With respect to all of the great stuff America has accomplished, the Saturn V rocket is probably our ultimate bad ass hot rod. Yes, we have more refined and technologically advanced rockets today, but like a twin blown 427 Shelby Cobra, nothing will ever be quite as bad ass as the Saturn V. Launched 13 times between 1967 and 1973, the Saturn V never failed to shoot its occupants into space. This is an amazing testament to a time when things were all built by hand, computers still took up spaces the size of small buildings, and the vast majority of the work was done with slide rules. The Saturn V was the biggest and most powerful rocket that humans ever successfully flew. It was a long way to go in a short time between the dubious Redstone program and the Saturn V. We marvel at the “speed” of technology today with advances largely in communication and computing devices. We’d argue all day that it was far more impressive to watch the “speed” of technology advance during the Space Race when the stakes were a hell of a lot higher than figuring out how to get a restaurant app to load quicker.
In this video you’ll see a tile screen featuring 13 of the said tiles. Each of those tiles is a video screen featuring one of the Saturn V launches. The audio feed is from Apollo Four launch and it features sound from both mission control and from Walter Cronkite. We love the excitement and joy in Cronkite’s voice as he describes and experiences the launch. The dude is giddy and clearly understands what he is seeing means something. It means the dawn of a new era in space travel for mankind, brought to us on the back of the mighty Saturn V.
As much as we like to revel in the power produced by nitro burning engines or huge turbo mills, those are but a spec on a gnat’s ass as compared to what you’ll see in the video. Pay attention to the mission control guys talking after launch, especially when they start talking about the velocity of the rocket. How fast is fast? 10,000ft per second is pretty damned fast in our book and s few brave guys were feeling every inch of it atop the rocket in every one of these launches.
We’re not going to lament bygone days or anything like that. The Saturn V stands on its own as an awesome cultural achievement. Seeing it go to work 13-times without a failure in this video is icing on the cake!
Thanks to Dwayne for the tip!
PRESS PLAY BELOW TO SEE EVERY SATURN V ROCKET LAUNCH AT ONCE!
EACH of the S5 engine fuel pumps was a turbine pump – gas from a small burn chamber turned the pumps that sent the fuel + oxidizer to the main motors .
Each pump made 50,000 hp !!!