GBH Openvault

NOVA; To the Moon; Interview with James W. Head III, Professor of Geological Sciences at Brown University, part 2 of 3

Part of To the Moon Interviews.

1998

James W. Head III, Professor of Geological Sciences at Brown University, who studies volcanoes on Earth and other planets, in interviewed about the specific missions of the Apollo program. Head talks about training the astronauts and the growth of understanding between the scientists and astronauts, as well as the historical, political, and scientific reasons why the Apollo program was conducted. Head recounts the initiative that the astronauts took in naming features of the moon after family members and the Apollo scientists, and describes the challenges to the Apollo 14 mission, including the landing site and the rover, and describes Dave Scott's exploratory sense on Apollo 15 as "very strong". Head also describes the process of working in the back room during missions and communicating with astronauts in space, and talks about the surprise upon Apollo 15's discovery that their landing site was not volcanic, but was full of impact craters. Apollo 17 almost did not happen because the canyon they landed in was very narrow, and Head advocates for the future of using robots to continue lunar exploration, but acknowledges that at the time there was a need for human exploration. The interview ends with Head's instructions to the astronauts of Apollo 17 to pick up specific types of rocks that may have proven scientifically significant.

Series

NOVA

Program

To the Moon

Program Number

2610

Title

Interview with James W. Head III, Professor of Geological Sciences at Brown University, part 2 of 3

Series Description

NOVA is a general-interest documentary series that addresses a single science issue each week. Billed as "science adventures for curious grown-ups" when it first aired in March, 1974, NOVA continues to offer an informative and entertaining approach to a challenging subject. It is also one of television's most acclaimed series, having won every major television award, most of them many times over.

Program Description

Alan Binder, former Principal Investigator of NASA's Lunar Prospector mission, is interviewed about the Lunar Prospector. Binder says that if moon travel became viable again, he would want to go to the moon, but says that in order to get financial and public support for space exploration, scientists need to sell the science of the moon. Another option, according to Binder, is to make travel to the moon commercially viable, and lists many benefits of going to the moon, including using it as a fuel source, or colonizing the surface for human habitation (audio cuts out from 00:07:30 - 00:09:00). Binder explains the work of the Lunar Prospector and talks about the necessity of having computers to do a lot of the work. On Apollo, Binder calls the program the most significant event of the 21st century, and talks about the roles of the Apollo program, the Clementine spacecraft, and hte Lunar Prospector. The interview ends with Binder's views on his relationship with NASA, which he characterizes as being needlessly bound up in beaurocracy and red tape.

Duration

0:23:00

Asset Type

Raw video

Media Type

Video

Subjects

Apollo

Moon

American history

Astronaut

Space

Gemini

Creators

WGBH Educational Foundation (Producing Organization)

Contributors

Head, James W., 1941- (Interviewee)

Rights Summary

Rights Holder: WGBH Educational Foundation

Citation

Chicago: “NOVA; To the Moon; Interview with James W. Head III, Professor of Geological Sciences at Brown University, part 2 of 3,” 1998, GBH Archives, accessed April 23, 2024, http://openvault.wgbh.org/catalog/V_D717A812B6B14142804830A83AF7DFFF.

MLA: “NOVA; To the Moon; Interview with James W. Head III, Professor of Geological Sciences at Brown University, part 2 of 3.” 1998. GBH Archives. Web. April 23, 2024. <http://openvault.wgbh.org/catalog/V_D717A812B6B14142804830A83AF7DFFF>.

APA: NOVA; To the Moon; Interview with James W. Head III, Professor of Geological Sciences at Brown University, part 2 of 3. Boston, MA: GBH Archives. Retrieved from http://openvault.wgbh.org/catalog/V_D717A812B6B14142804830A83AF7DFFF