I guess what is *meant* is that Carnarvon was one of the few places where NASA had located a tracking station of the Manned Space Flight Network. Anyone with a view of the Moon could track it.

It was put at Carnarvon for a couple of reasons –

– partly to be away from big cities with the RFI,

– but mainly to be in a spot which would see an Apollo spacecraft on its first and second orbits (and maybe one or two more, depending on the launch azimuth from Kennedy Space Center).

Carnarvon had a crucial role in checking all was OK with the spacecraft before the 3rd stage engine was re-lit for Trans Lunar Injection. This took place either over Central Australia (in which case Carnarvon, or an ARIA aircraft gave the go signal) or over the Pacific (in which case one of the tracking ships or ARIA would do it) depending on where the Moon was for a particular mission.

Carnarvon was also sited where it was for the earlier Gemini missions, since they used a similar launch azimuth (i.e. since Cape Canavaral is north of the equator, the missions were launched a little south of east – and Gemini and Apollo used a different launch azimuth from the Mercury missions, for which Muchea Tracking Station was perfectly located…)

Please see the map…

http://honeysucklecreek.net/images/Apollo_11/maps/A11_Earth_Orbit_Chart_Rev3.jpg

with various orbits marked depending on the launch azimuth. If the launch had been delayed, the launch azimuth would have been adjusted to account for the Moon moving in its orbit…

Once the NASA Carnarvon station was operational, the poor comms to the USA was a bit of a problem. In the early days, it was all via PMG landline. See

http://honeysucklecreek.net/other_stations/carnarvon/Hamelin_Pool_GT1.html

After that problem, a trop scatter system was set up to link to Geraldton, but building the OTC station was the real solution!

I should mention that I’ve also been working on the history of the Muchea Tracking Station, which was built specifically to support Mercury. I was delighted to be able to organise a message from John Glenn for the 50th anniversary a couple of months back.

See http://www.muchea.net/

or http://honeysucklecreek.net/other_stations/muchea/

I have recently borrowed some Department of Supply footage from Tidbinbilla tracking station and am working through that. There’s some footage of Muchea (and Carnarvon too) – with a couple of brief shots of Perth in 1961. Hopefully I’ll have those together before too long.

Best wishes

Colin

Footnote: Much appreciate Colin’s help on this matter.

A reminder that Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin will visit WA in June 22nd and 23rd this year, to open the Carnarvon Space and Technology Museum, where Phil Youd is the president. http://www.carnarvonmuseum.org.au/

Is this just some uninformed PR hype ?

Alan Gilham

[Buzz Aldrin will visit WA in June 22nd and 23rd this year, to open the Carnarvon Space and Technology Museum, where Phil Youd is the president.

http://www.carnarvonmuseum.org.au/

Phil also runs a local Cararvon radio station]