The George C. Marshall Space Flight Center or MSFC.
The historic The George C. Marshall Space Flight Center or MSFC is located in Huntsville, Alabama, and is the U.S. government’s civilian rocketry and spacecraft propulsion research center.
As the biggest NASA center, MSFC’s first mission was to produce the Saturn launch rockets for the Apollo program. Furthermore, Marshall has been the head center for the Space Shuttle main propulsion and external tank; International Space Station (ISS) design and assembly; payloads and related crew training; networks, computers, and information management; and finally, (SLS) or the Space Launch System.
It is situated on the Redstone Arsenal near Huntsville, MSFC, and its name is in honor of Army General George Marshall.
The Huntsville Operations Support Center or HOSC.
The George C. Marshall Space Flight Center contains the (HOSC) or the Huntsville Operations Support Center. It is also known as the International Space Station Payload Operations Center.
Furthermore, this facility maintains ISS launch, payload, and experiment activities at the Kennedy Space Center. The Huntsville Operations Support Center further controls rocket take-offs from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station when a Marshall Center payload is on board.
History of The George C. Marshall Space Flight Center.
This location has been NASA’s lead center for the construction of rocket propulsion systems and technologies. And during the 1960s, the projects were largely dedicated to the Apollo Program, with the Saturn family of launch vehicles produced and tested at MSFC.
The George C. Marshall Space Flight Center also had a significant role in post-Apollo enterprises, including the Space Shuttle, Skylab, and Spacelab and additional experimental activities making use of the Shuttle’s cargo bay.
Operation Paperclip
So, after the May 1945 end of World War II in Germany, the U.S. began Operation Paperclip to collect several scientists and engineers who had been at the center of Nazi Germany’s high-level military technologies.
In August 1945, 127 missile experts led by Dr.Wernher von Braun signed work contracts with the U.S. Army’s Ordnance Corps. Most of them had operated on the V-2 missile construction under Wernher von Braun at Peenemünde.
The rocket specialists were sent to Fort Bliss, Texas, entering the Army’s newly established Research and Development Division Sub-office (Rocket).
So, for the next five years, Wernher von Braun and the German specialists and engineers were mainly engaged in adapting and improving the V-2 rocket for U.S. purposes.
Furthermore, the testing was conducted at nearby White Sands Proving Grounds, New Mexico. Wernher von Braun was permitted to use a WAC Corporal rocket as a second stage for a V-2 rocket; the combination, called Bumper, reached a record-breaking 250 miles or 400 km altitude.
And throughout World War II, the creation and storage of ordnance shells were managed by three arsenals nearby to Huntsville, Alabama. So, after the war, these were shut, and the three areas were joined to form Redstone Arsenal.
Furthermore, in 1949, the Secretary of the U.S Army authorized the transfer of the rocket research and development projects from Fort Bliss to the new center at Redstone Arsenal. In April 1950, about 1,000 persons were included in the transfer, including Wernher von Braun’s group.
R & D’s responsibility for guided missiles was added, and investigations began on a medium-range guided missile that finally became the PGM-11 Redstone.
So, over the following decade, rocket development at Redstone Arsenal considerably expanded. Nevertheless, Wernher von Braun kept space constantly in his mind and published a broadly read article on this subject.
And in mid-1952, the Germans were selected as regular civil service employees, with most becoming U.S. citizens during 1954-55. Wernher von Braun was selected Chief of the Guided Missile Development Division.
Furthermore, in September 1954, Wernher von Braun suggested using the Redstone as the main booster of a multi-stage rocket for propelling artificial satellites. And a year later, research for Project Orbiter was completed, showing plans and schedules for a series of scientific satellites.
Nevertheless, the Army’s official role in the U.S. space satellite program was delayed after higher officials elected to use the Vanguard rocket then being produced by the NRL or the Naval Research Laboratory.
Furthermore, in February 1956, the ABMA or Army Ballistic Missile Agency was installed. And one of the first programs was a 1,500-mile or 2,400 km, single-stage rocket that was started the previous year, designed for both the U.S. Navy and U.S. Army, and this was designated the PGM-19 Jupiter.
Guidance component experiment for this Jupiter IRBM or intermediate-range ballistic missile began in March 1956 on a revised Redstone rocket named Jupiter A while re-entry vehicle testing started in September 1956 on a Redstone with spin-stabilized upper stages.
This Army Ballistic Missile Agency developed Jupiter-C has constituted of a Redstone rocket first stage and two upper stages for R.V. tests or three upper stages for Explorer satellite launches.
Army Ballistic Missile Agency had initially planned the September 20, 1956, flight as a satellite launch but, by the direct intervention of Eisenhower, was limited to the use of 2 upper stages for an R.V. test flight traveling 3,350 miles or 5,390 km downrange and attaining an altitude of 682 miles or 1,098 km.
While the Jupiter-C capacity was that it could have placed the fourth stage in orbit, that mission had been assigned to the NRL. Later Jupiter-C missions would be used to propel satellites.
The first Jupiter intermediate-range ballistic missile flight took place from Cape Canaveral in March 1957, with the first successful flight to the full range on May 31. Jupiter was finally taken over by the Air Force.
Furthermore, The Soviet Union propelled Sputnik 1, the first artificial Earth-orbiting satellite, on October 4, 1957. And this was followed on November 3 with their second satellite named Sputnik 2.
The United States tried a satellite launch on December 6 using the NRL’s Vanguard missile, but it scarcely struggled off the ground, then fell back and exploded.
So, on January 31, 1958, after eventually receiving approval to proceed, Wernher von Braun and the ABMA space development organization used a Jupiter C rocket in a Juno I configuration (addition of a fourth stage) to place Explorer 1 successfully, the first U.S. satellite, into orbit around the Earth.
Effective at the end of March 1958, the AOMC or U.S. Army Ordnance Missile Command, encompassing the ABMA and its recently operational space programs. In August, Army Ordnance Missile Command and ARPA, Advanced Research Projects Agency (a Department of Defense organization), together initiated a program managed by ABMA to form a massive space booster of approximately 1.5-million-pounds thrust utilizing a cluster of available rocket engines. So, in early 1959, this rocket was named Saturn.
Project Horizon
And on April 2, President Eisenhower suggested to Congress that a civilian agency be established to address nonmilitary space activities. So, on July 29, President Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act, creating NASA or the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. NASA included the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, Langley Research Center, Ames Research Center, and Lewis Flight Propulsion Laboratory.
Despite the presence of an official space agency, the U.S Army proceeded with far-reaching space programs. And in June 1959, a classified study on Project Horizon was created by ABMA, describing plans for using the Saturn booster in building a crewed Army outpost on the lunar surface. But, Project Horizon was rejected, and the Saturn rocket program was transferred to NASA.
The ceremony of transfer from the U.S Army to NASA July 1, 1960
Project Mercury was officially named on November 26, 1958. With a future crewed flight goal, monkeys Able and Baker were the first living creatures recovered from outer space on May 28, 1959.
They had been brought in the nose cone on a Jupiter rocket to an altitude of 300 miles or 480 km and a distance of 1,500 miles or 2,400 km, successfully enduring 38 times the normal pull of Earth’s gravity.
Then, on October 21, 1959, Eisenhower authorized the transfer of all Army space-related projects to NASA. And this was achieved effective July 1, 1960, when 4,670 civilian employees, around $100 million worth of equipment and buildings, and 1,840 acres or 7.4 km2 of land shifted from AOMC/ABMA to NASA’s George C. Marshall Space Flight Center.
On this same date, MSFC officially opened at Redstone Arsenal, then was dedicated on September 8 by President Eisenhower in person. The George C. Marshall Space Flight Center was named in honor of General George C. Marshall.
The 1960s and 1970s the initial decades
Rockets developed at Marshall Space Flight Center and ABMA before they are on display at MSFC. Originally, Huntsville technicians traveled to Florida to manage launch activities at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.
The primary NASA launch facility there (Launch Complex 39) was created and operated by Marshall Space Flight Center. On July 1, 1962, the overall site obtaining equal status with other NASA centers and was designated the Launch Operations Center, later renamed KSC or the Kennedy Space Center.
Later, when the Marshall Space Flight Center started official operations in July 1960, von Braun was the Director, and Rees was his Deputy for Research and Development.
Persons led the administrative activities in MSFC with backgrounds in traditional U.S. Government functions. Still, all of the technical heads were individuals who had assisted von Braun in his success at ABMA.
The initial technical activities and leaders at the Marshall Space Flight Center were as follows:
Director: Wernher von Braun
Deputy Director for R&D: Eberhard F. M. Rees
Reliability Office: H. August Schulze
Future Projects Office: Heinz-Hermann Koelle
Light & Medium Vehicles Office: Hans Hueter
Saturn Systems Office: O. Hermann Lange
Technical Program Coordination Office: George N. Constan
Weapons Systems Office: Werner G. Tiller
Launch Operations Directorate: Kurt H. Debus
Aeroballistics Division: Ernst G. Geissler. Included the Future Project Branch: 1 until that was dissolved in the mid-1960s.
Computation Division: Helmut Hölzer
Fabrication & Assembly Engineering Division: Hans H. Maus
Guidance & Control Division: Walter Häussermann
Quality Division: Dieter E. Grau
Research Projects Division: Ernst Stuhlinger
Structures & Mechanics Division: William A. Mrazek
Test Division: Karl L. Heimburg
Except for Koelle, all of the technical leaders had come to the United States under Operation Paperclip after working together at Peenemünde. Wernher Von Braun understood well the skills of these individuals and had high confidence in them.
In the coming decade of producing hardware and technical operations that established new levels of complexity, there was never a separate failure of their booster designs during a crewed flight.
The original main project at MSFC was the conclusive preparation of a Redstone rocket for Project Mercury to boost a space spacecraft carrying the first American into space. First scheduled to take place in October 1960, this was postponed several times, and on May 5, 1961, U.S astronaut Alan Shepard made America’s first orbital spaceflight.
Furthermore, by 1965, MSFC had approximately 7,500 government employees. Most of the prime contractors for launch vehicles and related major items (including Chrysler, Boeing, North American Aviation, Douglas Aircraft, IBM, and Rocketdyne) collectively had almost a similar number of employees working in MSFC facilities.
Several support contracting firms were also involved in the programs; the largest of these was Brown Engineering Company (BECO, later Teledyne Brown Engineering), the first high-technology firm in Huntsville. By this time, they had some 3,500 employees.
In the Saturn-Apollo projects, BECO/TBE produced about 20-million working hours of support. Milton K. Cummings was the BECO president, Joseph C. Moquin the executive vice president, William A. Girdini led the engineering design and test work, and Raymond C. Watson, Jr., directed the research and advanced systems activities. Cummings Research Park, the second-largest park of this type in the U.S., was named for Cummings in 1973.
Saturn launch rockets
So, on May 25, 1961, only 20 days after Alan Shepard’s flight, President John F. Kennedy committed the U.S. to a Moon landing by the end of the decade.
The main mission of MSFC under the Apollo Program was creating the heavy-lift Saturn family rockets. This necessitated the development and work of three new liquid-fueled rocket engines, the J-2, H-1, and F-1.
Additionally, the current RL10 was improved for use on the Saturn S-IV stage. Leland Belew led the Engine Development Office. The F-1 rocket engine is the most powerful single-nozzle liquid-fueled rocket engine ever used in service. And each produced 1.5-million-pounds thrust. Initially started by the Air Force, responsible for the construction was taken over by ABMA in 1959. And the first tests at MSFC were in December 1963.
The original vehicle named Saturn I consisted of two propulsion stages and an instrument unit. And it was first tested in flight on October 27, 1961. The first stage (S-I) had eight H-1 engines, giving nearly 1.5-million-pounds thrust total.
The four outboard rocket engines were gimbaled to enable rocket steering. And the second stage (SIV) had six gimbaled LR10A-3 rocket engines, creating a combined 90-thousand-pounds thrust. Furthermore, Ten Saturn Is were used in flight-testing of Apollo boilerplate units. Five of these test flights also brought important auxiliary scientific experiments.
The mighty Saturn I.B. (alternatively known as the Uprated Saturn I rocket) likewise had two propulsion stages and an instrument unit. The first stage, named S-IB too, had eight H-1 rocket engines with four gimballed, but the stage had eight fixed fins of similar size fitted to the sides to give aerodynamic stability.
The second stage, called S-IVB, had a single J-2 rocket engine that gave a more powerful 230-thousand-pounds thrust. The J-2 engine was gimbaled and could also be restarted through the flight.
The rocket was first flight-tested on February 26, 1966. Furthermore, fourteen Saturn 1Bs rockets (or partial vehicles) were built, with five used in uncrewed testing and five others used in human-crewed missions. And the last on July 15, 1975.
The Saturn V rocket, an expendable human-rated heavy-lift rocket, was the most important element in the Apollo Program. Produced under the management of Arthur Rudolph, the Saturn V rocket holds the record as the biggest and most powerful rocket ever brought to operational status from a combined weight, height, and payload standpoint.
The Saturn V rocket consisted of three thrust stages and an instrument unit. The first stage, called S-IC, had five F-1 rocket engines, giving a combined total of 7.5-million-pounds thrust. The S-II second stage had five J-2 rocket engines with a total of 1.0-million-pounds thrust. And, the third stage, named S-IVB, had a single gimballed J-2 rocket engine with 200-thousand-pounds thrust.
And as earlier noted, the J-2 rocket engine could be restarted in flight. The basic arrangement for this heavy-lift vehicle was selected in early 1963. The name Saturn V was used at that time (arrangements that might have led to the creation of Saturn 2, 3, and 4 were discarded).
So, while the three propulsion stages were the “muscle” of the Saturn V rocket, the IU or Instrument Unit was the “brains.” The Instrument Unit was on a 260-inch (6.6-m) diameter, 36-inch (91-cm) high.
The ring that was held between the third propulsion stage and the Lunar Module contained the basic guidance system components. It was a stable platform, a digital computer, accelerometers, control electronics, telemetry, radar, and other units.
The same Instrument Unit configuration was used on the Saturn I rocket and I.B. With IBM as the prime constructor, the Instrument Unit was the only full Saturn component built-in Huntsville.
Furthermore, the first Saturn V rocket test flight was conducted on November 9, 1967. Then on July 16, 1969, as its historic achievement in the Apollo program, a Saturn V rocket lifted the famous Apollo 11 spacecraft and three astronauts on their mission to the Moon.
Other Apollo launches extended through December 6, 1972. The last Saturn V mission was on May 14, 1973, in the Skylab Program. So, a total of 15 Saturn V was built; 13 worked flawlessly, and the other two remain unused.
Fabrication and test facilities
Von Braun thought that the person designing the space vehicles should have close, hands-on participation in the building and testing of the hardware.
And for this, Marshall Space Flight Center had facilities were prototypes of every type of Saturn rocket were fabricated. Massive, special-purpose computers were used in the checkout procedures.
Static test stands had been created at ABMA for the Redstone and Jupiter rockets. So, in 1961, the Jupiter rocket stand was modified to test Saturn 1 and also 1B stages.
Several other test stands happened, the largest being the Saturn V rocket Dynamic Test Stand completed in 1964. At 475 feet or 145 m in height, the entire Saturn V rocket could be housed. Furthermore, completed in 1964, the S1C Static Test Stand was for the live firing of the five F-1 rocket engines of the first stage.
They could be delivering a total of 7.5-million-pounds thrust, the tests produced earthquake-like noises throughout the Huntsville region and could be heard as far as 100 miles or 160 km away.
As the Saturn rocket activities advanced, external facilities and factories were required. In 1961, The Michoud Rocket Factory near New Orleans, Louisiana, was chosen as the Saturn V building site.
Thirteen thousand five hundred acres or 55 km2 isolated area in Hancock County, Mississippi, was selected to conduct Saturn tests and known as the Mississippi Test Facility. It was later renamed the John C. Stennis Space Center. And this was primarily to test the vehicles built at the rocket factory.
Credit: Wikipedia.
Early engineering and scientific research
From the beginning, the Marshall Space Flight Center has had influential research projects in science and engineering. Two of the early projects, Highwater and Pegasus, were conducted on a non-interference basis while testing the Saturn I rocket.
In Project Highwater, a model Saturn I second stage was filled with 23,000 US gallons or 87 m3 of water as a weight. And following burnout of the first stage, explosive charges discharged the water into the upper atmosphere.
The project explained inquiries about the diffusion of liquid fuels if a rocket was destroyed at high altitude. Highwater tests were carried out in April and November 1962.
Under the Program Pegasus Satellite, the Saturn I rocket’s second stage was instrumented to examine the frequency and penetration depth of micrometeoroids. Two huge panels were folded into the empty stage and unfolded in orbit, presenting 2,300 ft2 or 210-m2 of the instrumented surface. Three Pegasus satellites were launched through 1965, with each one staying in Earth’s orbit from 3 to 13 years.
Lunar exploration
Lunar Roving Vehicle test article on the test track.
Six Apollo missions landed on the Moon: Apollo 11, 12, 14, 15, 16, and 17. Apollo 13 was intended as a landing, but only orbited the Moon and returned back to Earth after an oxygen tank exploded and crippled power in the Command Service Module.
Except for the famous Apollo 11, all of the missions brought an ALSEP or Apollo Lunar Surface Experiments Package, comprised of equipment for seven scientific experiments plus a central remote control station with an RTG or radioisotope thermoelectric generator. Scientists from MSFC were among the co-investigators.
The LRV or Lunar Roving Vehicle, commonly known as the “Moon Buggy,” was produced at Marshall Space Flight Center to provide transportation for exploring a limited amount of the lunar surface. Not designed in the original planning, by 1969, it became clear that a Lunar Roving Vehicle would be required to maximize the scientific returns.
A Lunar Roving Vehicle was taken on the last three missions, providing an area similar in size to Manhattan Island to be explored. Outbound, they carried an Apollo Lunar Surface Experiments Package to be set up; on the return trip, they brought more than 200 pounds of lunar rock and soil samples. Saverio E. “Sonny” Morea was the Lunar Roving Vehicle project manager at MSFC.
ATM and Skylab
Marshall Space Flight Center engineers tested this articulated arm developed but not used for Skylab at a Marshall Space Flight Center flat floor facility.
Marshall Space Flight Center used the Neutral Buoyancy Facility to examine Skylab procedures. Here, engineers are testing methods for repairing Skylab.
The Apollo Applications Program (AAP) included science-based crewed space missions utilizing surplus Apollo equipment. Congress’s lack of enthusiasm resulted in most of the proposed activities being abandoned, but an orbital workshop continued of interest.
In December 1965, MSFC was authorized to commence the Orbital Workshop as a formal project. At a conference at Marshall Space Flight Center on August 19, 1966, George E. Mueller, NASA Associate Administrator for Human-crewed Space Flight, pinned down the last concept for the significant elements.
Marshall Space Flight Center was entrusted responsibility for the construction of the space station hardware as well as overall systems engineering and integration.
For testing and mission simulation, a 75-foot or 23 m-diameter water-filled tanks, the Neutral Buoyancy Facility, was started at Marshall Space Flight Center in March 1968. Astronauts and engineers used these underwater buildings to mimic the weightlessness (or zero-g) environment of space. And this was mainly used in training astronauts in exercises in zero-g work, particularly spacewalks.
The Orbital Workshop was developed into the propellant tanks of a Saturn V rocket’s third stage, fully refitted. It was renamed Skylab in February 1970. Two were built—the first for flight and the second for testing and mission simulation in the Neutral Buoyancy Facility. Leland F Belew worked for eight years as the overall Skylab program director.
Furthermore, another Apollo Applications Program project that survived was a solar observatory, originally intended to be a deployable attachment to the Apollo spacecraft. Designated the Apollo Telescope Mount (ATM), the project was assigned to Marshall Space Flight Center in 1966.
And as the Orbital Workshop matured into the Skylab, the Apollo Telescope Mount was added as an attachment, although the two projects were kept as autonomous development projects. And Rein Ise was the ATM project manager at Marshall Space Flight Center.
The Apollo Telescope Mount combined eight principal instruments for observations of the Sun at wavelengths from extreme ultraviolet to infrared. The data was mainly collected on unique photographic film; through the Skylab missions. The films had to be changed out by astronauts in spacewalks.
So, on May 14, 1973, the 77-ton or 70,000-kg Skylab was propelled into a 235-nautical-mile or 435-km orbit by the last flown Saturn V rocket. Saturn IB vehicles with their Command Service Modules were used to launch three-person crews to dock with Skylab.
Critical damage was sustained during Skylab’s launch and deployment, ending in the loss of the station’s micrometeoroid shield/sunshade and one of its central solar panels.
But, this loss was partially corrected by the first crew, launched on May 25. And they stayed in orbit with Skylab for 28 days. Two further missions followed with the launch dates of July 28 and November 16, with mission durations of 59 and 84 days.
Skylab, including the ATM, logged approximately 2,000 hours on some 300 medical and scientific experiments. The last Skylab crew returned back to the Earth on February 8, 1974.
Apollo–Soyuz Test Program
The ASTP or Apollo–Soyuz Test Project was the last flight of a Saturn IB rocket. On July 15, 1975, a three-person crew was launched on a six-day mission to dock with a Soviet Soyuz spacecraft.
The primary purpose was to provide engineering knowledge for future joint space flights, but both spacecraft also had scientific experiments. This was the last human-crewed US space mission until April 1981.
Post-Apollo Science
The HEAO or High Energy Astronomy Observatory Program included three missions of large spacecraft in low-Earth orbit. Each spacecraft was about 18 feet or 5.5 m in length, mass between 6,000 and 7,000 lb or 2,700 and 3,200 kg, and brought some 3,000 pounds or 1,400 kilograms of experiments for gamma-ray astronomy, X-ray and cosmic-ray investigations.
The project presented insights into astronomical objects by examining their high-energy radiation from space. Specialists from across the US served as principal investigators.
The High Energy Astronomy Observatory spacecraft concept started in the late 1960s, but funding did not become possible for some time. Utilizing Atlas-Centaur launch vehicles, three very successful missions were flown:
High Energy Astronomy Observatory 1 in August 1977, High Energy Astronomy Observatory 2 (also called the Einstein Observatory) in November 1978, and High Energy Astronomy Observatory 3 in September 1979. Fred A. Speer was the High Energy Astronomy Observatory project manager for MSFC.
Additional MSFC-managed space science projects in the 1970s introduced the Laser Geodynamics Satellite (LAGEOS) and Gravity Probe A. In LAGEOS, 422 prismatic mirrors reflect laser beams from 35 ground stations on the satellite to follow movements in the Earth’s crust.
The measurement precision is a few centimeters, and it tracks the action of tectonic plates with comparable accuracy. Conceptualized and built at Marshall Space Flight Center, the Laser Geodynamics Satellite was launched by a Delta rocket in May 1976.
Gravity Probe A, also named the Redshift Experiment, applied an extremely precise hydrogen maser clock to prove part of Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity. And the probe was launched in June 1976, by a Scout rocket, and resided in space for near two hours, as planned.
That’s it. Thanks for reading. If you want to know more about the classified program named Horizon, then head over to this interesting article called; Moon Base – Projekt Horizon.