Mission Insignia
Mission Statistics
Mission Name:	Skylab III
Call Sign:	Skylab 3
Number of Crew:	3
Launch:	July 28, 1973 11:10:50.5 UTC Kennedy Space Center LC 39B
Apogee:	441 km
Perigee:	423 km
Period:	93.2 min
Inclination:	50 deg
Station visit length:	58 d 15 h 39 min 42 s
Station EVA length:	13 h 44 min
Landing:	September 25, 1973 22:19:51 UTC 30°47′ N 120°29′ W
Duration:	59 d 11 h 9 min 34 s
Number of Orbits:	858
Distance Traveled:	~24,500,000 mi (~39,400,000 km)
Mass:	CSM 20,121 kg
Crew Picture
Skylab 3 crew portrait (L-R: Garriott, Lousma and Bean)
Skylab 3 Crew

Skylab 3 or SL-3 was the second manned mission to Skylab. The Skylab 3 mission started July 28, 1973, with the launch of three astronauts on the Saturn IB rocket, and lasted 59 days, 11 hours and 9 minutes. A total of 1,084.7 astronaut-utilization hours were tallied by Skylab 3 astronauts performing scientific experiments in the areas of medical activities, solar observations, Earth resources and other experiments. Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. ... July 28 is the 209th day (210th in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian Calendar, with 156 days remaining. ... 1973 was a common year starting on Monday. ... UTC also stands for the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga Coordinated Universal Time or UTC, also sometimes referred to as Zulu time, the basis for civil time, differs by an integral number of seconds from atomic time and a fractional number of seconds from UT1. ... Merritt Island and Kennedy Space Center The John F. Kennedy Space Center (KSC) is the NASA space vehicle launch facility (spaceport) at Cape Canaveral on Merritt Island in Florida, United States. ... September 25 is the 268th day of the year (269th in leap years). ... 1973 was a common year starting on Monday. ... Skylab 3 crew: Garriot, Lousma, Bean. ... Drawing of Skylab with components labelled Skylab was the United Statess first space station. ... July 28 is the 209th day (210th in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian Calendar, with 156 days remaining. ... 1973 was a common year starting on Monday. ... The Saturn IB was an uprated verson of the Saturn I, which was the first manned launch vehicle that was not directly derived from an ICBM (though its tanks were derived from the Jupiter and Redstone tanks, and its first stage engines were Navaho derived). ...

Crew

• Alan Bean (flew on Apollo 12 & Skylab 3), commander
• Jack Lousma (flew on Skylab 3 & STS-3), pilot
• Owen Garriott (flew on Skylab 3 & STS-9), science pilot

Alan Beans NASA photo Alan Bean (born March 15, 1932 in Wheeler, Texas) is a former NASA Astronaut. ... Apollo 12 was the sixth manned mission in the Apollo program and the second to land on the Moon. ... Jack Robert Lousma [Colonel, USMC, Ret. ... STS-3 was the third space shuttle mission, and was the third mission for the Space Shuttle Columbia. ... Owen Kay Garriott, Ph. ... STS-9 (Spacelab 1) was a United States Space Shuttle mission, the 6th mission of the Columbia orbiter. ...

Backup Crew

• Vance Brand
• William Lenoir
• Don Lind

Vance DeVoe Brand is a former NASA astronaut. ... Note: this is not the William Lenoir that Lenoir County, North Carolina is named after. ... Don Leslie Lind is a former NASA astronaut who was born in Midvale, Utah on May 18, 1930. ...

Support Crew

• Robert Crippen
• Richard Truly
• Henry Hartsfield
• William Thornton

Official STS-1 portrait of Robert L. Crippen, May 7, 1979 Robert Laurel Crippen (b. ... Richard H. Truly (born November 12, 1937) is a retired Vice Admiral in the United States Navy, former astronaut, and was the 8th Administrator of NASA from 1989 to 1992. ... Henry Warren (Hank) Hartsfield, Jr. ... William Edgar Thornton (M.D.) NASA Astronaut (former) Personal data Born in Faison, North Carolina, on April 14, 1929. ...

Mission Parameters

• Mass: about 20,121 kg
• Maximum Altitude: 440 km
• Distance: 24.5 million miles (39.4 million km)
• Launch Vehicle: Saturn IB

• Perigee: 423 km
• Apogee: 441 km
• Inclination: 50°
• Period: 93.2 min

The Saturn IB was an uprated verson of the Saturn I, which was the first manned launch vehicle that was not directly derived from an ICBM (though its tanks were derived from the Jupiter and Redstone tanks, and its first stage engines were Navaho derived). ... This article is about several astronomical terms (apogee & perigee, aphelion & perihelion, generic equivalents based on apsis, and related but rarer terms. ... This article is about several astronomical terms (apogee & perigee, aphelion & perihelion, generic equivalents based on apsis, and related but rarer terms. ... Inclination is one of the six orbital parameters describing the shape and orientation of a celestial orbit and is the angular distance of the orbital plane from the plane of the reference (usually planets equator or the ecliptic), stated in degrees. ... The orbital period is the time it takes a planet (or another object) to make one full orbit. ...

Docking

• Docked: July 28, 1973 - 19:37:00 UTC
• Undocked: September 25, 1973 - 11:16:42 UTC
• Time Docked: 58 days, 15 hours, 39 minutes, 42 seconds

July 28 is the 209th day (210th in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian Calendar, with 156 days remaining. ... 1973 was a common year starting on Monday. ... September 25 is the 268th day of the year (269th in leap years). ... 1973 was a common year starting on Monday. ...

Space walks

• Garriott and Lousma - EVA 1
• EVA 1 Start: August 6, 1973, 17:30 UTC
• EVA 1 End: August 7, 00:01 UTC
• Duration: 6 hours, 31 minutes

• Garriott and Lousma - EVA 2
• EVA 2 Start: August 24, 1973, 16:24 UTC
• EVA 2 End: August 24, 20:55 UTC
• Duration: 4 hours, 31 minutes

• Bean and Garriott - EVA 3
• EVA 3 Start: September 22, 1973, 11:18 UTC
• EVA 3 End: September 22, 13:59 UTC
• Duration: 2 hours, 41 minutes

August 6 is the 218th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (219th in leap years), with 147 days remaining. ... 1973 was a common year starting on Monday. ... August 24 is the 236th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (237th in leap years), with 129 days remaining. ... 1973 was a common year starting on Monday. ... September 22 is the 265th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (266th in leap years). ... 1973 was a common year starting on Monday. ...

See also

• Extra-vehicular activity
• List of spacewalks
• Splashdown

Astronaut Bruce McCandless on an untethered EVA Extra-vehicular activity (EVA) is work done by an astronaut away from the Earth and outside of his or her spacecraft. ... Related article Mir extra-vehicular activity (just an excerpt from the table above) List of ISS spacewalks (just an excerpt from the table above) External link NASA JSC Oral History Project: See link near page end to Walking to Olympus: An EVA Chronology PDF document. ... Atlantic splashdown locations of American spacecraft. ...

Mission Highlights

During the approach phase, problems developed in the Apollo CSM's reaction control system, and a leak formed. The crew was able to safely dock with Skylab, but troubleshooting would continue with the problem. For the first time, an Apollo spacecraft would be rolled out to Launch Complex 39 for a rescue mission, made possible by the ability for the station to have two Apollo CSMs docked at the same time. They eventually fixed the problem, and the rescue mission was never launched. Apollo Program insignia Project Apollo was a series of human spaceflight missions undertaken by the United States of America using the Apollo spacecraft and Saturn launch vehicle, conducted during the years 1961–1972. ... During the second crewed Skylab mission a rescue flight was assembled as a backup contingency. ...

The crew, during their first EVA, installed the twin-pole sunshade, one of the two solutions for the destruction of the micrometeoroid shield during Skylab's launch to keep the space station cool. It was installed over the parasol, which was originally deployed through a porthole airlock during Skylab 2. Both were brought to the station by Skylab 2. Astronaut Bruce McCandless on an untethered EVA Extra-vehicular activity (EVA) is work done by an astronaut away from the Earth and outside of his or her spacecraft. ...

Skylab 3 continued a comprehensive medical research program that extended the data on human physiological adaptation and readaptation to space flight collected on the previous Skylab 2 mission. In addition, Skylab 3 extended the astronauts stay in space from approximately one month to two months. Therefore, the effects of flight duration on physiological adaptation and readaptation could be examined.

A set of core medical investigations were performed on all three Skylab manned missions. These core investigations were the same basic investigations that were performed on Skylab 2, except that the Skylab 3 inflight tests were supplemented with extra tests based on what researchers learned from the Skylab 2 science results. For example, only leg volume measurements, preflight and postflight stereophotogrammetry, and in-flight maximum calf girth measurements were originally scheduled for all three Skylab missions.

In-flight photographs from Skylab 2 revealed the "puffy face syndrome" which prompted the addition of in-flight torso and limb girth measurements to gather more data on the apparent headward fluid shift on Skylab 3. Other additional tests included arterial blood flow measurements by an occlusive cuff placed around the leg, facial photographs taken before flight and during flight to study the "puffy face syndrome", venous compliance, hemoglobin, urine specific gravity, and urine mass measurements. These inflight tests gave additional information about fluid distribution and fluid balance to get a better understanding of the fluid shift phenomena.

The Skylab 3 biological experiments studied the effects of microgravity on mice, fruit flies, single cells and cell culture media. Human lung cells were flown to examine the biochemical characteristics of cell cultures in the microgravity environment. The two animal experiments were entitled Chronobiology of Pocket Mice and Circadian Rhythm in Vinegar Gnats. Both experiments were unsuccessful due to a power failure 30 minutes after launch.

High school students from across the United States participated in the Skylab missions as the primary investigators of experiments that studied astronomy, physics, and fundamental biology. The student experiments performed on Skylab 3 included the study of libration clouds, x-rays from Jupiter, in-vitro immunology, spider web formation, cytoplasmic streaming, mass measurement, and neutron analysis.

The crew's health was assessed on Skylab by collecting data on dental health, environmental and crew microbiology, radiation, and toxicological aspects of the Skylab orbital workshop. Other assessments were made of astronaut maneuvering equipment and of the habitability of the crew quarters, and crew activities/maintenance experiments were examined on Skylab 2 through 4 to better understand the living and working aspects of life in space.

Reference

• Skylab: Command service module systems handbook, CSM 116 - 119 (PDF) April 1972
• Skylab Saturn 1B flight manual (PDF) September 1972
• NASA Skylab Chronology
• Marshall Space Flight Center Skylab Summary
• Skylab 3 Characteristics SP-4012 NASA HISTORICAL DATA BOOK
• Source: [1]

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