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Marconi Veterans Association Newsletter 2015
‘Apollo in Ascension’ must be on time
John M Brown
Ascension Island, 8º 0'S, 14º 15´W in the South Atlantic, showing the desolate terrain of the satellite communication site
In 1965, I was Chief of Systems in Bill Quill’s Special Projects Group, Radar Division, New Street: our principal focus at the time was compiling the company’s technical and commercial input to the Hughes International Consortium bid for the £110M Project, NADGE (NATO Air Defence Ground Environment). The consortium had its offices in Paris (where NATO was at that time), so all of us were travelling regularly to Paris for meetings. Our Divisional Manager was Dr Tom Straker, who also had been following with interest the progress being made with communication satellites operating in synchronous orbit, pointing the way to global communications. Many readers will recall the design and development of the three SCAT (Satellite Communication Air- Transportable stations) for UK MoD, project-managed by Alec Kravis, which had to operate with random-orbit satellites, and were built around this time.
Although Dr Straker knew I was heavily involved with the NADGE bid, he tasked me to seek out any openings for the company in this possible new market of satellite communication ground stations, having already participated in some of the military study work carried out by the Baddow Research Laboratories, Hughes, and British Aircraft Corporation, which ultimately led to the UK’s SKYNET, and to Marconi’s provision of the central ground station at RAF Oakhanger, Hampshire.
I had visited Dick Cannon, Cable & Wireless’ Deputy Engineer-in Chief, during July to see if they were contemplating becoming Earth Station operators; however, their board had considered that it was too early at present. A month later, on a Friday afternoon, Dr Straker received a telephone call from its Managing Director to tell him that NASA had asked them to provide an Earth Station on Ascension Island urgently, as part of the Apollo ‘man on the moon’ project. Bids were being invited, and the tendering time would be only three weeks. An initial meeting was held on the Saturday morning, and Dr Straker tasked me to be responsible for co-ordinating the Company’s tender; the technical documentation would be available on the Monday. Having distributed this to the key engineers, I went across to Bridge Works, the company’s printing plant to see Peter Bass, the Superintendent. As always, Peter was most helpful and agreed to accept the tight timescale, even though he was as busy as ever. I held the first meeting on the Tuesday: everybody was enthusiastic, and appreciated the importance of winning this prestigious contract. Our principal competitor was likely to be World Satellite Terminals, a consortium set up by GEC, AEI, Plessey, and STC. The next two and a half weeks were hectic, but the material flowed in and was passed through to Peter Bass, after editing by me. The cost estimates started to come together as well, as the designers settled on their preferred plans. I delivered the twelve sets of tender documents to Mercury House before the deadline of noon on 9 September, 1965. After Cable & Wireless’ scrutiny of the bids, including clarification meetings, a month later we received the momentous news that Marconi’s had won the contract. At his own personal expense, Dr Straker held a ‘thank you’ lunch at Marconi College, and invited everyone who had contributed to the successful bid, including Peter Bass who had printed the entire document
Implementation
The jetty at George Town, Ascension Island, where all the station equipment was brought ashore
The Marconi design was for a 42ft parabolic reflector, fully steerable in both azimuth and elevation, mounted on a 15ft tripod gantry (the turntable and gantry being similar to those supplied to NATO for the Early Warning Chain). Because of the need for high reliability, the transmitters and receivers were duplicated. The shortness of the timescale and the remoteness of Ascension Island necessitated careful planning of the project between the equipment designers, the manufacturing organization, the installation planners, and Cable & Wireless Chief Architect’s Department who were responsible for the buildings, antenna foundations, and main power supply. Within Marconi, a special management team was formed, under Iain Butler, with overall responsibility for the complete project. As well as the Marconi factories, English Electric Accrington made a major manufacturing contribution to the project. Some idea of the achievements in production can be gauged by the fact that the entire station was put together for the first time at Rivenhall, seven months after the start of the project. This trial run proved invaluable since any snags could be cleared by the design engineers on the spot. Customer confidence was also established when the new station communicated through Early Bird, specially released to the Company on two occasions. HRH The Duke of Edinburgh also came to see the installation during tests.
The last petals going up to complete the dish in August 1966. In the foreground are Don Reed, David Oliver, and Dick Muir.
At the end of July 1966, the installation, having competed testing satisfactorily, was dismantled, carefully packed and crated and transported by a chartered ship from Harwich to Georgetown, Ascension Island. In early August a team of engineers departed from England for the island by a special charter flight to be ready to receive the equipment on its arrival. The speedy re-erection of the station was assisted by all the interconnecting cables between the antenna structure and the operations building being able to be dropped straight into prepared ducts, thereby eliminating the need to re-terminate cables, with all the inherent chances of faulty joints.
The station was satisfactorily commissioned and operationally demonstrated to Cable & Wireless using Early Bird, and handed over on 19 September, 1966, just eleven months from the commencement of the project. Thanks to the full steering capability of the antenna, the station was the first to lock-on, track, and communicate using the errant INTELSAT II Pacific satellite which had failed to achieve synchronous orbit, and was following a 12-hour elliptical orbit. Clear speech was transmitted from Ascension to Andover, Maine using the satellite. Perhaps the most significant achievement for the UK was that the Ascension Island station was the first to become operational in the Apollo network, although it was the last station to receive a contract to proceed.
In June 1967, this photo of the completed satellite communications earth station on Ascension Island was taken by Richard Raikes, then the company’s Publicity Manager, when in Ascension on the C&W visit.
Apollo in Ascension - a film made on behalf of C & W - parts 1 2 3 v2
An item about the film made by C&W - note no mention of Marconi
Another Memory
John Brand
My recollection is that the Apollo Satellite Tracking System included the communications link between Ascension Island and a synchronous satellite for the Apollo moon mission.
I worked on the Apollo satellite tracker during the latter part of 1965 and into 1966 under the management of Ian Butler. The system consisted of a 40-foot dish with a spinning Cassegrain sub-reflector and two transmitter/receiver cabin modules mounted on the back of the dish. On the ground a container was fitted with the servo control and drive systems for the azimuth and elevation drive motors.
The antenna and the associated transmitter/receiver cabins were assembled and tested at Rivenhall atop a 3322 pivot mount after the old S247 back-to-back antenna had been removed.
After pre-commissioning the Rivenhall system was broken down into large sub-assemblies and shipped to the island in late June.
On August 4th 1966 the engineering team departed from Gatwick on a chartered Brittania and met up with the Field Services crew the next day.
The on site team consisted of the following people:
Site Manager: Don Reed and assistant Ray Corduff.
For Field Services: Doug Clements,Johnny Thompson, Harry Wilson, Peter Bowket, Billy Ash, George Costley, Alec Hall, Paul Foy, Frank Quin and Brian Marjoram
For Engineering: Steve Mullen, Ken Walker, Barry Gammon, Cliff "Bugs" Barham, Cliff Hughes, Steve Grainger, John Bryant, Dick Muir, Mick Cranmer, Jim "The Runner" Selby, Anthony Wakeling, David Oliver and John Brand. (Don Rainbird followed later)
The development and installation of Apollo was, in part, documented in the "Marconi Companies and their People" Volume 16 number 9 (April 1966) and number 12 (July 1966) and Volume 17 number 4 (November 1966).
I have some old 2.25" square transparencies taken on the island.
This all brings back memories of a great experience and happy days with a crowd of engineers and riggers some of whom are, unfortunately, no longer with us.
Input from Ian Brighton Ground Segment Engineering Manager ( ret’d)
I recall my manager of the Ground Segment Division of Marconi Space Systems at Portsmouth telling me that under Marconi Radar he and his team from Gateshead supplied the Antennas used on Ascension Island. His name was Andrew Smith and his team including Alistair MacGregor and Hamish Duncan were responsible for the supply and commissioning of the equipment deliverable to the end customer.
Fiftieth Anniversary
The UK Space Agency has published a set of "Memories" for download - ours concerning the satellite communications station on Ascension Island appears about two-thirds of the way through. Also a related exhibition has been mounted at the Telegraph Museum Porthcurno.
Cable & Wireless Pensioners Association Newsletter Spring 2019
We have been given permission to include two articles from this journal:
Our contribution to the NASA Apollo programme by Richard Selby
On July 20th 1969, Neil Armstrong took “One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind”, becoming the first human to set foot on the moon. This year it will be 50 years since that event, and the following articles contain personal reflections on that event, which I found very exciting at the time.
It was in the 1960s that Cable & Wireless was awarded a contract with NASA (the American National Aeronautics and Space Administration) to provide communications services in support of their ambition to land men on the moon. This involved participation by Company staff working in Bermuda and on Ascension Island, as well as a huge effort from Head Office. It also involved the Marconi Company in at least two areas: designing and building the Earth Station on Ascension, and provision of HF transmitting and receiving equipment (including antennae) to Bermuda.
My first posting as a consolidator in 1968 was to the transmitting station at St George's in Bermuda, following which I was transferred to the HF receiving station, which included the “NASCOM” department dedicated to this project. I also spent time at the coaxial cable terminal and in the ITMC (International Transmission and Maintenance Centre), all on the same site. Bermuda was chosen due to its significant position, 665 miles off the US mainland, and 900 miles downrange from the path of any spacecraft launched from Cape Kennedy in Florida. It was vitally important that NASA’s mission control was able to track the launched vehicle, and monitor data and voice communications throughout the entire mission. This was especially important during the launch phase, and until it reached earth orbital height. This involved keeping in touch with it for the whole of its flight across the Atlantic. The tracking and monitoring communications was achieved in stages. Firstly, the launch was monitored from the ground in Florida, then it was followed by a NASA tracking station in Bermuda, then it was monitored from USS Vanguard, a tracking ship in mid-ocean, then from a US base on Ascension Island, before coming into view of the land station on the Canaries. Cable & Wireless in Bermuda had two roles: to provide communications between the NASA tracking station at Cooper's Island in Bermuda and Mission Control in Houston, and to provide communications between the USS Vanguard and Houston. We provided duplicated links to Houston — one via the Manahawkin cable, and one via Tortola. Voice circuits had to be taken out of service and private connections were activated. These had to be thoroughly tested and “conditioned” to provide both voice and data services (data as fast as 2.4kb/s!) for the duration of the mission. One complication was that the circuits on the older Manahawkin cable were only 3kHz, meaning that they were more difficult to line up and equalise. Once ready, the circuits were then patched through to Cooper's Island, or to the NASCOM centre to the tracking ship. The work of NASCOM was to make sure we stayed in constant communication with the USS Vanguard. We knew her position, then had to steer our log periodic antennae to face towards the ship’s position. We also relayed information to our transmitting station so that they could also turn their antennae to the right direction. Because of broad band propagation conditions we also had to change frequencies quickly and accurately. This was achieved through the use of Marconi self-tuning (MST) receivers and transmitters, meaning that a frequency change was performed merely by dialling it in on a synthesiser. The Company provided “Critical cover” whenever the missions were live, meaning we had double staff on duty. We were not allowed to plug anything in during periods of Critical Cover in case the power surge caused a breaker to drop out somewhere. We therefore had all test equipment and any possible maintenance equipment plugged in and turned on at all times. Even the use of the electric kettle was banned!
For me as a spotty-faced youth, it was incredibly exciting work, with the extra perk of being able to listen to the voice communications back and forth between Mission Control and the spacecraft, and in real time.
The Ascension Island Connection
Ascension is just a small island, but from 1899 the Eastern Telegraph Company originally used it as a relay station between South America, Europe, and South and West Africa, as well as Ascension and St Helena. The Eastern Telegraph Company was incorporated into Cable and Wireless in 1934, and during these early years the General Manager of the Company acted in the role of Administrator.
Apart from the Company, it has been an outpost for various government agencies, including the BBC, the RAF, the European Space Agency, a US/UK intelligence post, a US airforce base, and a NASA tracking station.
In early 1965 Cable & Wireless were asked by NASA whether they could provide data and voice links from the NASA tracking station on Ascension to Mission Control via the newly operational Intelsat II satellites. This, of course, meant that the Company had to have an Earth Station on the island — it would be the first the Company would own.
After a bidding process, the Company decided to work with Marconi in Chelmsford, who already had some experience in the sector, and together they designed an Earth Station for Ascension. Owing to its remote location it was essential that everything had to be available to erect the station on site, with no parts missing. It was decided to do a complete build of the new station in the UK, then take it completely apart and package each and every component into boxes which would be delivered to Ascension by a chartered cargo ship.
C&W staff witnessed the build near Chelmsford, and then undertook a training course. By then the Company was thinking of building other Earth Stations so several courses were set up to train for this new discipline of satellite communication.
The whole project went well, and by September 1966 the station was ready to carry traffic. NASA commissioned several satellite stations around that time, and Ascension was the last contract to be awarded, yet despite its remote and challenging location, it was the first to become operational.
First Marconi Earth Station Course:
Back row left to right: (?) from HK, Tony Murray Smith, John Worral, Yeung (HK), Dai Rees
Front row left to right: Dick Roynan, Dave Wright, Jon Greenway, (?), Charlie Benson
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