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November marked the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 12 mission. Once
on the Moon, an early task for Conrad and Bean was to lay out all the
equipment for the science experiments, the first ALSEP (Apollo Lunar
Surface Experiments Package). ALSEP was a collection of instruments,
including seismometers, magnetometers, and solar wind sensors,
designed to monitor the lunar environment for at least a year after
deployment: most of our knowledge about the Moon’s interior comes from
the ALSEP data. Once the ALSEPs were established on the Moon by
successive Apollo missions, the downloading of data was shared around
the tracking station network, including Honeysuckle Creek. The image
above shows Pete Conrad with the ALSEP Lunar Surface Magnetometer.
The Lunar Module and deployable S-band antenna are visible in the
background. When the Lunar Module returned to the Command Module, its
ascent stage was driven into the lunar surface at 6000 km/hr to
exercise the ALSEP seismometers. Geophysicists were surprised to find
the shock waves remained detectable for almost an hour, due to
extremely dry nature of the lunar rocks -- with no moisture to damp
out the vibrations, they continued for much longer than the few
minutes they woud have on Earth. More details are given in
Hamish Lindsay's essay on the Apollo 12 mission
on the
Honeysuckle Creek website.
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