<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Growing up, one of my favorite sayings we applied to solving complex problems was, \u201cKeep It Simple, Stupid.\u201d\u00a0 In the best NASA tradition, we trimmed it down to the acronym, \u2018KISS\u2019.\u00a0 During the period where some people strived to be more politically correct, someone came up with the idea that it should be shortened to just \u2018KIS\u2019 by eliminating the \u2018stupid\u2019 part.\u00a0 The thinking was, \u201cThe term \u2018stupid\u2019 might hurt someone\u2019s feelings.\u201d\u00a0 To me, this was a load of poppycock and it stripped the KISS philosophy of its intended punch.\u00a0 KISS was not designed to hurt anyone\u2019s feelings.\u00a0 Like a physical slap to one\u2019s own forehead, the sole purpose of KISS was to remind oneself that in many cases, simpler solutions trumped overly complex ones.\u00a0 Rube Goldberg\u2019s illustrations of overly complex machines doing simple jobs (called \u2018Rube Goldberg Devices\u2019, naturally) are a cartoonish exaggeration of this very idea.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Christopher Columbus Kraft (2-28-1924 to 7-22-2019) was employed by NASA as an engineer during the development of the multi-step Manned Space Program (MSP).\u00a0 We have featured Kraft in two previous <\/span>FTVs <\/span><\/i>(FTV:\u00a0 Mission Control –\u00a0 Parts 1 & 2\u00a0 11-27-24\u00a0 & 12-4-2024) so we won\u2019t repeat his full biography here.\u00a0 Suffice to say that he (like many in the engineering field) always thought that the solution to any problem should be \u2018simple, reliable, & effective\u2019.\u00a0 As Kraft and his fellow NASA engineers invented the hardware and software for the MSP, he would be the nagging voice reminding his team about \u2018simple, reliable, & effective\u2019 solutions to problems whenever he could see things getting too complicated for his own tastes.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0This approach to building Mission Control and flight procedure manuals worked very well during NASA\u2019s first manned flights that employed the Mercury spacecraft.\u00a0 The NASA think tank spent long hours researching the best way to get the astronauts into space and home again in one piece.\u00a0 On many occasions, they had to be flexible enough to change on a dime when unforeseen situations arose.\u00a0 For example, after two suborbital flights (taken by Alan Shepard and Gus Grissom), John Glenn was launched into space to fly the United States\u2019 first manned orbital flight.\u00a0 Between his first and second lap around the Earth, a green signal light flashed on a controller\u2019s console at Mission Control indicating the heat shield landing bag on <\/span>Freedom 7<\/span><\/i> had deployed.\u00a0 The heat shield was critical as it kept the 3,000 degree F heat the craft would experience during re-entry from incinerating the ship.\u00a0 Just prior to splashing down in the ocean, a cloth bag underneath the heat shield would deploy to help absorb the impact and then keep the capsule afloat.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0While the press pool alerted the whole world that Glenn would be doomed if the landing bag had been deployed in orbit, the NASA controllers began discussing the situation.\u00a0 Without explaining why they were asking, the capsule communicator (CapComm) asked Glenn if the light showing that the heat shield landing bag was deployed was off (it was).\u00a0 They also asked if he heard any unusual bangs or thumps from the bottom of the Mercury capsule (he had not).\u00a0 Most of the engineers in the discussion thought it was an instrument failure and the normal landing procedure could be followed.\u00a0 Some suggested that the retrorocket pack strapped over the heatshield could be left in place (instead of being jettisoned after the three rocket motors were fired to slow the craft down for re-entry) just in case.\u00a0 Craft resisted the idea as it had never been simulated.\u00a0 Finally an engineer from the company who built the capsule asked, \u201cBut what if it is not instrumentation and the heat shield is loose?\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0In Glenn\u2019s case, the KISS solution was to leave the retrorocket package in place just in case.\u00a0 Glenn had already figured out why they were asking him questions about the heat shield before they instructed him to not jettison the retrorocket packet.\u00a0 He landed safely and inspection of the capsule after the mission showed the warning light had occurred because of a miswired switch on the spacecraft.\u00a0 The next flight also developed a problem while in orbit that needed to be addressed, but it came from the pilot, not the spacecraft.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The second orbital flight by Mercury astronaut Scott Carpenter was basically a repeat of Glenn\u2019s three orbit jaunt.\u00a0 Kraft had not been impressed with the lackadaisical effort Carpenter had displayed during training and would have dismissed him from the program if it was up to him.\u00a0 As one of the original Mercury 7, he had already cemented himself as a new American icon so the NASA officials higher up the chain of command wouldn\u2019t hear of it.\u00a0 This would have been the simple, reliable, and effective way to avoid what happened next, but again, it was not Kraft\u2019s call.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0As soon as he reached orbit, Carpenter began using the capsule\u2019s thrusters to turn the ship this way and that as he positioned himself to take photos of the Earth.\u00a0 On three occasions, Mission Control cautioned him that he was using too much fuel.\u00a0 Even when CapComms Grissom (and then Shepard) passed along a direct order to save fuel, Carpenter\u2019s sight-seeing ways continued.\u00a0 Two minutes before the critical deorbit burn of the retrorockets, he was still flying forward with the all important heatshield facing the wrong way.\u00a0 Carpenter lost some time getting the capsule in the proper orientation which caused him to fire the retros a few seconds late.\u00a0 This mistake at orbital speeds caused Carpenter to land down range 250 miles away from the recovery vessels.\u00a0 It took a few hours to reach him (unlike Glenn who had landed in sight of his recovery vessels).\u00a0 When the ships arrived, they found him floating in a rubber raft next to his capsule, munching on a candy bar.\u00a0 Carpenter didn\u2019t think there had been any major problems, but Kraft\u2019s \u2018simple, reliable and effective solution\u2019 was to make sure Carpenter never flew again.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0When President Kennedy announced the United States intended to land astronauts on the Moon before the end of the decade, NASA had to shift into high gear.\u00a0 In order to test all of the steps needed for such a flight, they needed an upgrade from their one man Mercury capsules.\u00a0 Given three options, the mission planners opted for the Cadillac version – a two man craft that would eventually be called \u2018Gemini\u2019 (\u2018Geminee\u2019 in NASA speak).\u00a0 The major changes needed to upgrade from Mercury would challenge Kraft\u2019s \u2018simple, reliable, & effective\u2019 mind as the craft and mission designers struggled to get it off the drawing board and into space.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0One of the major challenges was the rocket booster needed to get a larger, heavier craft into orbit.\u00a0 The Redstone rockets used in Mercury were not powerful enough, so they settled for the twin engine Atlas rocket.\u00a0 The Atlas was not only more powerful, it used hypergolic fuel – two substances that ignited when mixed allowing for the elimination of a combustion chamber.\u00a0 Tests of the Atlas had shown it had a propensity to explode so it was decided to add ejection seats for the two astronauts.\u00a0 Mercury capsules had an escape tower that would fire and pull the astronaut clear of a failing rocket.\u00a0 The designers wanted to eliminate the weight of this tower for Gemini, hence the need for ejection seats.\u00a0 Kraft pointed out that the rocket was powerful enough to do the job even with the simpler escape tower design, but he was overruled.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The ejection seats were eventually incorporated into the capsule design, but the problems they encountered found Chris Kraft still lobbying (unsuccessfully) for the \u2018simple, reliable, and effective\u2019 launch tower.\u00a0 To test if the seats would work on a rocket traveling over 2,000 mph, a four mile long rocket sled track was set up on the desert near California\u2019s China Lake.\u00a0 The first tests did not go as planned:\u00a0 on the first run, one of the rocket motors came loose and destroyed a demonstration capsule.\u00a0 Through many tests, many crash test dummy astronauts were killed.\u00a0 Seats were ejected from a tower the height of the Atlas rocket to simulate the astronauts aborting from a stricken rocket still on the pad.\u00a0 During these trials, the parachute* shroud lines kept getting tangled and the seats would either land upside down or at too great a speed to be survivable.\u00a0 (*It should be noted another new technology was also being tested with the ejection seats – a \u2018ballute\u2019 – a combination balloon \/ parachute).\u00a0 When the chief engineer from the Gemini Program Office told Bob Gilruth and Kraft, \u201cThe remaining technical problems are in debugging the details of a very complex design,\u201d Kraft\u2019s scowl said it all:\u00a0 \u201cThe \u2018very complex designs\u2019 were exactly the wrong kind of solution.\u201d\u00a0 He pitched the escape tower idea again but was still overruled because of the amount of time and money that had already been invested in the ejection seat plan.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Another innovation that was being considered for the Gemini craft was using a type of parasail for the final landing instead of a parachute.\u00a0 Parachuting into the ocean meant a craft landing well outside of the predicted zone could lead to another country retrieving it.\u00a0 The parasall coupled with landing skids would allow Gemini to land somewhere inside the United States.\u00a0 This one must have really rankled Kraft and not just because it was another untested technology.\u00a0 Installing the parasail meant altering the capsule\u2019s design and adding more complexity to it.\u00a0 There would have to be a mechanism to deploy the parasail and skids that would involve a system of shroud lines, hinges, reels, and explosive bolts.\u00a0 A series of tests were run by dropping one half scale size Gemini capsules from a helicopter.\u00a0 The only thing that the parasail equipped craft seemed to do well was make impact craters on the desert floor.\u00a0 Kraft argued for the simple, reliable, and effective parachutes that had a proven record of performance but the chief design engineer was committed to the innovative parasail design.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Powering a long duration flight for Gemini (and later Apollo) would need a longer term electrical source than batteries could provide.\u00a0 Fuel cell technology was the answer, but it was still not ready to be flown in space.\u00a0 A fuel cell generates electricity when oxygen and hydrogen from separate tanks are combined from opposite sides of a platinum-coated membrane.\u00a0 The process not only creates electricity but also potable water.\u00a0 The fuel cells worked and would be perfect for Gemini and Apollo, but the big and balky units in use on Earth needed to be turned into smaller, more reliable units for use in space.\u00a0 It was a simple and effective technology, but not yet reliable.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The last nagging problem in the Gemini program was the Atlas rocket itself.\u00a0 It was powerful but the g-forces it generated (7.6 g\u2019s) would be near the level of what the astronauts could tolerate.\u00a0 The bigger problem lay in an effect called \u2018pogoing\u2019.\u00a0 As the pressure in the fuel lines of the rocket pulsated, it generated a front to back oscillation that added an extra 2.5 g\u2019s to the rocket and payload.\u00a0 The rocket engineers thought they had found a simple solution;\u00a0 adding pressure relief valves to stabilize the line pressure during flight.\u00a0 Instead of fixing the problem, it doubled the g-load caused by the pogoing to 5.0 g\u2019s.\u00a0 In one test, the shaking was so violent that the second stage of the rocket separated prematurely and rocketed off to a crash landing 700 miles away in an unpopulated area (thankfully).<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0With all of the problems and the lack of simple, reliable, and effective solutions forthcoming, the Gemini program was not making the progress it needed to make.\u00a0 Summoned before a congressional committee to update them on how their money was being spent, assistant director George Mueller did not impress.\u00a0 Trying to explain the difficulties being encountered, he managed to only raise their level of skepticism that the Gemini program would ever fly.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The first problem solved was the pogoing of the Atlas rocket.\u00a0 As the fuel tanks emptied, the open space allowed the fuel to slosh which resulted in the oscillating action.\u00a0 Pumping helium gas into the empty space coupled with a surge protector brought down the added g-forces to the required .25 g\u2019s.\u00a0 Director Webb was summoned to meet President Kennedy during the fall of 1963 to assure him that the Moon project would be able to meet his end of the decade deadline.\u00a0 The Gemini problems were being worked on and the success of the Gemini project would pave the way for Apollo.\u00a0 It would also help Kennedy in his bid for re-election in 1964.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Kennedy\u2019s assasination in Dallas in November of 1963 could have derailed the entire Moon landing program except for a decision that was made when he was elected in 1960.\u00a0 Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson had taken the reins as the government\u2019s biggest promoter of the space program.\u00a0 Construction on the new Manned Space Center in Houston was already underway and Johnson was not about to pull the plug on Kennedy\u2019s legacy program.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0As the nation mourned their slain president, the problems that had perplexed Project Gemini began to fall into line.\u00a0 The paraglider landing system was finally scrapped in favor of the tried and true traditional parachute landing in the ocean.\u00a0 The escape tower was still replaced by the ejection seats but the astronauts were counting on the reliability of the Atlas rocket to keep them from having to endure the 28 g\u2019s they would be subjected to if the seats were needed (and thankfully, they never were).\u00a0 The last problem was the fuel cells that would be needed to power the longer duration missions.\u00a0 Progress was being made, but not fast enough to keep them from having to tweak the earliest mission plans.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0After two unmanned test flights (Gemini 1 and 2), Gus Grissom and John Young were scheduled for Gemini 3, the first manned flight.\u00a0 Grissom had a little fun when he named their capsule <\/span>Molly Brown<\/span><\/i> (after the popular musical <\/span>The Unsinkable Molly Brown)<\/span><\/i>.\u00a0 It was a little tweak of his own for all the guff he had taken about his Mercury capsule sinking and almost taking him with it.\u00a0 The brass was not amused but the word was out and they couldn\u2019t change it – although they did do away with astronauts naming their capsules.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Delays allowed the Russians to get Voskhod 2 in space where Alexei Leonov made the first tethered spacewalk.\u00a0 When the thruster problems for Gemini were finally worked out, G3 took flight on March 23, 1965.\u00a0 Aside from the corned beef sandwich Wally Schirra had talked Young into smuggling aboard (the floating crumbs in the cabin made them decide to stash it after one bite), it was a flawless flight.\u00a0 As they bobbed in the ocean, Grissom refused to open the hatch until the recovery team was on site. \u00a0 \u201cThat was no boat,\u201d he muttered after losing his lunch in the rolling seas.\u00a0 They had proved that the Gemini craft was a nimble, maneuverable ship that would allow NASA to test all the steps they would need to get Apollo astronauts to the Moon before Kennedy\u2019s deadline.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Each flight would add another notch to their belt.\u00a0 Long duration flights, rendezvous, docking, and spacewalks would all be tested on future flights.\u00a0 In the end, Christ Kraft\u2019s \u2018<\/span>simple, reliable, & effective\u2019<\/span><\/i> mantra would remain the hallmark of getting Gemini into space and Apollo to the Moon.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Top Piece Video:\u00a0 I could not really think about a simple, reliable, & effective song – so I settled for Simple Minds.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Growing up, one of my favorite sayings we applied to solving complex problems was, \u201cKeep It Simple, Stupid.\u201d\u00a0 In the best NASA tradition, we trimmed it down to the acronym, \u2018KISS\u2019.\u00a0 During the period where some people strived to be more politically correct, someone came up with the idea that it should be shortened […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,8,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3794","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-education","category-from-the-vaults","category-woas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3794","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3794"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3794\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3797,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3794\/revisions\/3797"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3794"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3794"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3794"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}