Magnificent Desolation_ The Long Journey Home From the Moon - Buzz Aldrin [24]
As we completed all the liftoff procedures, Ron Evans gave me one last bit of instruction. “Roger, Eagle. Our guidance recommendation is PGNS, and you’re cleared for takeoff.”
Knowing the pressure everyone felt, I spontaneously injected a touch of humor into the situation. Maintaining a steady, serious tone to my voice, I responded, “Roger. Understand. We’re number one on the runway.”
Unfamiliar with my sardonic sense of humor, Evans paused for a few seconds as he processed my remark, and then simply replied, “Roger.”
The computer continued to count down the seconds to liftoff. Standing side by side again, Neil and I looked at each other, took one more furtive glance at that impaired circuit breaker, threw the switches, and held our breath. The LM engine fired, belching a plume of flame and blasting lunar dust as we rose off the surface. The liftoff went as smoothly as could be. I wanted to cast a last look back at the surface, but our attentions were focused on navigating the spacecraft. The ascent of the Eagle was strikingly swift compared with the liftoff of the huge Saturn V rocket from Cape Canaveral. For the Eagles liftoff, we had no atmosphere resisting us, and only one-sixth gravity to overcome, so even though we had worked on this aspect of the flight in simulators, the Eagle’s speed in whisking us into space was almost surprising. Nothing we had ever practiced in simulators could compare with our swift swoop upward. Within seconds we were streaking high above the moon’s surface.
Unfortunately, I neglected to turn the camera on just before our ascent, so we didn’t get a good shot out the window as we left the ground. It would have been interesting to study the effects of our liftoff around the descent stage that remained on the moon. But I was more concerned with our actual liftoff than with getting good pictures. It was critical to get into orbit with the right speed. As the ascent engine sent us into orbit, we sort of wallowed around, momentarily struggling to correct the center of gravity with the four rod thrusters. It was a little unnerving.
In fact, we were somewhat concerned because we knew that shortly after liftoff the spacecraft was going to pitch forward about 45 degrees, so it could be more nearly horizontal as it gained more velocity and not so much altitude, a procedure necessary for us to rendezvous with Mike, who was guiding Columbia around the moon in an orbit sixty miles high.
Despite the surprises, I described our liftoff to Houston as, “Very smooth, a very quiet ride.”
We lifted off the moon at 1:54 p.m. (EDT), and, within a couple of hours, we had completed the first of two orbits necessary to rendezvous with Mike. During our second orbit, the Columbia came into view. We had a little jolt at the moment of docking because Neil and I had arbitrarily altered the flight plans slightly in a spur of the moment decision opting for a more direct path to Mike. Nobody at Mission Control seemed to mind, although there were probably a couple of rendezvous experts sitting there staring at their computers fretting, “What are they doing? What are they doing?” But I was known as “Dr. Rendezvous” around NASA—sometimes respectfully so, and at times derisively— because of my passion for the subject and my rendezvous doctoral thesis at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). I didn’t really mind; in fact, usually after my fellow corps of astronauts hemmed and hawed, balking and complaining at my ideas, they more frequently than not embraced them and incorporated my ideas and calculations into their plans. I just took it as a backhanded compliment. Perhaps when the guys on the console noticed Neil and me changing the rendezvous details, they figured, “Well, Buzz knows what he’s doing.”
Overall, the rendezvous and docking with Mike were absolutely beautiful. We came