Made in 1967, this Aeronautics and Space Report was produced by NASA. Just ten years after the launch of Sputnik, this film shows some of the preparations for the Apollo 11 moon landing. First, the Surveyor probes are shown landing on the Moon and making photographic surveys. The Lunar Orbiters are also shown — 3 of these craft circled the Moon to create photographic maps of the surface. The Apollo 4 mission is also shown, with a successful test of the Saturn V rocket. In the wake of the loss of the three Apollo 1 astronauts, this film shows (at the 4 minute mark) some of the safeguards put into place to prevent a future incident. Other unmanned space explorers shown include the Biosatellite, the Orbiting Solar Observatory series, and more. The Atlas-Agena rocket is shown launching communications and weather forecast satellites. This includes new satellites for communications with aircraft over the oceans, which were often out of range of ground signals for an hour or more. Also seen is the Mariner V program run through the Jet Propulsion Lab, with William Pickering shown discussing the probe at the 9 minute mark. The San Marco rocket is seen, with a launch platform from near Kenya, is seen at the 10 minute mark. Sounding rocket launches are seen as well from Wallops Island. The XB-70 supersonic aircraft is seen at the 10:40 mark, the F-111 with its variable shaped wings, and the hypersonic X-15 rocket plane which was retired in 1967. The X-15 was pushed toward Mach 7 in a specially-coated X-15 (which here appears white). An HL-10 Lifting Body is also seen being tested at Edwards Air Force Base. The film ends with studies of civil aviation including work to diminish noise from jet aircraft.

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This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD and 2k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com