Charles Stark “Doc” Draper (left) tours Wernher Von Braun through the MIT Instrumentation Lab during a March 1964 NASA VIP visit. (MIT Museum collection)
system using an analog computer. Armstrong challenged them to consider using a digital computer instead. “I just went to the moon and back on one,” said Armstrong, who suggested they contact the MIT Instrumentation Lab. In 1972, a modified Navy F-8C Crusader made its first successful flight at NASA’s Flight Research Center using a digital fly-by-wire system based on a modified Apollo Guidance Computer and software developed by the Instrumentation Lab. As the Apollo program came to an end in the early 1970s, NASA asked the MIT Instrumentation Lab to begin developing the space shuttle avionics system. Following its divestment from MIT in 1973, the renamed Charles Stark Draper Laboratory continued the development and testing of the space shuttle’s flight control system for both on-orbit and powered flight operations. Draper Laboratory continues to play an active role in each space shuttle mission, verifying that the payload configuration won’t cause adverse dynamic interactions with the flight control software. Forty years later, many members of engineering team at the MIT Instrumentation Laboratory that developed the hardware and software for the Apollo Guidance Computer consider working on Apollo to be the highlight of their engineering careers. Software engineer Margaret Hamilton captured the spirit of working on Apollo at the MIT Instrumentation Lab. “How fortunate I was to work with and share this experience with the
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AEROASTRO 2008-2009