As we all know, NASA was the Mission Control for all the Apollo moon missions shuttle missions. This was a chance to get up close and see some of the most amazing technology and a bit of history. The day started with a bus ride around the facility starting in the actual mission control used for the Moon Landings. They told a story it was removed an updated in the late 70’s to make way for the shuttle control and new technology but was sent to the Smithsonian in Washington. When the shuttle facilities were moved to a new modern building the gear was brought back to Houston and refit exactly as it was in the 60’s. One interesting fact was the Tom Hanks Apollo II movie wasn’t filmed there because the cameras would not fit so they built a replica.
The next stop was one of the testing and training facilities. Here procedures could be made and practiced on replica equipment. There was a few large sections of the international space station, the shuttle and some development rovers and robots that are being designed for the upcoming man on mars missions about 17 years away.
The tour finished in a huge shed housing a full Apollo rocket, the size of it was amazing, We remember seeing another one at Cape Canaveral on a earlier trip, but the awe of the size still amazes. How you can get something that big into space is an amazing feat especially when the computing power used in the whole mission both on the rocket and back here at Houston was less than what is in our iPhones. There were no calculators, all the calculations were done with slide rules and some pretty clever guys
