【誰にともなしに、独り言レス―その2971】
そもそもはアポロ 1 で事故死したガス・グリソムこそがファースト・マンと目されていたとか何とか、よく目にするがネタもとのディーク・スレイトンに解説して頂くと―
Deke! U.S. Manned Space の一節
With the success of Apollo 8, it was time to name the Apollo 11 crew. On the planning charts this might very well turn out to be the first manned lunar landing. But no one knew for sure. The lunar module was still a couple of months away from a test flight. There was the Apollo 10 lunar orbit mission, too. Some people were thinking that if 9 went well, we should skip the F mission (going down to just above the surface) and have the 10 crew do the landing.So it wasn't just a cut and dried decision as to who should make the first steps on the moon. If I had to select on that basis, my first choice would have been Gus (Grissom), which both Chris Kraft and Bob Gilruth seconded. With Gus dead, the most likely candidates were Frank Borman and Jim McDivitt. I had full confidence in Tom Stafford, Neil Armstrong,and Pete Conrad, too. The system had put them in the right place at the righttime. Any one of them might very well make the first landing.Jim McDivitt was still tied up with the lunar module flight, but here I had Frank and his whole crew available, and given that they had already made a lunar orbit flight, of all the astronauts they were clearly in the best position to train up on the landing procedures.There were two other things to keep in mind. Frank had been away from home pretty steadily for almost two years. Hewas tired of the grind and not happy about what it had done to his family life.He had already told me he was ready to move on.
