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"THE INNOVATIVE FORCE IS STILL NOTICABLE"

An interview with Professor Jesco von Puttkamer, Program manager Future Planning at NASA, about the relevance and the results of the Apollo program. With Jesco v. Puttkamer spoke Anatol Johansen.

FLUG REVUE: If you want to send another manned mission to the moon, would it be possible to rebuild the Saturn V after all these years, or have the documents vanished?

Prof. Jesco von Puttkamer: It is a modern myth that the design papers of Saturn V have allegedly vanished. It is a popular opinion, but untrue. The blue prints are still around, however only on microfilm.

FR: That means the rocket could be built again if there were plans to go back to the moon?

v. Puttkamer: If that were the case she would not be re-constructed, because all the sub contractors and suppliers, who were involved when the Saturn V was first built, are no longer around. Apart from that, and this is more important still, technology is much more advanced now. So many innovations would be built into such a vehicle, which would turn Saturn V into an entirely new rocket. After all, no one would re-build a 1961 Chevrolet today.

FR: A new moon rocket would therefore be smaller and lighter?

v. Puttkamer: Yes, we can make everything smaller, lighter and more effective. We can fly more economically, rocket engines and flight performance will be better. Still, for its time the Saturn V was a great rocket.

Back then, you could read in all the textbooks that it was impossible to weld aluminium. So what we did was develop a new way of soldering aluminium for the Saturn V. Dozens of new techniques were invented for the Saturn V and the Apollo spacecraft, which later became spin offs for other areas of the industry.

FR: Aluminium welding was then also used in aircraft construction.

v. Puttkamer: Exactly. The same companies that worked on the Apollo program were also engaged in aircraft construction. Boeing, McDonnell Douglas, North American and others used the new knowledge for civil aviation. Apart from the technologies that were developed during the Apollo Program were later used in car manufacturing, bridge construction as well as in calculations for skyscrapers. Computer programs developed for calculations of vibrations on Saturn V became generally useful for constructions of big structures of this kind.

FR: Is therefore the old accusation not justified, that the equivalent of $130 billion were wasted only to reach the moon before the Russians?

v.Puttkamer: Five years ago a famous German philosopher, Richard von Weizäcker said on the 25th anniversary of the first moon landing, "You know, science has not benefited one bit from Apollo". I had to shake my head in disbelief when I heared that. Thousands of scientists, who were involved in the Apollo program had been challenged by the landing on the moon. They discovered new insights, which then found practical uses on Earth.

FR: Can you give some examples?

v. Puttkamer: The new knowledge was used for monitoring on intensive care units in hospitals, new scanning techniques of the human body, for entertainment electronics and optoelectronics, the microminiaturisation in electronics and it was instrumental in reducing the size of computers and in increasing their performance.

Of course, all this does not make the headlines. However, today the use of technologies derived from spaceflight is integrated into our lives so much - even though they do not carry a "made in space" label - that everything would collapse globally, if all these spin-offs were suddenly taken out of our civilisation.

FR: One must not ignore the fact that technology would have developed without spaceflight.

v. Puttkamer: I do not claim that all the mentioned applications directly derive from spaceflight. But spaceflight was an impelling force for new ideas. I am convinced that without those creative young brains, which developed technologies for the first moon flight with such enthusiasm, those technologies might not have been created. After all, spaceflight was a very potent stimulus, which increased man's creativity enormously.

You can't simply say, "Everything would have come about without space flight". That is just not the case. The American economy and industry has profited tremendously from the Apollo program. The quantity of innovations, which were generated by Apollo, is still noticeable today.

FR: What did science gain from the Apollo Program? After all, Harold C. Urey, American Nobel Price Winner for Chemistry said in the wake of the first landing on the moon, "Give me a rock from the moon and I will tell you how the solar system came into existence". Did he maybe take his mouth a littel too full?

v. Puttkamer: Maybe he exaggerated slightly. We have admittedly found out a lot about the moon through the Apollo landing.

FR: What for example?

v. Puttkamer: Most importantly perhaps that the moon is absolutely sterile. It is completely lifeless, without the least traces of any living organisms, fossils or organic compounds.

FR: Has it been possible to find the true origin of the moon?

v. Puttkamer: Maybe not absolutely and conclusively. However, we know through Apollo, that the moon is not a primeval star, which has remained unchanged since it came into existence. It has gone through various developmental stages, shows up different internal zones and has most probably got a core. It has therefore many similarities with Earth. Its stone has been melted repeatedly and was smashed by heavy meteorite strikes.

FR: How can one picture that?

v. Puttkamer: During its ancient history the moon had been covered by a very deep ocean of melted magma. Relatively light rocks swam on this glowing ocean. What remained of these rocks are today's moon rocks. The liquid magma cooled down in time. Then there were powerful asteroid strikes and the craters, which resulted, were enormous. The lava, which occurred because of the impact heat, then formed the "mare" like the Mare

Tranquilitatis, the Sea of Tranquility, which is situated near the moon's equator. This is where the Apollo 11 astronauts landed in 1969.

FR: Are there any substances on the moon from far away worlds, which cannot be found on Earth?

v. Puttkamer: No, Earth and Moon contain the same substances, although the proportions of the mixture are different. This was evident when the rock samples, which the Apollo astronauts returned to earth, were examined. Both, Earth and moon, have the same amount of oxygen isotopes in their rock, however there is less iron in the moon's matter. This explains why one cubic cm of Moon matter weighs 3.36g, while the Earth's matter weighs 5.5g. The Earth's satellite has fewer volatile elements, which are necessary to form atmospheric gases and water. The lower gravity of the Moon - it only has a sixth of the earth's gravity - was obviously not able to hold them.

FR: There are similar steps in development and a similar composition of the rock as on earth. What about the composition of the moon's interior?

v. Puttkamer: It is very similar. Just like the Earth the Moon is composed of various layers, consisting - going from the outside to the inside - of a crust (of 60km thickness), underneath the lithosphere (about 60 to 100km), underneath which is a partly liquid asthenosphere with a thickness of 1,000 to 1,740km, and in the middle there is presumably a core.

FR: Is our moon as old as the Earth?

v. Puttkamer: After the Moon's matter had been examined, the findings indicate the same age. The oldest rocks, which were picked up by the astronauts on the moon, are about 4.2 billion years old. They were taken from higher areas. The youngest rocks were from the lower regions, the so-called mari. They are about 3.2 billion years old.

FR: If moon and earth have indeed so many similarities, might one not assume that the Moon was not in fact part of the Earth and was split up when an asteroid or planetoid hit?

v. Puttkamer: That is correct. However, there is as yet no proof for this theory.

FR: Does this mean that we have to go back?

v. Puttkamer: Definitely

From page 38 of FLUG REVUE 9/99