Welcome To The Apollo Project
First Landing on the Moon

JRL is proud to have played small role in the design of the historic Mercury, Gemini and Apollo Programs.

A Brief History

In 1961, President Kennedy announced that man would go to the Moon within 10 years. His bold announcement led to the Gemini program which laid the ground for the subsequent Apollo program.

The Apollo program started with the development of the Apollo space craft and Saturn V rocket, at the same time it was conducting unmanned inspection missions of the moon using such equipment as the lunar orbiter. Apollo received valuable information from the manned-flight Gemini and Mercury projects, which coincided with Apollo's development stages. The Apollo program was a series of human spaceflight missions undertaken using the Apollo spacecraft, conducted between 1961-1972. It was devoted to the goal of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to Earth within the decade of the 1960s. This goal was achieved with the Apollo 11 mission in 1969.

Goals for the Apollo Missions went beyond simply landing on the moon. The program continued into the early 1970s to carry out the initial hands-on scientific exploration of the Moon. The other goals were:

• To establish the technology to meet other national interests in space.
• To achieve preeminence in space for the United States.
• To carry out a program of scientific exploration of the Moon.
• To develop man's capability to work in the lunar environment.

They left equipment on the moon to measure tremors and sun rays and collected 21 kilograms of specimens of moon rocks and dust.

Although, it succeeded in it's mission, Apollo had its tragedies. In January 1967, a fire broke out in the cabin of an Apollo craft undergoing a simulated launch. Three astronauts - Virgil I. Grissom, Edward H. White and Roger B. Caffey - died. In April 1970, an explosion in a power supply oxygen tank forced Apollo 13 to abort its planned lunar landing. The craft flew around the moon and used numerous methods to safely pull off a "miraculous return" to Earth. The Apollo 13 flight was the basis for a later movie production.

Neil A. Armstrong, the first person to touch the moon, On July 20, 1969, marked the occasion with the now famous words:

It's reported that from age 9 Neil was an aircraft nut, loving all types of aircraft . Neil started out working as engineer and researcher far out on the fringes of flight. Sounds a lot like our Ron Eason if you read his story.

JRL's part in the Apollo program involved work on the Lunar Ascent Engine [the one boosted the Crew off the moon], it burned U.D.M.H. and Nitrogen Tetra oxide and delivered 4000 Lbs of thrust. It's engine was made of filament wound fiberglass. JRL also tested and evaluated the performance of rocket assemblies and components such as valves, turbine, thrust chambers and injectors for a number of model versions. JRL was responsible for engineering, design and construction of various rocket and component test cells including piping, valves, tanks, controls, and instrumentation and for for writing procedures for testing engines and components; pre & post test firing and conducted Tests assemblies and components for the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo_Programs.