The United States launched its first space station, Skylab, from Launch Complex 39A at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida May 14, 1973, at 12:30 p.m. CDT.
The Saturn V rocket (SA-513), originally built for the canceled Apollo 18 mission, served as the launch vehicle for Skylab and marked the final flight of the powerful Saturn V.
Engineers at McDonnell Douglas modified an S-IVB-212 third stage, originally built for the Saturn IB program, a medium-lift launch vehicle, into what was officially named the Skylab Orbital Workshop.
Let’s go back to the launch of Skylab, where NASA reported all as nominal (proceeding as planned) during the liftoff.
However, 63 seconds later, aerodynamic forces tore the micrometeoroid shield away from the Skylab module, which exposed the space station to the sun’s intense heat once it reached Earth orbit.
Also, as the shield broke loose, it became entangled with one of Skylab’s two main solar arrays (solar wings) and completely tore the second array off the space station.
The debris from the shield had jammed the remaining solar array, preventing it from deploying and leaving Skylab critically underpowered.
With no sunshield and minimal power, internal temperatures inside Skylab soared to 126 degrees Fahrenheit, threatening to ruin food, photographic film, sensitive equipment, and risking the release of toxic gases that would make the space station uninhabitable.
The first crew to Skylab was scheduled to launch May 15; however, their mission was delayed until May 25, as it changed from a routine flight into an emergency rescue of the space station.
NASA engineers needed time to devise a recovery plan and train the astronauts to carry it out during their Skylab 2 mission to the space station.
The crew of Skylab 2 launched May 25, 1973, aboard an Apollo command module attached to a Saturn IB, a smaller, medium-lift rocket used to obtain Earth orbit.
The astronaut crew consisted of commander Charles “Pete” Conrad Jr., science pilot Joseph P. Kerwin, and pilot Paul J. Weitz.
Upon reaching the space station, a fly-around confirmed their worst fears: the shield was gone, one solar array was missing, and the other appeared hopelessly jammed.
The astronauts’ first extravehicular activity (EVA) attempt to free the stuck array was unsuccessful.
The following day, the astronauts donned gas masks and made their way into the sweltering hot Skylab workshop cabin.
They used a narrow airlock to deploy a type of parasol umbrella outside of the space station, which they unfurled to provide shade for Skylab, reducing the interior temperature to 75 degrees Fahrenheit.
However, the space station still faced significant power shortages.
Astronauts Conrad and Kerwin conducted a three-hour, 25-minute EVA outside of Skylab June 7.
They used a 25-foot pole equipped with a cable cutter in an attempt to slice through the aluminum strap that was restraining the solar array in place.
With the solar array partially opened and its hinge frozen by the cold of space, the astronauts attached a rope to it and, with all their strength, forced the array to spring fully open.
Skylab flew with one fully extended wing.
Mission Control soon confirmed that the newly freed solar wing was generating substantial power, providing the station with enough electricity to sustain itself.
“Pete and his crew saved the Skylab,” said fellow astronaut Tom Stafford, who commanded the Apollo 10 Moon mission in May of 1969.
The Skylab 2 crew went on to complete a 28-day mission, which also set a record for spaceflight endurance.
Skylab featured two docking ports to facilitate a crew rescue in the event of an Apollo command module failure.
NASA’s contingency plan included launching a Saturn IB rocket with a modified five-seat command service module (CM-119) to carry a two-person crew along with the three stranded astronauts from Skylab.
Skylab operated for two years, supporting three crewed missions totaling 171 days.
The final crew left the space station Feb. 8, 1974 after boosting it into a higher orbit, with the hope that it would remain stable until at least 1983, when a future space shuttle mission could revisit it.
Unfortunately, increased solar activity caused more drag on Skylab, leading to an earlier-than-expected orbital decay, two years before the first shuttle launch.
The 84.5-ton Skylab space station made its fiery descent into Earth’s atmosphere July 11, 1979.
NASA had announced that people in the Northern Hemisphere would be able to see Skylab’s final orbit.
I stood outside Wednesday, July 11, 1979, at 5:30 a.m., looking up into the early morning light, and I saw Skylab streak across the sky like a bright star.
Most of Skylab fell into the Indian Ocean, but some debris reached sparsely populated areas of western Australia.
No injuries were reported, but the Shire of Esperance, a local government area in western Australia, humorously fined NASA $400 for littering; NASA did not pay the fine.
The July 12, 1979, Minneapolis Star Tribune reported that 10 airline flights in the Minneapolis air traffic control area were delayed during the re-entry of Skylab.
The Esperance Municipal Museum exhibits several components from Skylab, including a large oxygen tank, a food storage freezer, and a section of the hatch.