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Old 07-04-2021, 08:19 PM
gary
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Philip K. Chapman - the first Australian born astronaut, dead at 86

ABC News has reported that Philip K. Chapman has passed away in Arizona at age 86.

Philip Chapman attended Parramatta High and was selected as a scientist-astronaut by NASA
in August 1967.

At a period when being selected as a NASA astronaut meant you were an extraordinarily
gifted individual, what was even more extraordinary was that Chapman was born in
Australia. in fact, he was the first NASA astronaut not born in the United States.

Parramatta High was the first public co-educational high school in New South Wales and I
attended there myself. Chapman's name appeared multiple times as dux on the school honour
boards for the final year he attended, attesting to what an outstanding scholar he was.

In fact Chapman's exploits both scholastically and as an athlete were the stuff of legend.

During National Service, he learnt to fly and he went on to earn a B.S. in science at
Sydney University.

At short notice, he found himself on his way to Antarctica where he was stationed at a
remote two-man base to study aurora and radio physics.

Once during a gale, the wall of the hut blew down and the boxes of tin food went
scattering over the ice field. Chapman said upon retrieving them all the labels had peeled
off, so after that, whatever was for dinner came as a surprise.

Being in isolation for two winters proved good experience in later being selected as an
astronaut.

Chapman moved to Canada in 1960 working on flight simulators before going to MIT where he
gained a masters in aeronautics and astronautics and a doctorate in instrumentation.

After gaining US citizenship, he was selected as an astronaut and he underwent jet fighter
pilot training with the USAF and training with the US Navy Underwater School.

He served as the Apollo 14 Mission Scientist but unfortunately never got to fly in space.

As is well documented, NASA astronauts were divided into those who were pilot-astronauts,
most of whom had been test and combat fighter pilots, and those who were
scientist-astronauts.

Deke Slayton had been put in charge of who flew and had a distinct bias against the
scientist-astronauts. As far as Deke was concerned, none of them would ever fly. The only
one who did during the Apollo era was geologist Harrison Schmitt on the last Apollo 17
mission.

Philip Chapman came to Parramatta High in November 1970 for the opening of the sports field.
He was a tall, dashing figure, smoked a pipe and sported his astronaut's badge - a rare
thing in the world to own then. I got to shake his hand, have a photo taken with him and
he signed a book for me.

One of the great things about Philips's legacy was that it said you could grow up in the
western suburbs of Sydney, attend a co-ed public school and go on to achieve incredible
things.
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Last edited by gary; 08-04-2021 at 11:44 AM.
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Old 07-04-2021, 08:21 PM
gary
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An 11 minute story about Philip Chapman that appeared on ABC TV in 1969
https://youtu.be/d7Ix9JkqQ_E
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Old 07-04-2021, 08:38 PM
DarkArts
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That's quite a story. Sounds like a heck of a guy, may he rest in peace. Even if he never got to fly in space, being there at that time, being part of the Apollo program, must have been the experience of a hundred lifetimes.

Thanks for posting that - I would never have known.
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Old 07-04-2021, 09:02 PM
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multiweb (Marc)
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Great write up Gary. I happened to see an ABC report about him around lunchtime today. Like most people I had no idea who he was or what he achieved before they mentioned his passing. It brings it even closer to home to hear he went to school in Parramatta. Must be quite special for you to have known and met him. Some characters seem larger than life. I remember talking to Alex Cherney one night at BSG about 10 years ago when he had won his first competition and a trip to the canary islands at the big telescope. The event coincided with another venue and a few Russians and American astronauts were there. It also was Alex's birthday. The organisers knew it so they arranged a cake for him on the day and he even had Neil Armstrong singing happy birthday during the gathering. Imagine that. So I asked him if he shook his hand. When he said yes I shook his. That's as close as I'll ever get.
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Old 08-04-2021, 10:37 AM
gary
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First Aussie: Dr. Philip Chapman, Apollo’s Astronaut from “Down Under,”

Quote:
Originally Posted by Emily Carney | Jun 13, 2020 | National Space Society
In Scientist-Astronauts, Chapman held nothing back: “To put it plainly, it seemed to me that Deke had no understanding that leadership is a two-way street, and no vision of spaceflight beyond keeping it as his own little fiefdom. Furthermore, he apparently thought that the only legitimate purpose of a space mission was flight testing a vehicle; that science in space was a worthless distraction, and that scientists were inherently unacceptable as astronauts, regardless of their flying skills.” To be fair, Chapman wasn’t the first astronaut or spaceflight personality to disagree with Slayton’s decisions around this time period (for example, his decision to let Alan Shepard command Apollo 14 has been criticized by some as Mercury 7 cronyism).

During this time, Chapman would face more opposition from Slayton when he tried to design scientific duties for astronaut Stuart Roosa, Apollo 14’s command module pilot. According to Chapman, Roosa approached him asking for a list of more scientific tasks he could undertake while he orbited the Moon during his crewmates’ EVAs. Chapman suggested an attempt to image Kordelewski clouds (faint clouds believed to exist at Lagrangian points L4 and L5); he stated, “All [Roosa] had to do was to point a camera in the right direction at the right time, and he might make a major scientific discovery.” However, Slayton was not happy with this idea, and Chapman reported, “he carpeted Stu and me.” While Chapman argued that focusing on formal experiments left Roosa ample spare time in which he could undertake meaningful scientific work, Slayton was unmoved, and even stated rather punitively that Roosa would be removed from the flight and banned from other flights if he did impromptu experiments.

Slayton soon found another hill to die upon: according to Chapman, he sent a memo to all astronauts stating that TV reporters judged a mission’s success by its number of completed objectives. It became painfully obvious to Chapman that by limiting scientific objectives, the number of overall objectives was smaller and more achievable, signifying “mission success” to the media. Here, Chapman’s Australian “insubordination” (his word) would surface again: “I was dumbfounded by the idea that the way to increase interest in spaceflight was to minimize the useful results…I told Deke what I thought of his new policy.” Ironically, the same outspokenness and boldness that had likely impressed the astronaut selection board in 1967 – and his astronaut group colleagues, including O’Leary – now seemed to work against him. And within 18 months, the cancellation of a space station that held promise for Chapman would spell what he viewed as the death knell of his astronaut career.
Part 1
https://space.nss.org/first-aussie-d...nder-part-one/

Part 2
https://space.nss.org/first-aussie-d...nder-part-two/

Part 3
https://space.nss.org/first-aussie-d...er-part-three/
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Old 08-04-2021, 10:45 AM
gary
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Whilst working at Phillips in Sydney, Chapman received a fortuitous
phone call that at short notice would send him on an incredible
journey. It would be amazing to be given this opportunity even today, but at age 22 in 1958, what an adventure!

Quote:
Originally Posted by Emily Carney | Jun 13, 2020 | First Aussie: Dr. Philip Chapman

One morning just before Christmas, I received a phone call in my lab at Philips from Fred Jacka, the chief scientist at ANARE in Melbourne, He said that one of their physicists for 1958 had broken his leg. Could I fill in? Damn right.

Chapman had roughly ten minutes to break the news to his boss at Dutch Philips, and also had to break the news to a girlfriend:

The ship would sail in a week, and I would need some orientation, issue of gear, etc. – so could I possibly be in Melbourne that evening? A plane ticket would be waiting at the airport. So I gave ten minutes notice to my boss and went to see my girlfriend (who also worked at Philips) to tell her I would be back in 15 months. She was not pleased. Ten days later I was on iceberg watch on the bridge of the MV Thala Dan, in the monstrous seas of the Southern Ocean. I was 22, and I had never been out of sight of land.

There were 29 of us at Mawson, all male. My job was to study the aurora australis. To that end, a two-man camp had been established the previous year at Taylor Glacier, 50 miles west of Mawson. The idea was to take stereo photos of the aurora (which is at an altitude of about 60 miles), using a camera mounted on a theodolite. I spent most of the winter there.

My companion was replaced about every two weeks, using one of two DH Beavers at Mawson. They landed on the sea-ice, usually about a mile from shore.

A principal attraction was that most of the nameless nunataks (rocky hills) nearby had never been climbed, and a first ascent got your name on it (mine is called Chapman Ridge).

Chapman also was able to interact with some of the region’s natural habitats in ways that could not be done at present time:

Another tourist attraction was that the camp was in a gully adjacent to an Emperor penguin rookery with about 5,000 birds. Like almost every animal in Antarctica they were very tame. I have a photo somewhere of Henry Fischer, our cook from Mawson, standing on an actual soapbox, giving a political rant to the penguins, in German (Henry was Swiss). They were not impressed.

Access to the rookery is now restricted to biologists, but we had no such constraints. I don’t believe socializing with the Emperors ever did them any harm.

The original hut at Taylor was blown away in a blizzard, so we lived in a packing crate, about seven by seven by nine feet. It was guyed down to anchors in the rocks, but it bounced around a lot when the wind got up. There was no daylight near midwinter, the temperature was about 40 degrees Celsius below zero, and the wind was often over 100 knots. It was a formative experience.

The aurora was a mystery when I went to Antarctica, but the first US satellite, Explorer 1, discovered the Van Allen Belts while I was there. Physicists everywhere understood the lights in the sky – except for those of us who had been observing them, out of touch in Antarctica.
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Old 08-04-2021, 11:39 AM
Startrek (Martin)
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Gary,
Brilliant post
What a remarkable Australian
I followed the Apollo missions as a space kid and teenager and never heard of an Australian Apollo Astronaut as you always thought they were all American
My Aunt moved to Los Angles in 1946 ,married a US marine and started a new life over there. She was lucky enough to land a job with Rockwell then Rocketdyne as a PA to one of the big Managers.She would always send me Apollo merchandise during the late 60’s early 70’s.Family here in Australia said my Aunt met Neil Armstrong but I thinks it’s just a bit of family folk law , maybe he visited one of the facilities and my Aunt waved to him from her office window ???
So I suppose I had a family link to Project Apollo
Also my neighbour 2 doors up in Sydney is the cousin of Paul Scully Power , the first Australian astronaut to orbit the earth. He was mission specialist in the Shuttle program on STS41

Thanks for sharing this story about our own “Apollo Astronaut”
Thanks also for the links

Martin
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Old 08-04-2021, 12:32 PM
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lazjen (Chris)
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Gary, thanks for the write up/story. I never knew about this at all.
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Old 08-04-2021, 12:45 PM
gary
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A snapshot of my brother and I meeting Philip Chapman on 28 Nov 1970.

I was eleven years old at the time.

Parramatta High was founded in 1913 and was the first co-educational
public high school in New South Wales.

Chapman had attended in the 1950's and was the head of the
school cadet corps. Even during my time there, the school had a walk-in
armoury behind a thick steel door and an arsenal of .303's and an
Owen machine-gun. A legacy of its founding during the Great War.
Funny to think of a public school today being supplied weapons by the
government

When Chapman attended Sydney University he joined the university
RAAF corps and learnt to fly in Tiger Moths. An experience
that would no doubt been another tick in the box for astronaut
selection. He went on to training in jet fighters.

I would like to stress that Parramatta High was a public school.
Boys and girls were equal, in the same class rooms and playgrounds.
The demographic of Parramatta was that kids came from families
with varying backgrounds and it was all very egalitarian.
Demographers would say most came from working
class or middle class backgrounds.

So when Chapman visited as an ex-student for the opening of the sports
field that the school had been granted a lease for from the Parramatta Park Trust,
the context was that it was 1970, the prior year we had only just landed
on the moon and this is a guy who is in training for the planned extended
Apollo flights.

Amazing in itself.

But he has gone from a public school in the western suburbs of Sydney
to NASA as an astronaut when astronauts were a rarity.
Thousands would apply whenever NASA put out the call and only an elite few
would be selected.

So it said to me at the time you could be a kid from the western suburbs of
Sydney attending a state run school and yet the sky was the limit.

And it says exactly the same today for any kid growing up in the
suburbs of Australian cities or out in the country. Anything is possible.
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