NOVA; To the Moon; Interview with Rocco Petrone, mechanical engineer and director of NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center from 1973-1974, part 3 of 3

To take number one. On 17, did you have to be convinced about the trajectory issue getting in over the Hadley Rill at very steep mountain top? On 17, the trajectory was probably our toughest one today. In our work we did prior to site selection, we take all those factors into account. In the fact of landmark tracking plays a part, the kind of pictures you have of the site, of how level it is, how many bolders there are, where are you going to come down, all play

apart. Now, 17, because of the confirmation of the terrain there, you had a mountain side, you had an area of the land, which was tight, but we felt confident after much discussion, after much analysis, after much thought that it was safe to go to. And when we selected the site, it was one of the number we were looking at. We felt confident that we could land there. Now, the geology training that was going on, how did you feel about that? Did you think, I know that you went on one geology field trip yourself to the coastal hills in California? Yes. Were you concerned about the training, did you think that it was worthwhile? Well, the training that the astronauts got was outstanding. Men like Lee Silver, who conducted two that Apollo training sites, missions that I went on, they were just outstanding.

They would have the astronauts go over terrain in which the scientists, of which Lee Silver was leading, knew what the lessons were. And these men would only be in radio contact with somebody simulating the mission room in Houston. And they would talk of what they found, they would mention things, and so forth. Then once they finished that cycle, and it might be two or three hours, we then would all walk it over. And Lee Silver would take the spot of saying, what did you see here? And the astronauts would report, he said, well, what about that? And they saw something they missed. And that there would be much that they saw the first time. And that was a learning curve, which was just outstanding. I was very impressed with their field training for geology. And the scientists that worked on those did an outstanding job. Do you think that the Apollo program ended prematurely? Well, it ended when we had planned it, but I wish we had planned, we had planned to

go to 20. And there was a time frame when we were buying hardware for the administration, put a cease and hold on it after 17. So I was, you might say, disappointed, but I also know the reason decisions have to be made. They wanted to get on with the shuttle, wanted to get on with other things. And said, hey, we've been enough. We could keep going to the moon for many more launches. So we're going to end it at 17. I was disappointed, not terribly so, because we had accomplished really quite a bit. One puts it in perspective and looking back at it today, it's an outstanding program. It really returned science and showed us how to operate in space and operate a quarter million miles from home. And I wish we had done more. And we were prepared to do more, but decisions had to be made and decisions made to stop at 17.

Okay, okay, great, Mark.