Launch of Skylab 1 (NBC)

The launch of the Skylab Space Station (Skylab 1) - 14th May 1973.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• Skylab
• space
• station
• nasa
• launch
• saturn
• rocket

[vomit49894]

@johnDenverSINGS True. we need DEEP space exploration, and that's not the Shuttle.

[moboutmen]

The Mighty Saturn V. Gone way too soon.

[johnDenverSINGS]

i guess usa is going back to the 1960s with this orion deal there.. geez i liked the shuttle there but i was hooked up to a thermos bottle of explosives! .geez whatt next america..

[MightySaturn5]

@2014cwajts71 great point -I hear if they made a second production run of Saturn V's they would have used the uprated F-1 A engine which would have given the vehicle a 20% payload increase, considering that would have been the mid 70's I kind of wonder how much more lighter and more power a modern version would have been.

[jetfreak4]

@helljumpr5150 I agree. Spaceflight really did not get much more routine with the shuttle than with the Saturns. Five Saturn V's could have gotten the ISS into orbit with less time and money than the shuttle cost. Also, reusable spacecraft proved to be as costly as expendable rockets. The shuttle taught us more about what not to do with rockets than what to do. Hopefully the SLS will be able to follow in the Saturn V's footsteps. Why we chose to throw that rocket away still baffles me.

[usaeagle1776]

the US should have given NASA the money and resources to save Skylab. Instead of that dumbass Apollo/Soyuz bullshit,they should have went to Skylab and saved that station. outrageous.

[elwhit95]

@RFKFANTS67 The shuttle did things that could never be done by any rocket we had then or even waht the USSR had or has. The ability to catch repair satelights and repair missions could never be done by anything but the suttle. I will say Challenger should have never happened NASA had enough data to know there was an issue, but Columbia is like Apollo 1 its was an accident.

[helljumpr5150]

@jetfreak4 At the time they considered the shuttle over the Saturn, they wanted it for MILITARY applications as well as space travel, AND they wanted spaceflight to become routine thinking a spaceplane could make it so; however that is entirely counter-productive as we already had routine access to space with the Saturns and could do so much more. Nixon couldn't see it in the long run, but hey, he was a politician (a bad one) and didn't know enough of the benefits of Apollo-era technology.

[altfactor]

In all likelyhood, the only reason this footage even exists is that WRC Washington videotaped the NBC network feed to excerpt the blastoff on their local evening newscast.

[RFKFANTS67]

@jetfreak4 Finaley someone who thinks as I do. The saturn 1b-V are tried and tested for all the fucking around in orbit we should have stuck with the Rockets, just as the Ruskies stick with their Soyuz rocktests the shuttle cost 14 lives compared to Apollo's 3...we must also bare this in mind