A few years ago while on the phone with a customer discussing possible future topics, I was asked if I had ever considered putting together a disc with a collection of rocket mishaps. I had thought about it before and really hadn't acted on the idea. So the next time I was at the archives I was armed with a listing of some of the more "spectacular" of the rocket "accidents" and found some pretty good stuff. So I decided I'd do a one-disc set of just rockets blowing up. Plans always change.
I started putting the set together and found that alone the set just wasn't what we do. So I added a second disc, consisting of some of the more important rocket "successes" and moved forward with the set. I added a large amount of material I had run across on Robert Goddard, which I had previously had transferred but didn't have a reason to use. And I called up Dave Mohr, who is a propulsion consultant in Florida who has an incredible knowledge of launch vehicles and space history in general. He formerly worked for Rocketdyne and agreed to supply commentary on many of the tracks. The result is one of most popular sets: Liftoff: Success and Failure on the Launch Pad.
The 2-DVD set covers rockets in the U.S. from the Thor and X-17 to Germany's V-1 and V-2, through Vanguard, some sounding rockets, Atlas, Titan, Delta, Saturns and the Shuttle. It is packed with rockets blowing up - yes... and rockets doing precisely what they were intended to do... open up space to man and his machines.
Liftoff is in stock and available for immediate shipment. View Liftoff Preview.
I really enjoyed this set (as I have all of them so far)! I've always felt more attention needed to be paid to those early days of rocket development. Thanks so much for all the work on this set.
Posted by: Mark Daymont | September 27, 2011 at 07:41 AM