NASA Mission Transcript Collection
Table Of Contents

This two CD-ROM collection contains 80 transcripts totaling nearly 45,000 pages of text covering every U.S. human spaceflight from the first mission of Mercury Redstone 3 through the last lunar landing flight of Apollo 17. Through the combined efforts of the history offices at NASA Headquarters and the Johnson Space Center, searchable Adobe Acrobat PDF scans of these mission transcripts were made from the best available copies currently in NASA’s historical collection.

Users of this CD will note that the quantity and type of transcripts made for each mission vary. For example, the Mercury flights each had one transcript whereas the Gemini missions produced several. Starting with the Gemini flights, NASA produced a Public Affairs Office (PAO) commentary version, as well as at least one "technical" air-to-ground transcript version, per mission. Most of the Apollo missions produced four transcripts per flight. These included the onboard voice data recorder transcripts made from the Data Storage Equipment (DSE) on the Command Module (CM) and the Data Storage Electronics Assembly (DSEA) onboard the Lunar Module (LM), in addition to the PAO commentary and air-to-ground technical transcripts.

Both the Apollo 7 and Apollo 8 missions had no lunar module, hence no DSEA transcripts were made. Because of a malfunction, Apollo 11 had no DSEA transcript either. Due to the in-flight accident during Apollo 13, in which the crew were forced to power down all but life sustaining systems while they retreated to the LM for the critical journey back to Earth, no DSEA transcript was made for this mission as well.

Please note that these transcripts contain content mistakes and that, as a part of this project, no effort was made to correct these. Volunteers who took part in the review of the initial transcript scans pointed out errors in some of the mission time sequences (MET, GMT, CST, or GET) as well as page numbering. Such mistakes are due, in part, to basic human error. The typists who transcribed each voice tape inevitably made occasional typos. In particular, the PAO Commentary transcripts were the first transcripts produced and, because NASA wished to make them available to the press as soon as possible, they often contained errors. Nevertheless, we hope you find these transcripts useful.

Complete onboard, air-to-ground, ground-to-air, and commentary transcripts.


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