earth orbit. The S-IVB on the Saturn V had 2 ullage rockets and could be restarted once. The first firing, a fairly short one, achieved earth orbit and the second, longer firing after a parking orbit or two was for translunar injection.

[ApolloWasReal]

@kargaroc386 Apollo 4 was the first unmanned test flight of the Saturn V, and this is definitely not a Saturn V. The 3 ullage rockets on the S-IVB give it away as a Saturn IB; the Saturn V version of the S-IVB had only 2 ullage rockets. This appears to be AS-203 (aka Apollo 2, not 3) as evidenced by the slightly underperforming ullage rocket. The ullage rockets on AS-202 (aka Apollo 3) were normal but one of the four *retrorockets* on the S-IB underperformed. Here they're normal.

[ApolloWasReal]

@kikaskilla I don't think there was an *official* Apollo 2 or 3 flight, but AS-203 (which this appears to be) is sometimes called Apollo 2 (not 3) and AS-202 is sometimes called Apollo 3 (not 2). There was of course no Apollo 1 flight, and the first "official" Apollo flight was Apollo 4, the first unmanned test flight of the Saturn V.

[ApolloWasReal]

@DumbYankies According to the mission report the S-IVB ullage rockets fired for 4 seconds. Here they are seen for 16, so this would be slowed down by 4x.

[ApolloWasReal]

@charliegoodboy I'm pretty sure this was not normal speed. According to the mission report, the three ullage rockets on the S-IVB fired for only 4 seconds but here we see them for 16. That implies a 4x camera frame rate, i.e., 96 fps or maybe 100 fps.

[ApolloWasReal]

This is definitely a 2-stage Saturn IB; its S-IVB has 3 solid-fuel ullage rockets while the S-IVB on the Saturn V has only 2. From the one underperforming ullage rocket this appears to be AS-203, sometimes known as Apollo 2 (not 3). The ullage rockets actually fired for 4 seconds, so this appears to be at about 1/4 speed (96 fps).

[rickcain2320]

This shot was used repeatedly in the original "BattleStar Galactica" as a depiction of its main missiles firing at Cylon base ships.

[charliegoodboy]

Hard to believe it but that was normal speed--this was an unmanned mission and the stage containing the camera was "coasting" upward and purposely maneuvered to track the stage above, the camera lens was protected by thick glass, remember, in those days they had to recover the film for developing!

[malamagr]

Just FYI, this is very slow-mo.  The staging happened quickly, in a couple of secs.