Customer Reviews

Arrows to the Moon: Avro's Engineers and the Space Race: Apogee Books Space Series 19

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In 1957, a Canadian company, Avro Aircraft, unveiled a new supersonic airplane, the CF-105 Avro Arrow. Two years later, the aircraft project was canceled, and many of the engineers lost their jobs. Fortunately, at the time, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) was just created and needed to hire engineers to put US astronauts into space. This was an exciting time for NASA since they were in an intense competition with the Soviets in space projects, including the race to land a human on the moon. This book is about the key role that many Avro engineers played in the US space program, but it also discusses the role of Canadians in general in NASA's endeavors. In the process, Gainor presents a nice history of the space program from Mercury through Apollo. Final chapters discuss the Canadian Space program and the role of Canadians in the space shuttle. The book is illustrated with black-and-white photographs from space missions and of the key Canadians involved in space flight efforts. An appendix includes biographical sketches of Avro Canada engineers who worked at NASA. General readers.

Most people know that German rocket engineers led by Wernher von Braun helped build the rocket that put Apollo astronauts on the Moon. But few have heard about the Canadian and British engineers who also made a big contribution to the success of Apollo. Now their story is told for the first time in "Arrows to the Moon." This excellent book starts off with the story of how Canada scrapped the Avro Arrow, the most advanced jet interceptor of its time, and how NASA scooped up 32 of Avro's top engineers. This book follows their work in the U.S. space program from the early Mercury flights right through to the International Space Station. It includes stories about Jim Chamberlin and his design work on the Gemini spacecraft, John Hodge's efforts as the flight director when America faced its first emergency in space on Gemini 8, and Owen Maynard's contributions to Apollo. And there's much more. Top NASA officials were unanimous: the group from Canada was a "godsend" to NASA. Now, for the first time, their story is told in Arrows to the Moon.

I grew up with the space program and have read every book I could get my hands on concerning the early space programs. This well-written and extensively-researched book covers a topic I hadn't considered: the contributions to the American space program made by the Canadian and British engineers and scientists who lost their jobs when the Canadian Avro Arrow was abruptly cancelled just as the space race was heating up. Many of these highly-trained workers made their way south, signed on with NASA, and made significant contributions to every manned space program from Mercury to the ISS. This is the definitive story of these people. Highly recommended.

After the nationally devastating (IMHO, even today), colossal Canadian Government screw-up of the cancellation of the CF-105 (AVRO Arrow) in the late 1950's, chronicled in Greig's Shutting down the national dream: A.V. Roe and the tragedy of the Avro Arrow, Chris Gainor's "Arrows to the Moon" is almost "a save", at least philosophically speaking. It testifies to the talent, and perhaps even genius, of some of the "Made in Canada" engineering and technical people who were scooped-up by the US' Gemini, Apollo and later the Space Station programs. As an old Canuck air force brat, I felt a little less demoralized after finishing this one. It's a good read.

Readers interested in the Technical details of the CF-105 may also be interested in Avro Arrow: The Story of the Avro Arrow From Its Evolution To Its Extinction. The flight logs record that aircraft number RL-202 reached Mach 1.98, even before the more powerful Orenda Iroquois engines could be flight-tested.