- Year
- 1962
- By
- NASA
- Section
- Apollo · Mission reports & chronologies
- Shelf
- Box 4
- Catalog
- Catalog F · NASA Missions
Transcript booklet (“Information for You from Marshall PIO,” limited circulation) of the July 11, 1962 press conference at NASA Headquarters where Administrator James E. Webb announced that Apollo would proceed primarily on the lunar orbit rendezvous (LOR) mode, using an advanced Saturn C-5 to launch a three-module spacecraft and a separate lunar excursion vehicle, while continuing secondary studies of Earth orbit rendezvous and direct ascent.
Includes statements by Associate Administrator Robert C. Seamans Jr., Office of Manned Space Flight director D. Brainerd Holmes, and Deputy Director of Systems Joseph F. Shea — who explains the LOR mission profile in detail using scale models — followed by a question-and-answer session and Webb’s concluding summary.
NASA’s Manned Space Flight Management Council had recommended LOR unanimously as offering the highest probability of mission success at the lowest cost and technical risk; the decision announced here would shape the separate command/service module and lunar module design later credited with making the 1969 landing possible.
