Scott Manley | The Surprising Success of NASA's First Moon Landings - The Surveyor Program 1966-1968 @scottmanley | Uploaded 6 months ago | Updated 2 hours ago
The Surveyor program was originally the grand plan for lunar exploration in the 1960's until Kennedy decided to prioritize putting humans on the moon. Instead the Surveyor missions, developed and operated by JPL, became precursor missions to test technologies and measure the lunar surface to make sure humans could safely land on the moon.
After recent lunar landing missions experienced various levels of success, I was really curious as to how the landing guidance operated on a 60 year old spacecraft without fully digital computers. Using 4 radar beams the spacecraft's analogue guidance system was able to descend under control and cancel its velocity for the soft landing.
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The Surveyor program was originally the grand plan for lunar exploration in the 1960's until Kennedy decided to prioritize putting humans on the moon. Instead the Surveyor missions, developed and operated by JPL, became precursor missions to test technologies and measure the lunar surface to make sure humans could safely land on the moon.
After recent lunar landing missions experienced various levels of success, I was really curious as to how the landing guidance operated on a 60 year old spacecraft without fully digital computers. Using 4 radar beams the spacecraft's analogue guidance system was able to descend under control and cancel its velocity for the soft landing.
Follow me on Twitter for more updates:
https://twitter.com/DJSnM
I have a discord server where I regularly turn up:
https://discord.gg/zStmKbM
If you really like what I do you can support me directly through Patreon
https://www.patreon.com/scottmanley
