Guest: Walter Cunningham. Topics: An inside view of the American space program from Apollo to today. You are invited to comment, ask questions, & discuss the Space Show program/guest(s) on the Space Show blog, http://thespaceshow.wordpress.com. Comments, questions, & any discussion must be relevant & applicable to Space Show programming. Transcripts of Space Show programs are not permitted without prior written consent from The Space Show (even if for personal use) & are a violation of the Space Show copyright. We welcomed Walt Cunningham to discuss our space program from Apollo through today's developing commercial space industry. For more information, visit his website, www.waltercuningham.com. You can buy "The All-American Boys: An Insider's Look At The U.S. Space Program" from Amazon & they will make a contribution to The Space Show/OGLF if you use this URL: www.amazon.com/All-American-Boys-Walter-Cunningham/dp/1876963247/ref=on…. I started the discussion by asking Walt about his perspective on Apollo 7 today, 44 years later. Walt had some interesting things to say about perspective, especially over the past 10-20 years as compared to when he actually carried out the mission. A few times during our discussion, questions came up about the so called "mutiny" with the crew & NASA ground control so listen to how Walt described what was mostly a non-event despite media & blog reports to the contrary. He did talk about Wally Schirra, his head cold & the Actifed commercials, but there was far more to the mission & to the significance of Apollo 7. Dr. Jurist asked about the ride on a Saturn 1B, professors & experiences while both were at UCLA. We discussed risk regarding his ride on the Saturn 1B. Walt had much to say about risk during the Apollo era as compared to now. We extrapolated from this discussion to Columbia's foam issues. We talked about commercial space. Walt suggested that today's commercial space efforts were not purely commercial given government funding & missions. He also said that retiring the shuttle when we did was a big mistake. He then took us through a cost analysis process to illustrate that space is & always will be costly. At the end of the first segment, one way trips to Mars & reality TV show funding were mentioned. In the second segment, Terry called with questions about Von Braun. Walt had high praise & much to say about Von Braun & his experiences with him. Commercial space came up again & I asked him about asteroid mining. He did not think it would be a good investment & talked about the need to pay attention to the laws of physics. We talked about He3 on the Moon, fusion energy possibilities & more. I read an email from a London listener asking about the Apollo rocket & mission sounds on Apollo 7. We talked some more about the problems on board Apollo 7, this time regarding Wally & the TV broadcast delay & the wearing of the newly designed helmets during reentry. Walt talked about climate change & global warming, urging people to do their own research & examine the data rather than believing what people had to say regardless of their position. John in Atlanta called in about global warming & said that there was no practical mitigation strategy. Our guest shared what he perceived to be the true motivation of global warming extremists. John also talked about having built a next gen space shuttle from the old space shuttle to avoid retiring it or having to build an entirely new & very costly program. Walt supported that idea but history proved otherwise. Toward the end we discussed the pros & cons of international cooperation & competition, Ares 1 as a safe rocket for HSF, & the cost of the ISS being more due to international cooperation. Our final topic was risk versus reckless behavior & the difference between the two. If you have comments/questions, please post them on The Space Show blog.
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