A New View of the Ocean of Storms

THE MOON

WITH ecstatic verbal descriptions, Apollo 12 Astronauts Charles Conrad and Alan Bean enabled millions of listeners on earth to share their experiences as they walked and worked on the surface of the moon. But the failure of the color TV camera brought to the moon aboard the lunar module Intrepid deprived earthbound watchers of the spectacular sights that should have accompanied the sounds. Last week, while the astronauts remained in quarantine aboard the carrier U.S.S. Hornet, the world finally got a close-up view of the Ocean of Storms. Movie and still films brought back by the astronauts were flown to Houston, decontaminated, developed and released by NASA. They were well worth waiting for.

Under a pitch-black sky, the Ocean of Storms presents an eerie face, its black shadows starkly contrasting with the blinding white reflection of early morning sunlight from the desolate, rock-strewn surface. The black-and-white monotony is broken only by the color brought to the moon by man--the golden insulating foil on Intrepid, (continued on page 41) the red and blue of the American flag, the golden reflection from the umbrella antenna--and the blues of the earth in the sky above.

Most striking of all are the closeups of Surveyor 3, which had not been seen by man since it was sent to the moon some 2 1/2 years ago. In one shot, Astronaut Conrad is shown examining Surveyor as it stands in its crater. In the background, protruding above the crater's edge, only 600 ft. away, Intrepid and the nearby umbrella antenna gleam in the sunlight. To the dismay of scientists--who wanted to study the discoloration of Surveyor's white paint--all of the Surveyor pictures are in black and white; while photographing the little craft, the astronauts forgot to exchange their black-and-white film for color.

Clinging Dust. In one movie sequence, shot through Intrepid's window as the craft settled toward a landing, dust kicked up by the descent engine begins to obscure the lunar landscape. It finally blots out the landing site completely, vividly demonstrating why Conrad had to make an instrument landing. Another strip, shot on the trip home, shows a dazzling eclipse of the sun caused by the earth itself.

Other trophies of the Apollo 12 mission also preceded the astronauts to Houston. Some 80 Ibs. of lunar rock were delivered by midweek to eager scientists at the Lunar Receiving Laboratory (LRL). Although a thick coat of clinging dust prevented immediate detailed observation, geologists could see that several of the rocks were igneous--formed out of molten material like lava. They were also of a lighter hue than the brownish gray Apollo 11 rocks from the Sea of Tranquility--and much larger. The biggest of these "grapefruits," as Conrad had called them, weighed as much as four pounds and were about six inches long and five inches wide. Said a pleased Dan Anderson, curator of the LRL: "Scientists are oohing and aahing. The astronauts were asked to bring back some larger rocks if they 'could, and these are plenty big."

Scientists were just as elated over what the astronauts had left behind. Performing well at the Ocean of Storms base, ALSEP (for Apollo Lunar Surface Experiments Package) had begun transmitting valuable data even before the astronauts left the moon. For the time being, earth controllers commanded two of the instruments--designed to investigate any traces of lunar atmosphere--to go into a stand-by mode; that would allow earthly gases left within them to bake out during the torrid two-week-long lunar day (maximum temperature: 240DEG F.). Once freed of these vapors, which interfere with their high-voltage power supply, the instruments will be switched into full operation.

The other three instruments were anything but idle. Radioing data constantly, ALSEP's magnetometer indicated that the moon's magnetic field--which could offer important clues to the lunar interior--may be considerably stronger than had been believed. Palmer Dyal, one of the magnetometer experimenters, had an esoteric, but speculative explanation: after a period of vulcanism, the moon cooled more rapidly than scientists had heretofore thought, thus preserving a larger portion of its primordial magnetic field.

Echo Chamber. The solar-wind spectrometer was also working well, even though it had, for the moment, little to detect; the moon was passing through the earth's magnetic tail (April 22, 1966), which shielded the lunar surface from the high-velocity solar particles that normally bombard it. Meanwhile, the seismometer had recorded an unexplained, two-minute tremor. And scientists were still trying to explain the strange vibrations recorded for 55 minutes by the instrument immediately after Intrepid's ascent stage impacted into the Ocean of Storms.

Although these bell-like reverberations were unlike any seismic event on earth, Columbia University Geophysicist Gary Latham offered a plausible explanation. The effect may have been caused, he said, by a layer of rubble or fractured rock sandwiched between bedrock in the floor of the Ocean of Storms and a solid cover of fine material deposits above. Lacking dampening fluids or gases, the layer of rubble may have acted as an echo chamber in which the seismic waves reverberated. If so, the next big seismic event on the moon should be a scientific spectacular; the third-stage rocket of Apollo 13's Saturn 5 will be sent crashing into the lunar surface, creating an impact equivalent to the explosion of 8 1/2 tons of TNT.

The astronauts' own splashdown was far more gentle. At the end of a three-day homeward flight that was uneventful to the point of boredom, Yankee Clipper dropped into the choppy Pacific 405 miles southeast of American Samoa--exactly 10 days 4 hr. and 36 min. after its lightning-marred launch from Cape Kennedy. The landing was only 13 seconds off schedule and only 2.6 miles from its target near the bow of the Hornet. Even so, there was a moment of tension. Drifting down under its three big orange-and-white chutes in full view of a worldwide TV audience, Yankee Clipper suddenly seemed to be billowing smoke--a sight that was ominously reminiscent of the fatal Apollo fire in 1967. In this case, however, Skipper Conrad was simply venting surplus fuel, an operation usually performed at a higher altitude.

Youngest Captain. Although Yankee Clipper capsized as it hit the water, the astronauts quickly righted their craft by inflating three large flotation bags attached to its tip. Lifted aboard the aircraft carrier by helicopter, the crew was hustled into the same mobile quarantine van that housed the men of Apollo 11. Soon afterward, they were cheered by a call from President Nixon, who told the three Navy commanders that he was promoting them to captain. That made the 37-year-old Al Bean the Navy's youngest to attain the rank.

During their five-day cruise to Honolulu, the astronauts began debriefings, ate a Thanksgiving Day turkey dinner and staged a traditional Navy "pollywog" ceremony for Astronaut Richard Gordon, who had never before crossed the equator at sea. Gordon was draped with a sign reading: "Beware! Luney Wog. Unclean. Unpredictable." Following a hula-skirted welcome in Pearl Harbor, the astronauts were trundled in their van aboard a flatbed truck and driven to nearby Hickam Air Force Base for the flight to Texas.

At week's end, as Apollo 12's astronauts bedded down in the LRL for the remainder of their 21-day quarantine, NASA was making plans for its next lunar expedition. Buoyed by the bull's-eye at Surveyor Crater, the space agency tentatively scheduled the launch of Apollo 13 for March 12 and picked the most difficult site to date for man's next lunar landing: the ancient highlands near the mountain-ringed crater Fra Mauro.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.