A conversation with
Skylab’s
Ed Gibson
America’s first space station, Skylab was launched into orbit on a
Saturn V rocket in May of 1973. Three
manned missions to the outpost were
immensely successful. Repairs made
to the orbital station during several
spacewalks ultimately proved that
it was possible for astronauts to conduct work in outer space, which
gave NASA the confidence to eventually follow Skylab with on-orbit assembly of the International Space
Station.
Astronaut-scientist Edward G.
Gibson, who earned a doctorate in
engineering with a minor in physics,
was the Science Pilot for the third
and final mission to Skylab in late
1973, returning to Earth in February of
1974. Being the last humans to board
Skylab, the crew was kept busy from
day one, but still found time to enjoy
the view.
Astronaut Edward Gibson spoke
with RocketSTEM about the final
Skylab mission and other topics.
Here is the condensed interview.
Gibson: “Well, let’s see. What
was it like? How do I ever give you
a concise answer to that one? The
beginning, of course, is always exciting, the liftoff on through rendezvous
and docking. Once you get inside
the station, you encounter two challenges. First, there is a lot of work to
get started. Second, you also have
to be careful that you don’t move
too fast or you’ll get space sickness.
Jerry [Gerald Carr], who was the
commander, and myself, did alright
28
28
on that. Bill [William Pogue], the Pilot, did get sick and he was sick for
a number of weeks, which slowed
him down. That’s just the nature of
the animal unfortunately and hard
to predict.
“We got up there and immediately
had a lot of work to do because the
previous crew had done a great job.
They started slow and finished fast.
Even though Ground Control tried to
make several allowances, they really
started us a little faster than we were
ready for. We ended up being behind the scheduled activities as opposed to ahead of it, which is where
you always like to be.
“We sorted through that and by the
time the smoke cleared at the end of
the mission we had accomplished
the same average work per day that
the previous crew had done.
“You never get tired of looking out
the window. That’s something I wish
everyone could do. If people could
experience zero gravity while looking
out the window, they would have a
different perception of our home
planet. Pictures are great, but they
don’t really give you the same physical and intellectual perspective.”
For all astronauts, reentering the
Earth’s a