Listening to “A World In Your Ear”, as recommended by someone on my f-list, I fell to wondering where the capsules from the various manned space flights physically are now. It’s odd to think that it’s over 30 years now since the last splashdown, of the US astronauts from the Apollo-Soyuz mission in July 1975. Since then, Russian and Chinese flights have come down on land, and the Space Shuttles are of course in continuous circulation (apart, sadly, from Columbia and Challenger).
Anyway, I couldn’t find any information on-line about what happened to the Russian or Chinese manned spacecraft capsules after landing. For the 31 American ones, their current resting place is as follows:
Apollo-Soyuz: Kennedy Space Centre, Cape Canaveral, Florida
Skylab 4: National Air and Space Museum (Smithsonian Institution), Washington, DC
Skylab 3: NASA Lewis Research Center, Cleveland, Ohio
Skylab 2: Naval Aviation Museum, Pensacola, Florida
Apollo 17: Johnson Space Centre, Houston, Texas
Apollo 16: US Space and Rocket Center, Huntsville, Alabama
Apollo 15: National Museum of the US Air Force, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Dayton, Ohio
Apollo 14: National Air and Space Museum (Smithsonian Institution), Washington, DC
Apollo 13: Kansas Cosmosphere and Space Center, Hutchinson, Kansas
Apollo 12: Virginia Air and Space Center (NASA Langley Visitor’s Center), Hampton, Virginia
Apollo 11: National Air and Space Museum (Smithsonian Institution), Washington, DC
Apollo 10: Science Museum, London, U.K.
Apollo 9: Michigan Space Center, Jackson, Michigan
Apollo 8: Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago, Illinois
Apollo 7: Museum of Science and Technology, Ottawa, Canada
Gemini 12: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland
Gemini 11: California Museum of Science and Industry, Los Angeles, California
Gemini 10: Norwegian Technical Museum, Oslo, Norway
Gemini 9: Kennedy Space Center, Cape Canaveral, Florida
Gemini 8: Neil Armstrong Museum, Wapakoneta, Ohio
Gemini 7: National Air and Space Museum (Smithsonian Institution), Washington, DC
Gemini 6: McDonnell Planetarium, Saint Louis, Missouri
Gemini 5: Space Center Houston (NASA Johnson Space Center’s Visitor Center), Houston, Texas
Gemini 4: National Air and Space Museum (Smithsonian Institution), Washington, DC
Gemini 3: Grissom Memorial Museum, Mitchell, Indiana
Mercury 9 (Faith 7): Space Center Houston (NASA Johnson Space Center’s Visitor Center), Houston, Texas
Mercury 8 (Sigma 7): Astronaut Hall of Fame, Titusville, Florida
Mercury 7 (Aurora 7): Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago, Illinois
Mercury 6 (Friendship 7): National Air and Space Museum (Smithsonian Institution), Washington, DC
Mercury MR 4 (Liberty Bell 7): Kansas Cosmosphere and Space Center, Hutchinson, Kansas*
Mercury MR-3 (Freedom 7): U.S. Naval Academy, College of Medicine, Anapolis, Maryland
* The Liberty Bell 7 capsule spent 38 years at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean.
Not very surprising that six of the 31 are in the Smithsonian (though I think only three on display); and three at the Johnson Space Centre in Texas. There are two at the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida, two at the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, and another two (including the recovered Liberty Bell 7) in the gloriously named “Kansas Cosmosphere and Space Center” of Hutchinson, Kansas. Only three are outside the United States – Ottawa and London are fairly obvious locations, but I was surprised to find that the farthest-flung of the US capsules has found its final resting place in Oslo.
Back when I was a lad, the Armagh Planetarium had something which claimed to have been a capsule from the Gemini program. It obviously wasn’t a real one, though I have no difficulty in imagining that Patrick Moore, the Planetarium’s first director, managed to persuade NASA to let him have some old training equipment. I see the Planetarium is being refurbished at the moment; I guess they’ll throw it out, if they haven’t already.
There’s probably a paper in there somewhere, but I’m not going to write it.
One thought on “Space relics”