Saturn—Rocket Of The Year

Press, Volume CV, Issue 30955, 11 January 1966, Page 8

Saturn—Rocket Of The Year

An outstanding feature of the 1965 record of space vehicle launchings is the perfect firing record of the giant Saturn C-l rocket.

In a development programme involving 10 firings, all were successful—a record unmatched by any other pub-licly-fired rocket. Even by the end of 1964 this rocket’s record was so perfect that it was declared operational after seven shots instead of the planned 10. This is another way of saying that no further development was needed and in the remaining three shots attention was concentrated on the performance of the payloads. These included three huge Pegasus meteoroid detection satellites, with 96-foot “wings,” as well as the Project Apollo capsules and escape towers that were carried on the previous flights. The completion of the Saturn C-l Series clears the way for the new Saturn C-18, the

first of which should be launched shortly. It will be larger and more powerful than the C-l and if its record is as good the America Apollo moon effort will get away to a fine start.

Another good rocket performance was shown by the Titan II launch vehicle for the Gemini flights. It is fortunate that a two-cent plastic diaphragm was discovered in Gemini 6 before its final liftoff, otherwise the flight would have been aborted. Yet this was a human error and not in any way a weakness in the rocket. In fact, the overall design and construction of such rockets as the Saturn C-l and Titan 11 is so near perfect that the most likely cause of any flight failure would be human. We do not know whether the inspector who “signed out” the diaphragm at the Titan factory lost his job or not but the warning from this mistake will put others on their toes.