Magnificent Desolation_ The Long Journey Home From the Moon - Buzz Aldrin [3]
Crucial to the success of our flight navigation were the two onboard guidance computers we had on the mission (one in the command module and one in the lunar module), each with about 74 kilobytes of memory and a 2.048 MHz clock processor. With their small displays and nineteen-button keyboards, the Apollo control system seems archaic by today’s standards. Many modern mobile phones have more computing power than we did. But these computers enabled us to measure our velocity changes to a hundredth of a foot per second, determine rendezvous and course corrections, and make minute maneuvers for our descent to the moon. You couldn’t do that with a slide rule. NASA made sure the Apollo computers were the most advanced of the day, the first to use integrated circuit technology, and we expected them to work astoundingly well to perform all the complex calculations needed.
Weightless now, we could float around the module as Neil and I began running through our checklists while Mike checked out the equipment bays below. At approximately three hours into the trip, Mike ignited the Saturn V third-stage rocket engines for our Trans-Lunar Injection burn to take us out of Earth’s orbit, catapulting us to a speed of nearly 25,000 miles per hour, heading toward the moon. The burn was successful, so it was time to let go of the third stage rocket. But first we needed to extract the lunar module (LM) that had been stored in the third stage, now fully exposed as the protective panels were released. We detached the command module (CM) to move forward and away from the rocket, and then navigated a full U-turn to head back toward the LM. Mike adeptly docked the nose of the CM to the nose of the LM, just as he had done hundreds of times in simulations. With a firm hold on the lunar lander, we practically plucked it out of the third rocket stage as we threw the switch to release the rocket and send it on its way in the direction of the sun. We were now an odd-looking apparatus speeding along, one cone-shaped command module sitting atop its cylindrical service module, nose to nose with what looked like an upside-down, gold-foil-covered cement mixer. We would fly that way until we reached lunar orbit, when Neil and I were safely inside the LM ready to disconnect from Mike and the CM, and descend to the surface of the moon.
The eight-day journey to the moon would take three days outbound, and another three days to get back home, plus two days in lunar orbit, including the day Neil and I planned to be on the lunar surface, so we were happy when we could finally take off our bulky pressurized space suits and stow them after the first five hours. Working in our more comfortable flight suits, we could now move around our weightless environment much more freely, having completed several crucial engine burns and our docking procedures. We ate our first meal aboard—real tasty precooked food from pre-measured packages organized by each meal. We had selections of chicken salad, applesauce, and even freeze-dried shrimp cocktail. It wasn’t exactly gourmet cooking, but it was enough sustenance to keep us energized. Some of the meals were ready to eat, and others required hot water, which we could add from a hot water gun in the CM. Eating with a spoon was a much trickier activity without gravity; any crumbs from your pineapple fruitcake could float around just about anywhere in the cabin. But I liked it better than simply squirting food into my mouth, as Jim Lovell and I had done on our Gemini 12 mission.
With the CM starting to feel like home, after dinner it was time for a nap. We pulled down the shades on our windows, and dimmed the cabin lights and the sound from