Science: Station MOON

The U.S. Army does not admit officially that it plans to shoot rockets at the moon. Congress might think it frivolous, though the moon is the handiest gull’s-eye for extra-atmospheric target practice. In spite of the Army’s reticence, Dr. J. A. Hutcheson, associate director of the Westinghouse Research Laboratories, has heard unofficially that the Army’s first moon rocket may be fired in 18 months. This seemed optimistic, considering the difficulties. But last week Dr. Hutcheson was excitedly designing a radio station to be rocketed to the moon, where it would broadcast back to earth.

A 100-watt ultrashort-wave transmitter could weigh less than 50 lbs., said Dr. Hutcheson, and its signal would be strong enough to reach from moon to earth, even without the advantage of a directional beam. Power could come from batteries. The whole apparatus would have to be designed to deal with the vacuum of space, and designed to operate both in extreme cold and in the high temperature (250° F.) of the lunar midday. To Dr. Hutcheson such difficulties were minor.

More serious was the problem of landing on the moon without smashing the radio to smithereens. Parachutes would not help, for the moon has little or no atmosphere. Dr. Hutcheson’s solution: a tiny radio in the nose of the rocket. Working like the proximity fuses in antiaircraft shells, it would detect the approach of the moon’s surface and fire “braking rockets” at the proper distance. Shooting their power forward, they would counteract the moon’s gravitational pull (one-sixth as strong as the earth’s), and allow the whole apparatus to make a sufficiently gentle landing.

To prolong the life of its batteries, station MOON would be clocked to broadcast only one minute in each hour. After landing, it would settle down to reporting local conditions. Compressing their findings on the radio wave, sensitive instruments (already highly developed by meteorologists) would feel for moisture and atmosphere. Thermometers would measure the violent temperature changes during the moon’s month-long “day.” Other instruments might report the effects of cosmic rays upon the moon. Carried back to earth by the radio wave, such information would give a new view of the sun’s radiation, prime mover of life on earth.

Neither the Army nor Dr. Hutcheson was thinking of rocketing passengers to the moon. But Robert Lee Farnsworth, president of the U.S. Rocket Society, was practically (in imagination) an earth-moon commuter already. He could see one serious obstacle only: “I’d like to be on the first flight,” said he, “but my wife gets pretty indignant with me.”