Johnsonverse World History/Space

== Apollo ==
The Apollo 1 fire isn't fatal because concerned North American Aviation engineers managed to sneak a blow-hatch function in, allowing Gus Grissom to blow the hatch and for the crew to quickly bail out before the fire really spread. Apollo 1 ends up having a successful 14-day flight (the original plan called for a 6-day flight, but Grissom had vowed to keep it in orbit for 14, and did so; NASA initially derided this, before realizing that such a long test flight would allow them to retool Apollo 2 into an unmanned LM test, as development of the LM was further along than in OTL) in May 1967, using a repaired and modified Command Module with the Block II hatch.
Apollo 2 was identical to OTL Apollo 5, Apollo 3 saw an unmanned Block I CSM with a docking port rendezvousing with an LM launched on another Saturn IB, Apollo 4 was like OTL, Apollo 5 was a manned version of Apollo 3 with the OTL Apollo 9 crew and the first Block II, Apollo 6 ended up stranded in orbit until it is rescued by Apollo 46 in 1976, Skylab as launched in 1968, Apollo 7 was the first flight to Skylab, Apollo 8 happened as in OTL, Apollo 9 was mostly the same (the crew consisted of Gordon Cooper, Al Worden, and Bruce McCandless II), but after the final check-out of the LM, the CSM docked to Skylab, Apollos 10-17 were the same as OTL (meaning Apollo 13 still had its mishap), and Apollos 18-20 were flown as they were planned OTL.
Apollo was indefinitely extended after the Soviets managed to land on the moon (they nixed the troubled N-1 and instead opted for an Earth Orbit Rendevouz mode, which also allowed for an enlarged LK lander); as a result, Apollo grew out into a world-class space program.
The first big improvement was the introduction of the Apollo Supply Craft (ASC; based on the AARDV from "Eyes Turned Skyward"), an unmanned version of Apollo meant for space station resupply that first flew to Skylab in 1973. That same year, Skylab was moved into a graveyard orbit and replaced by a newer modular station called Olympus, which was expanded with new modules over the years. The ASC's introduction coincided with the introduction of the Saturn IC rocket, a Saturn IB with the eight H-1 engines replaced with a single F-1A engine
Apollo received a blow in April 1975 when Apollo 33 suffered a major malfunction. At T+1 minute 20 seconds, the first stage of the Saturn V suddenly exploded. Fortunately, the onboard Emergency Detection System (EDS) detected the abrupt loss of telemetry data coming from the S-IC, and activated Mode 1B (One Bravo), which saw the first in-flight abort of the Apollo program. The crew (Robert Crippin, Ken Mattingly, and William Pogue) survived, as a result, but the Saturn V was grounded, and all lunar flights put in a stand-down state. Apollo wouldn't fly again until July of that year, for the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, a flight that was also the final launch of the Saturn IB.
In August 1975, a new rocket was introduced: the Saturn INT-20. In a nutshell, the Saturn INT-20 (later renamed the Saturn II in 1980) is a Saturn V without the S-II stage and only three engines on the S-IC. Fears that this S-IC would explode were vanquished when it performed flawlessly on its first launch, Apollo 38, which launched the Docking Module to Olympus to enable five craft (including Soyuz and Progress in an emergency) to dock to the station.
The next April, the Block III CSM was introduced. The key differences lie in the service module, which was more suited for Earth orbital operations than the cumbersome Block II; the Block III SM is smaller, lighter, and has a smaller antenna and deployable solar panels. It was modified to hold a five-man crew in 1987 as part of a joint program with the European Space Agency. The Block III also saw the Saturn IC being used for manned flights, a practice that continues to this day.
Lunar flights were reintroduced in 1977 with Apollo 50, commanded by Neil Armstrong. Apollo 50 also marked the first use of the Block IV CSM, which is similar to the Block II, only that it has a pair of LM Ascent Stage engines instead of the SPS, and uses batteries instead of fuel cells; the Block IV was designed for lunar orbit operations. Later that year, the Manned Venus Flyby took place, with the crew of Apollo 11 making their final flights.
The final Apollo CSM variant, the Block V, was tested in 1978. This variant replaces one of the fuel cells with two SNAP-27 RTGs, and is intended for interplanetary missions.
1979 marked the beginning of construction of the Phase 1 Lunar Base, later renamed Armstrong Base. New variants of the LM were developed, these being the LM Truck (a cargo hauler), and the LM Shelter (a Frankenstein's spacecraft combining the Apollo CM with the LM Descent Stage, intended for use as the crew quarters).
Apollo 62 marked the final flight of the Block II CSM. NASA had ceased production of the Block II in 1976 after the Block III was introduced, and used the remaining stock aggressively to be rid of them so they could ramp up production of the Block III full-time. The previous flight, Apollo 63, also saw the first flight of the Saturn III, a Saturn V without the S-IC stage, which launched larger solar panels on a truss segment after the Apollo Telescope Mount was removed and deorbited in anticipation of the Hubble Space Telescope. Apollo 64 was also the final manned flight of the Saturn II, as the rocket was considered grossly-overpowered for the Block III CSM.
Despite Apollo continuing, the Space Shuttle continued development regardless, in hopes that it would slowly replace Apollo. Ultimately, though, the entire system never played nothing more than a supporting role, always second-to-run to Apollo. Plagued by cost overruns, multiple delays, a fatal accident in 1986, and a spectacular rescue operation in 2003, the Space Shuttle is technically still in operation, but was replaced by the unmanned Shuttle-C in 2011 after STS-135 (Johnson Aerospace's own spaceplanes, Eridanus and Esperia, were considered the final nail in the coffin when they were first launched in 2001). The shuttle system's primary role, when it wasn't launching satellites and probes or carrying out Spacelab missions, was delivering new modules to Olympus (the station). The last module was delivered in 1986, at which point NASA began winding down Spacelab operations in anticipation of Space Station Freedom. Ultimately, though, Spacelab remained in orbit until 2004, when it was deorbited over the Pacific by an ASC (amusingly, Johnson Foods ran a contest promising free Big Macs for everyone at McDonald's if a floating target was hit by the Spacelab core; Taco Bell had done a similar promotion with Mir, and unlike that, it was a bullseye, meaning everyone got free Big Macs; what made this feat even more amazing was that Johnson Aerospace and Continental Shipping Lines managed to calculate the exact location Spacelab would impact).
Apollo was used increasingly for military applications in the 1980s, as the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 never existed. As a result, the United States and USSR launched a bunch of different space-based weapons with different purposes. ITTL, the SDI system was launched, as was a classified manned Air Force space station called the Manned Weapons Platform (which carried 60 MIRV nuclear warheads). Apollo 83 carried a pair of Air Force personnel to the MWP in 1984, but this flight attracted too much attention from the media and conspiracy theorists, leading NASA and the USAF to develop the Crew Transfer Vehicle (CTV), comprised of Big Gemini, an Apollo Block II SM with an Agena engine, a newly-designed LES, and the Saturn II. The CTV remained in service until it was replaced by the Personnel Ferry (PF) in 2004. Other activities allegedly carried out by Apollo in the 80s included photo recon using a Block IV with cameras mounted in the SIM Bay, ASC craft used as tugs to move SDI satellites around, a servicing mission of a KH-11 satellite, and installing an anti-satellite autocannon on Olympus. In addition, Skylab B was launched into lunar orbit as LunarLab, with its own crew rotation cycle; LunarLab was launched in response to an announcement by the Soviet Union that it would be launching Salyut 7 into lunar orbit, and as a result, was a primarily military station, but also did scout out potential landing sites for future lunar flights; ultimately, Salyut 7 was never launched into lunar orbit, instead staying firmly in low Earth orbit. After the Cold War ended in 1991, an ASC sent LunarLab into a heliocentric orbit.
But these military operations were overshadowed by an even bigger accomplishment. In 1982, a Titan III rocket launched Apollo 72. The payload: the Martian Excursion Module. Throughout the early 80s, a whole new system for Martian flights was developed, including the Saturn VI (even bigger than the Saturn V, and including solid rocket boosters), the Ares Propulsion Stack (launched by the Saturn V and fueled by the Space Shuttle), and the aforementioned MEM, with the Block V CSM incorporated in. On March 27, 1986, a little over a year after launch, Apollo 90 landed on Mars, with John Young and Robert Crippin being the first humans to set foot on Mars. Two more Martian flights were flown in 1989 and 1993, before the Mars flights were put on the backburner to focus on a new project.
Other changes were to come to the Apollo program. For one, the venerable A7L spacesuit was retired in 1983 and replaced by the Launch Entry Suit (the "pumpkin suit") and the Extravehicular Mobility Unit (originally developed for the Space Shuttle); the LES was replaced by the ACES suit (Advanced Crew Escape Suit, a bit of a misnomer as the suit would only be used for escape on Space Shuttle; the Apollo ACES suits lack the parachute pack) in 1994, and was fully phased out in 1998.
In 1993, the Clinton administration announced that Space Station Freedom would be combined with the Mir-2 and ESA Columbus space station concepts to create the International Space Station. The station would be constructed using the Space Shuttle and Proton-K rocket, with crew rotation provided by multiple nations; initially, the Apollo Block III and Soyuz were to be the only crew transfer craft, before the ESA developed the Hermes shuttle, Russia resumed development of the Buran program, and private aerospace firm Johnson Aerospace developed the Antares spacecraft. Resupply was initially provided by the ASC and Progress, later joined by the Shuttle-C and ESA Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV), and commercial spacecraft such as the Johnson Aerospace Verrezzano and SpacePlanes Eridanus and Esperia, SpaceX Dragon, and Orbital ATK Antares; SpaceX later began providing crew rotation with the Dragon 2, while the Boeing CST-100 Starliner was just as much of a boondoggle as IOTL, leaving two astronauts stranded on the station (though they were able to come home sooner on an Apollo). Originally, it was planned to incorporate Spacelab into the new station, before NASA sent a crew to ascertain Spacelab's condition, coming to the conclusion that it would be cheaper to just build a new station, resulting in Spacelab's deorbiting in 2004.
Today, Apollo is still going strong, with no sign of stopping. Not even the uncertainty of the Trump administration affected it, as President Donald J. Trump granted the program a $12 billion boost in the FY2018 budget to return to Mars. Armstrong Base has since been expanded as part of the Phase II Lunar Base, and is now a permanently-manned presence on the Moon.
Apollo is due to undergo a few major changes in the coming years. For one, the aging Lunar Module was replaced by a new lander called Artemis in 2020, and NASA is due to launch a new lunar space station known as Lunar Orbital Platform, a spiritual successor to LunarLab, but for civilian purposes such as a staging ground for manned and unmanned lunar expeditions, and a checkpoint for spacecraft bound for Armstrong Base.
A gallery showing the spacecraft in Kerbal Space Program is coming soon.
Category:Johnsonverse