Dave Scott
Al Worden
Jim Irwin
The leaning Falcon rests on on the lunar surface. Irwin took this photo at the start of the third EVA.
Credit: NASA via Retro Space Images
radioed, “that we checked off the
100-percent science completion
square time during EVA-1 or maybe
even shortly into EVA-2. From here on
out, it’s gravy all the way!”
The gravy of the third excursion
would be tempered by the fact that
it would also be the shortest, scheduled to last barely four and a half
hours. It started with the recovery
of a core sample from EVA-1. For a
few moments, their efforts to extract
the core tube from the ground were
fruitless and Scott was almost ready
to give up. However, with Irwin’s
persuasion, both men hooked an
arm under each handle of the drill
and after several firm tugs the tube
sprang from the ground.
Precious minutes were wasted,
though, when the vice carried on the
rover to dismantle the tube into storable sections proved to have been
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fitted backwards; Irwin broke out a
wrench and used that, but Scott’s
frustration was evident. He knew that
for every minute wasted before the
drive started, they would lose at least
another two minutes of geological
exploration.
Some of the senior NASA managers in Mission Control wanted to
abandon the core entirely. However,
the astronauts and Joe Allen had
an ally in Flight Director Gerry Griffin, who had shared several of their
geological trips in the California
mountains and knew how important
the science was…and how important the deep core sample was to
the success of this mission. It was he
who persuaded the managers not to
abandon the core tube work.
After they had partially disassembled the tube, it was decided that
they should leave the remainder of
the task to later. When the core was
finally opened on Earth, it proved to
contain several dozen layers which
documented some 400 million years’
worth of lunar history...
At length, Scott and Irwin buckled
into the rover and headed westnorthwest for a good look at Hadley
Rille. After the rille, if time permitted,
they hoped to grab an opportunity
to inspect the mysterious “North
Complex” of craters, which some
geologists thought might be a cluster
of small, ancient volcanoes.
Their arrival at Hadley Rille was
truly breathtaking. Its far wall, bathed
in the harsh, direct sunlight of the late
lunar morning, showed distinct layers
of rock pushing through a mantle of
dust, lending credence to theories
that Mare Imbrium had been built up
as a succession of ancient lava flows.
One theory was that the rille was
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