How Apollo Flew to the Moon [Paperback]

This exquisite book fills a noticeable gap in historical coverage of the Apollo missions. A number of excellent books cover the political decision to go to the Moon, the technological challenge of designing and testing the hardware, and the time spend by the LM crews on the lunar surface. What are rarely covered are flight operations - the procedures and systems - that made it possible to get to the Moon, to live and work in lunar orbit and during the journeys between worlds, to land, and to return safely to Earth. Some of the existing astronaut biographies - most notably, Michael Collins' unmatched "Carrying the Fire" - deal with aspects of flight operations but not across all the missions or in the depth that Woods achieves. Woods takes us expertly through a composite mission, while avoiding the mistake of losing his readers - well, this one, anyway - in a tangle of detail. Essential aspects of the flights are presented clearly and at appropriate moments. I particularly liked the idea of using the portion of the book covering the long coast out to the Moon to delve into such topics as life support, hygiene (how you shave and go to the bathroom in space), food, communications, etc. Woods' discussions of such critical operations as lunar orbit insertion, landing, returning to lunar orbit, and re-entry into Earth's atmosphere are impressive. Perhaps more than any other book I've read on the subject of Apollo, "How Apollo Flew to the Moon" gives me a feeling for the magnitude of the Apollo achievement. Highly recommended.

W. David Woods is the Senior Editor of the on-line Apollo Flight Journal (AFJ), hosted by NASA at http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/ap15fj/index.htm

First of all, I second all the wonderful things that folks have said about this book in the other reviews. It beautifully fills in the gaps as to what was actually going on, and explains in relatively simple terms how the systems work. An engineer or space enthusiast won't have any problems with the terminology. A less educated reader might be somewhat less able to understand - but then again, they're probably not the target audience, anyway. As someone who spent his teenage years watching Apollo live, I'm very happy to have the book in my collection.

There are a few quirks that stuck out at me:
(1) The book literally stinks. I don't know what kind of paper and ink combination they used, but the book smells AWFUL. There's something in it that I'm allergic to. It makes me sneeze if it's within 18 inches of my face, so I have to hold it at arms length to read it without my eyes watering and my nose running. I hate to mention that, but it's enough of an issue to be more than just annoying. I have never had that problem with any other book.

(2) Most of the black and white photos are reproduced very darkly. Some of them are so dark that it's difficult to tell what we are supposed to be seeing in the photo.

(3) The author says up front that he will insist on using metric instead of English units because that's the way the rest of the world measures things. As someone who has memorized all the pertinent dimensions of the Apollo from his youth, it's very disconcerting for me to see them expressed solely in different units. In some cases, the author's writing around the units makes this even more bizarre to my American sensibilities. For example, we would say the F-1 engine produced 1.5 million pounds of thrust. On page 19, the author says the F-1 "produced a force that could balance 680 tonnes of mass." I only recall him using the word "thrust" once in the book - the rest of the time, he speaks of balance tonnes of mass.

(4) The editing was a little sloppy. Perhaps the book was not intended to be read sequentially, but there are examples when entire paragraphs are reproduced almost verbatim in several chapters. One section has a footnote that refers the reader to the previous chapter - the one we just read - for a discussion of a concept. The author also introduces verbatim transcripts of transmissions from actual missions to illustrate points about systems that he is discussing. However, he tends to include more of the conversation than is pertinent to the issue in question. It's as if someone is showing you film clips that go on a little longer than they should, past the punch line.

These are relatively minor quibbles, though. Again, I believe this is an excellent book than any fan of the Apollo era will want to have in his or her library.

Praxis, the company that also printed "The Manned
Spaceflight Log: 1961-2006", a compendium of every manned mission
from Gagarin to Spaceshift One.

In the author's preface he makes a point that I had been craving
for years:

"A particularly popular sub-niche is the astronaut bgraphy, a
somewhat variable collection of tomes that do much to relate the
story of humanity's only fora away from the grip of planet Earth.
Other volumes relate, in varying levels of detail, what the
intrepid explores actually did during their far too brief spells
on the surface of another world.

"Remarkably few books discuss the practical aspects of how
the voyage form the Earth to the Moon was achieved. The genre
seldom describes the equipment that was used; nor does it relate
the procedures and techniques that allowe the Apollo crews
to accomplish their audacious task: in general, historians
are not concerned with how a feat was achieved technically.
Instead, the dominant form of written history on Apollo studies
the experiences and interrelationships of the pople involved,
the political and social millieu in which they operated or it is
the polemic and ranting of those who are doing the commentating.
[...] The details of how something was achieved are considered to
be the realm of the 'geek' or 'nerd', and should not be presented
to the general public."

I've recently finished "In the Shadow of the Moon" and enjoyed
the stories of all of the astronaunts (and cosmonauts) who made it
into space, and how they were selected by the beocratic system to
be so honored. In case you were wondering, Alfred Worden was the first
divorced astronaut (an entire chapter!) and Boris Volynov was overlooked
for years due to his Jewish mother (being another chapter!).
Likewise, "The Right Stuff" is full of fighter-pilot bravado,
womanizing and alcool.

These are fascinating stories, but the are woefully lacking in the
technical details! Where is the red meat for the (geeky) base?
I want to know who designed the F-1 rocket motor and how the LOX
inlet combines the hypergolic fluid with the output of the turbo pump.
I want to read about the six dozen different abort modes that were
considered and the detailed arguments about earth orbit rendezvous,
lunar orbit rendezvous, direct TLI and why we selected LOR.
I want to know the Max-Q for the Saturn V as compared to the
Delta IV Heavy and the SSME. And I want details on the solid
waste system!

"How Apollo Flew to the Moon" delivers. I've been reading it all
evening and feel that it was written for me. Why aren't there more
historical books like this?

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