Apollo 8 : The NASA Mission Reports With CDRom [ILLUSTRATED] (Paperback)

by Robert Godwin (Editor), United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Corporate Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"Likely to appeal to someone who likes to delve deeply into the workings of NASA..." -- Astronomy Now, August 2001. "An essential read, Apogee should be applauded for producing this material in such an attractive format..." -- Spaceflight, August 2002. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Product Description
On December 21st 1968 the United States' National Aeronautics & Space Administration sent three men to orbit the moon. It was the boldest step yet taken in the quest to fulfill President John Kennedy's goal of landing a man on the moon by the end of the decade. This book finally puts in one place four of the most important documents from this triumphant odyssey, The Apollo 8 Press Kit, The Apollo 8 Pre-mission Report and Objectives, The Apollo 8 Supplemental Technical Report and The Apollo 8 Post Flight Summary. Includes: Windows CD-ROM featuring: 850 - 70 mm images taken during the mission; The film "Go For TLI" - over 21 minutes of full screen, full color MPEG video. The NASA Mission Reports is a series of books that will include all of the Apollo missions from Apollo 8 to Apollo 17 and all of the Mercury, Gemini and Skylab missions. All books will have CD-ROMs included.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 184 pages
• Publisher: Apogee Books (November 1, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1896522505
• ISBN-13: 978-1896522500
• Product Dimensions: 10.2 x 7 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #2,440,391 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

• This is item 1 in The Apogee Books Space Series.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Don't miss the point: this is a collection, not an edition., March 9, 2000

By	Evan Machlan (New Jersey) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Reading these Apogee books is like leafing through a thick stack of mimeographs. Robert Godwin's decision to leave the documents essentially "as-is" (leaving spelling and punctuation errors, for example) and to publish as much relevant material as he could find in the archives (similar, but not identical reports) allows you, the reader, to process the information yourself, as if you had gone to the archives to do research. If as a reader you are uncomfortable with the idea of developing the narrative on your own out of this raw material, these books may not be for you.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars First of a great series, June 16, 2006

By	Voodude (Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Apollo 8: The NASA Mission Reports: Apogee Books Space Series 1 (Paperback)

If you're really into the history of space flight (as I am), then this is the first entry in a series that you will love. These aren't really for someone with a casual interest in the subject, but are primarily intended for the dedicated enthusiast who wants to learn more about the missions than can be obtained from more ordinary references.

The various volumes in the Apogee Mission Reports series (covering Apollo, Gemini, Mercury and Shuttle flights) reprint a lot of difficult to find NASA documentation for the various flights. For each flight, there are reprints of the original press kits, with biographical details of the prime and backup crews, the planned schedule for the flight, information on the flight plan, etc. One of the things that I find most interesting is that the press kit lists some of the options for the flight in the event that things didn't go entirely to plan. It's interesting to see the advance preparations that were made for in flight emergencies, or for possible alternative missions.

Other things featured in the mission reports are the original debriefings of the crews after the flights, where the details of the mission just ended are discussed with the crews and their opinions on how the mission went (and suggestions for future improvements) are solicited.

Each book also includes a CD-Rom, with extra material. In the case of the Apollo 8 disk, it includes a copy of the official NASA film on Apollo 8, an interview with Apollo 8 Command Module Pilot Jim Lovell, and scans of lots of pictures from the flight. Similar extras are on the CD-ROMS (or DVDs) on other books in the series.

Some of the information in the press kits is slightly repetitive from one flight to the next, but there is plenty of really good stuff here for the enthusiast. Given that the original NASA documents are hard to find (and generally very expensive when they are available), the availability of this range of reprinted versions is a godsend - having a set is like having the NASA archives on your bookshelf! Hopefully, this series will eventually cover the entire history of American Manned Spaceflight. These reprints (together with the availability of the complete film/video from the missions on DVD from Spacecraft Films) are the best thing that ever happened for Space enthusiasts!

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Valuable technical background to a critical mission, January 31, 2002

By	Kevin W. Parker (Greenbelt, MD) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Apollo 8: The NASA Mission Reports: Apogee Books Space Series 1 (Paperback)

This is the original book in the series, now revised and including the crew debriefing (my favorite part, as I keep saying) and other materials, including a Jim Lovell interview on the accompanying CD. I don't know what I can say about this volume that I haven't said about others in this series. Apollo 8 was a key step on the way to the moon and probably the riskiest mission in NASA history. This provides a valuable technical background to the mission and a useful accompaniment to more human-oriented books such as Jim Lovell's Lost Moon or Andrew Chaikin's A Man on the Moon.