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Bumper:
The story behind
the first launches from the Cape
Before
the KSC Direct! webcast of the "Bumper:
The story behind the first launches from the Cape," space
enthusiasts from all over the world submitted questions for our program
guests, Stan Starr, Liz Bain and Norris Gray. The questions were answered
during the show. In case you missed the webcast, or would like to review
each of the questions and answers, we have provided the Bumper: The Story
behind the first launches from the Cape Q&A in its entirety below.
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Harold
from Boston
Was there a lot out at Cape Canaveral during the launch of Bumper? |
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During the launch itself, all of the civilians were
removed temporarily from the Cape and there was about 150 primarily
service people and then civilians that were supporting the launch
effort, and those were the only people out at the Cape. We’ve
addressed that there were just a handful of houses and a hotel,
and a pier. |
Carl
from Columbus, Ohio
Was Cape Canaveral used mostly as a missile testing site during
the 1950s? |
| In
1950 it was used strictly as a testing site for the first 10
years, and then when we went into Vanguard, that’s when
we tried to put a satellite into orbit, and it failed, and it
was still a testing site as far as I’m concerned for the
first fifty years. |
Jim
from Fort Worth
Was Bumper top secret? If it was not classified, did the public
know it was going on, or was it just a little known military
program? |
| It
was not classified as secret, but there were certain aspects
of it that were secret, mainly how the WAC was fitted into the
nose of the V-2. It was considered a confidential program.
Expert 2: The thing of it is,
is that you saw it in all the papers what was going on, but
the ones of us who worked on it, we were absolutely sworn
to secrecy about anything that was going on about it. So,
as a result, no one knew in our group that were weren’t
supposed to talk about it.
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Bill
from Cocoa (For Norris Gray)
What was one of the more unusual duties that you performed in
support of a Bumper launch? |
| One
of the most unusual duties that I ever had was strictly out
of range of anything. We had one elderly woman on the site,
and she refused to move out of the safety zone area for launch.
So I, as a civilian, in the uniform I had at that time, was
selected to entice her off of the site. Well, there wasn’t
very much enticing going on, and I had to kind of get her support,
and I said, “You got to move it.” She says, “I’m
staying right here.” I finally had to pick her up, push
her up over my shoulder, and take off. Just before this, she
had threatened some people with a shotgun. This included a federal
judge. I knew the shotgun was plugged because I had inspected
it one day, it’s not going to hurt, so I was the only
brave one who walked up to her to put the shotgun away, the
rest of them was all headed to the woods, and that’s how
we got her off the base. |
Sarah
from Melbourne
Just how close were you to the Bumper as it launched? Did you
have to wear special headphones to protect your hearing? |
| I
was about 25 feet from where they were working on this. When
it was launched, all of us took off in this little truck to
about 50 yards away from there, and we didn’t have any
special headgear or anything to protect us. The only thing we
had was get in the truck and go into the woods.
Host: What were you actually doing
before the launch?
My headphones were used to monitor
all of the frequencies that were going on. If a truck came
by and did not have the shield that would protect it from
emitting different frequencies that would interfere with the
Bumper we would have to cancel it and tell them to go back.
So there were many of them that we would not permit any trucks
on the launching site.
Host: What would happen if they
were emitting too much?
Expert: If they were emitting
too much they weren’t permitted to come. We were afraid
it would blow the whole thing up.
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Jode from Wasilla
What was the primary fuel of the rocket and were you concerned
about it blowing up? |
| The
V-2 used oxygen and alcohol, that’s the main liquid there.
Add the sodium manganate with it, which turned the propellers
for the engine, and analyn, a red fueling nitrate. If you got
them together like you were supposed to, it was one of the best
fuels you could ever get. But, otherwise, if you got them together,
unknowingly in another way, you get what is called a hypergolic
reaction. Host:
That means they ignite on contact.
Expert:
On contact. All over the place. Another thing, when we were
fueling, we had to make sure everybody was upwind.
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John
from Ames
What was the most spectacular mishap of the Bumper program?
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Actually, the bumpers went pretty good except for
Bumper 7, and Bumper 7 was going to be our first launch. Brought
it up, and that was the first missile I ever owned, because
they turned around to me and said. “It’s all yours
if it misfires.” We had to go out on the launch pad and
safe it at that time. We didn’t have any remote conditions
to safe it. So myself and two other individuals went out there
and made sure the igniters were safed and all that and we turned
a couple of valves off so it would depressurize. |
Kaylee
from Rosebud
What is the Bumper project? |
The main purpose of the Bumper project was to extend
the range of guided missiles. It had some secondary requirements
also that is primarily to fire a missile at a greater range.
It was really about multistage rockets; being able to launch
a rocket from another rocket in flight. We just call that multistage
rockets today but back then it was quite a feat of technology
to be able to accomplish the Bumper missions.
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James
from Vancouver, Washington
When visiting the Cape Canaveral Lighthouse recently, I don’t
remember a launch stand nearby. Where exactly was Bumper launched
from? |
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Bumper was launched on a pad that was about a mile
from the lighthouse. There was just no way in-between that,
as far as I’m concerned. It was quite a distance to walk,
I know that. Host:
As you saw in the films, there’s really nothing there
today except a concrete slab to let you know that it was launched
there. As Norris pointed out, the shadow of the V-2, and that
kind of verified for everyone else that was the spot that
the Bumper launched from. There’s really no other evidence..
Actually
what it was, the spotting in the concrete, you could tell
where the launch table sat for the two V-2 launches.
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Steve
from New Orleans
Was Goddard’s experiments with rockets helpful for the
Bumper program? |
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Dr. Robert Goddard really started the entire liquid
fuel rocket program, all programs, owe their heritage to Dr.
Goddard. He developed the concept of multistage rockets but
he didn’t actually work on any two or three stage rockets
themselves. So, while he did all the fundamental work, it was
the later generations that really did the work on that Bumper
programs. Everything we do today can ultimately be tracked back
to Robert Goddard. |
David
from Bethesda, Virginia
What altitudes did Bumper 8 reach? Did it have multiple stages?
What was the payload? |
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The altitude reached by Bumper 8 was about 60,000
feet, it was meant to fly much higher, as we mentioned in the
film it was a two-stage rocket and the payload was really a
radio transmitter and a Teflon nose cone for trying to protect
the nose cone from the aerodynamic heating. That was the only
payload. |
Cletus
from Mims
What was the biggest challenge, technical or personnel related,
encountered during the Bumper program? |
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The biggest challenge there was safety of all personnel,
especially with the type of fuels we were using. Too many people
weren’t conditioned to the fuel we were using at that
time. It was strictly a launch site, testing for range to see
what we could get out of the two missiles that were joined together.
The name Bumper comes from the V-2 with the WAC corporal on
the nose, as the missiles got up it bumped the WAC corporal
up and that’s where the Bumper name comes from. We wanted
to call it Bumper Booster, but it ended up with Bumper. And
there is a road named Bumper over on Cape Canaveral today.
Our
biggest problem was actually getting people to come to work
here. My job was not in personnel but in an operating section,
where we were writing the job descriptions of engineers, “Please
come to Patrick,” and we were trying everything we could
think about, writing these job descriptions. People would
show up, but because of looking around and seeing what we
didn’t have here they decided they wouldn’t come.
It was very difficult to get it started and so as a result
it was very slow in getting manned like we needed to have.
One of the reasons I ended up being at the Cape at the time
was because they just couldn’t get people to work.
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Claus
from Hunstville
If the Army launched Bumper, why is NASA claiming this as their
work? |
NASA’s not claiming it as their work, of course,
Bumper preceded NASA by quite a few years. Really, if you look
at the entire heritage of launching activity and launch technology
in the United States, NASA owes everything we’re doing
today and accomplishing today to the pioneering work that was
done by Robert Goddard, the German engineers, by General Electric,
by the Air Force, by the Navy; we’re really honoring the
Bumper launch. It was a tremendous accomplishment and it was
the first launch here in the Cape Canaveral Spaceport.
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Gundorf
from Dusseldorf
Were German engineers involved in the Bumper program, and if
yes, what were their responsibilities? |
We’ve actually done a lot of work to try and
figure out if there were German engineers from Dr. Von Braun’s
group, especially Dr. Kurt Debus, involved in the launches.
The only thing that we can find that they really contributed
to were some of the initial studies on how to mate the WAC corporal
to the V-2. The launches here at the Cape took place during
a time when Von Braun and his team were moving to Huntsville
and setting up the Redstone arsenal. So we believe they were
basically too busy and were not here at the time.
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Gabriel
from Orlando, Florida
Were there many women involved in the Bumper program? |
The only two people that I know that were actually
involved in it were Mary Taggard and Bea Sylvester who were
in a van that was quite a distance from where the launch pad
was. They were monitoring and taking caring of different things
that they had to do, but their van was not on the launch pad.
It was over close to the ocean. So, their support was given
to the Bumper project but not actually at the launch pad.
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Bob
from Atlanta
When you participated in the first Bumper launch, did you think
then that the rocket and space program would develop into what
it is today? |
I didn’t think it’d ever go that far.
I knew the Bumper program was the embryo of the space industry,
the way we were looking at it then. I didn’t think anything
would ever come up like going to the Moon and safely returning,
I never thought it would end up with that. I’ve been very
fortunate to follow it all the way through.
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