NASA Ballinger, Leon - May 25, 2000
Interview with Leon Ballinger
Interviewer: Dalinda Y. Dupree
Date of Interview: May 25, 2000
Location: Dupree home, Wimberley, Texas
DUPREE: Today is May 26, 2000, and this is the oral history with, oh no it’s May 25 isn’t it? May 25?
BALLINGER: Today is May 25.
DUPREE: Yes. This the oral history with Leon Ballinger and its being conducted at 88 Saddle Rock Ridge in Wimberley, Texas at the home of the interviewee and this interview is being conducted for NASA/Johnson Space Center Oral History Project in conjunction with Southwest Texas State University, History Department by graduate student Dalinda Dupree. Mr. Ballinger, are you aware that this interview is being conducted for the NASA/Southwest Texas State University Oral History Project and will be available for research purposes?
BALLINGER: That’s correct.
DUPREE: Okay. Well then, we’ll start in a second, let’s check this. You’ve been interviewed plenty of times, haven’t you?
BALLINGER: Two.
DUPREE: Where were you and what were your thoughts when you first heard about the launch of Sputnik by the Soviet Union in October of 1957?
BALLINGER: I was in Huntsville, Alabama. Are you taking about the one that was the echo, the balloon, the satellite?
DUPREE: Well, the Sputnik went up in 75 [1957], October of 75 [1957]. You were in college?
BALLINGER: No, I was working for the Army Missile Command in Huntsville, Alabama. We saw it going overhead and it was very impressive. We were very sorry to see them get ahead of us.
DUPREE: So you were already involved in the space program then?
BALLINGER: Well, I was working the Army Missile Command. So, I was aware of the programs and what they were doing and so on.
DUPREE: What was it that got you interested in the space program?
BALLINGER: Well, I was an engineer and that was the ultimate in engineering at that time, was to be involved in a program that would eventually get a man to the moon.
DUPREE: How did your background and previous experiences prepare you for your career in NASA?
BALLINGER: Well, I’m not sure. As you went into each new job there were always new aspects to it and you just had to adjust to them.
DUPREE: Did NASA go looking for you or did you go looking for NASA?
BALLINGER: I went looking for them. I felt like that was a good place to work. It would be interesting and very challenging work. So, that’s what I wanted.
DUPREE: What talents did you bring to the table?
BALLINGER: A degree in engineering. I was a hard worker and gave them a full day’s work for my pay. [laughter]
DUPREE: Let’s talk a little bit about when you first started working with them. Can you explain to me a little bit what you did in the Lunar Excursion Module as a technical manager?
BALLINGER: At that time, I was in the Program Office. We had several things we had to keep up with: the schedule, the configuration, and the funding that supported the program. The schedule had to be maintained because the Lunar Excursion Module was just one piece of the total package that had to meet together to make a good flight. Well, we had to have all the pieces together in order to have a good flight to the moon.
DUPREE: Can you explain what configuration means?
BALLINGER: Configuration is the design you have that has to be compatible with the other pieces of hardware that come together down at the Cape [Canaveral]. It has to be interfaced electrically, structurally, and environmentally so that they all meet and work together.
DUPREE: So what parts specifically did you work on or did you design some of these?
BALLINGER: No. I was in the Program Office, as a program officer, you sort of overlook all of it. In other words, you were concerned with the engineering part, you were concerned with meeting the schedule, and you were concerned with obtaining the funds necessary to complete the job. This takes justification to the headquarters and to Congress in order to get the funding to allow the job to be completed.
DUPREE: Did you ever go before Congress?
BALLINGER: No. Never did. Somebody above me was doing that. I just supplied the inputs.
DUPREE: There we go. And how about the Apollo experiments?
BALLINGER: The Apollo experiments were very interesting. We had some that went on the command service module door. At the time of the accident, when they had the fire on Apollo [1], of course, we got thrown out as far experiments there when they redesigned the door. Some of the other experiments that were in the service module involved some foreign scientists who wanted to put up frogs and other things to see how they would be affected in space. Of course when they had the fire, all of those were thrown off. We had several million dollars’ worth of experiments and every one of them was thrown off the program at the time of the fire.
DUPREE: And you’re talking about the fire in which Gus Grissom was killed.
BALLINGER: Yes. White, Grissom, and Chaffee.
DUPREE: Did you work on any other Apollo programs?
BALLINGER: No. About that time is when I went over to Earth Resources.
DUPREE: What did you do in Earth Resources?
BALLINGER: Well, the first job I had was modifying a C-130 where we put in a lot of instruments in it: scatterometers, radar, cameras of all kinds, and a multi-spectral scanner.
DUPREE: What was their purpose?
BALLINGER: We would survey different areas in the United States, Jamaica, and Alaska and supply that data to universities and colleges that needed it.
DUPREE: What kind of information was that?
BALLINGER: Well, there was data of different kinds. The photography was interpreted. The radar would indicate whether you’ve got foliage or dry areas that were lacking in moisture and so on. But there were different purposes for different things.
DUPREE: Was it for mapping?
BALLINGER: Mapping was part of it, yes.
DUPREE: And studying the geology?
BALLINGER: Mapping, geology, agriculture.
DUPREE: What it also to check on the populations?
BALLINGER: No, I can’t remember any of the experiments where we were actually trying to count heads. [laughter]
DUPREE: Was the photography that good that you could see?
BALLINGER: Ours was not.
DUPREE: How far up were the aircrafts?
BALLINGER: We ran anywhere from five up to ten thousand, sometimes higher. But not too high with the ones we had. The C-130, P-3 and RB-57F, now, went into higher altitude, of course.
DUPREE: What exactly does Earth Resources manage? I mean it sounds like it’s a great big title and there’s a lot of things under it.
BALLINGER: Well, you’re looking out for all of the things that are good for mankind. For instance, when you’re surveying a forest and you do it from year to year, you can tell how much of the forest is being utilized or cut by the forestry people or industry and what is happening to it. Those are resources that have to be managed and should be managed in order to preserve the atmosphere and the current foliage and so on that we have available to keep a healthy atmosphere for all humans.
DUPREE: Okay, so some of the data and information was used to compare from one year to the next – the pollution and the changes.
BALLINGER: That’s correct.
DUPREE: How about your Space Shuttle payload integration?
BALLINGER: Most of Space Shuttle payload integration that I did involved Air Force or classified payloads. There were satellites of various kinds but I can’t talk too much about those. [laughter]
DUPREE: Okay. I don’t want to be shot. Did that still have anything to do with NASA?
BALLINGER: Yes. The Air Force payloads were just like any other payload as far as NASA was concerned. They had to meet all the interfaces and were flown on flights very similar to the other payloads. In other words, just because they were classified didn’t mean that they didn’t have to meet the electrical and structural and environmental interfaces that you have on the Shuttle and the payload bay, just like the other payloads.
DUPREE: Can you describe to me what exactly payload integration means for people who are coming to the table fresh and they have no background in engineering? Could you put that in layman’s terms so they can understand?
BALLINGER: Okay, if you’re designing a payload and you are approved to fly on one of the Space Shuttle’s flights, then you are given a set of specifications. Those specifications will tell you how you must build, design, and build the payload. The payload must meet all of the interfaces that structurally, electrically, and environmentally that are present in the bay, not only on Earth, but once it gets in space. In other words, you’ll have a payload that once its in orbit, it would have to be checked out. It’s connected to the Space Shuttle interfaces and before the crew would deploy the payload, they would automatically or not automatically, but they would need to check the systems out and be sure that they’re working before they deploy the payload. So, you have to design the payload so that it meets all those requirements, electrically, structurally, environmentally. Both when they’re being checked out at the pad at KSC [Kennedy Space Center] or when they’re doing the same thing in orbit.
DUPREE: Okay, so, we’re talking about making sure weights and everything will match to how much fuel it going to take for them to go and come back?
BALLINGER: Well, that’s one of the considerations, yes. The weight is always a problem as far as getting a Space Shuttle or a payload of any kind into orbit. In other words, the more payload you’ve got, the less leeway you’ve got for loading more fuel and so on, for the Shuttle. So that’s always a consideration. That’s probably one of the critical things, is the weight. Anytime you start exceeding the interfaced established weight, then you’ve got a problem. You have to go back to NASA and get that approved. Otherwise they may have a problem in putting the whole payload, including the Shuttle into orbit.
DUPREE: So how much would it throw things off when the astronauts would want to sneak little things onboard like cards, baseball cards or whatever – little knick-knacks people asked them to “take it to the Moon; it’s been to the moon.”
BALLINGER: Well, they did a little of that, but you’re talking about a small amount that in most cases didn’t affect us. That’s something that I’d rather not talk about either – what those guys did. [laughter] I had nothing to do with that.
DUPREE: So, when did you know that you wanted to work for NASA? What was the occasion specifically that inspired you that “yeah, this is what I want to do with my life.”
BALIINGER: Right when we were talking about Sputnik, I think that was along about that time was when I decided that I really would like to work for NASA. I saw them doing that and I was concerned that the Russians were ahead of us and I would like to become involved in catching up.
DUPREE: What was the most memorable project that you worked on?
BALLINGER: It would be the three Air Force payloads that I worked.
DUPREE: Did they have anything to do with NASA? Is this something you can’t talk about?
BALLINGER: What do you mean?
DUPREE: Well, I mean you said you worked for, the most memorable project that you worked on was with?
BALLINGER: The Air Force, the DOD, Department of Defense payloads.
DUPREE: Okay, so those didn’t have anything to do with NASA?
BALLINGER: Only that they were flown up into orbit by the Space Shuttle. In other words, NASA hauled those payloads up into orbit.
DUPREE: And we can’t talk about those?
BALLINGER: Ah, no.
DUPREE: Okay. [laughter] What was the most memorable award that you received from NASA?
BALLINGER: I guess it was the Sustained Spirit Performance Award. It meant that I’d been doing a good job over a long period of time and finally got my deserve.
DUPREE: Did the President come to give it to you?
BALLINGER: No, no. Just the Center Director.
DUPREE: Who was that at the time?
BALLINGER: It was Chris Kraft.
DUPREE: And what’s the most memorable situation? Were you ever involved in watching anything there at Johnson Space Center? What was the most memorable situation for you there at NASA?
BALLINGER: I was involved with one of the astronauts, Ellison Onizuka, on his previous flight on 51-C. When that flight exploded, that’s to me the most traumatic, I guess, event. You asked what was the most?
DUPREE: Memorable.
BALLINGER: Memorable. Then I guess it would have to be that one.
DUPREE: What was memorable about it other than it was very tragic. What about Ellison that, you know?
BALLINGER: He’s a good friend of mine. He was a super guy – Japanese-Hawaiian. We had big plans for him for the future but I knew that was the end of that.
DUPREE: What was he in line for?
BALLINGER: We were just talking about running him for Governor of Hawaii.
DUPREE: What was it about his past career that made him such a memorable personality?
BALLINGER: I guess the fact that he was Japanese, and he’d gone so far in becoming an astronaut and doing a good job in what he did. Of course, all of the guys did that.
DUPREE: What do you feel was your greatest contribution to the space program?
BALLINGER: I suppose the three Air Force payloads that I helped manage to get into orbit because they’re, in effect, are still helping to maintain peace in the world.
DUPREE: And those are the ones that we can’t talk about?
BALLINGER: Yeah. [laughter]
DUPREE: This is cutting my interview short. [laughter]
BALLINGER: Well, that’s the way it goes.
DUPREE: So, if you could design a project right now with unlimited funds and hand pick your crew, what would it be and who would they be? Want me to give you some time to think about that?
BALLINGER: Nah. I don’t know. I think the crew would have to be Mattingly, Anazuka, Schriver, and Buckley. That was my best crew, I think. But what to design to put up there?
DUPREE: Any project that you could design, whether it would be something to help Earth right now or to go further in exploration, what would you like to see done?
BALLINGER: Oh, I think the manned flight to Mars would certainly be something that would test you, sort of like our trip to the Moon.
DUPREE: Is there something other than the thrill of exploration that moves you to want to see what’s up on Mars?
BALLINGER: No, I think just that – to see what’s there, to see what’s over the next hill.
DUPREE: All right, so what do you see for the future of manned and unmanned space flight?
BALLINGER: I think the trend about the time I started that I was retiring was toward more automated, unmanned systems. I know there’s a lot of things that you can’t automate in space, that have to be done by man, but it seemed to me that that was the trend as far as technology is going to the automated, unmanned systems.
DUPREE: Did you have anything to do with the Hubble telescope?
BALLINGER: No, I did not.
DUPREE: When I was at the Johnson Space Center, I saw one of the films that they had there and I’m not sure exactly which film it was because I sat there for about three of them, and it was just amazing. They said it was huge, solar panels that just unfolded like an accordion and folded back up into a seven-inch space.
BALLINGER: Yeah, we started doing that during Sky Lab.
DUPREE: So, you did have a part in that?
BALLINGER: Well, I was working there at the Resources Part at that time, but Sky Lab had, as a matter of fact, we had some problems with the folding and unfolding the solar panels during Sky Lab. Matter of fact, we used the airlock that I had originally, was Dr. Henize put on the Command Module door. They used that same airlock in order to fix the solar panels for the Sky Lab.
DUPREE: Okay, I’m going to have to get that name, Dr. Henize, could you spell that for me?
BALLINGER: Carl, Dr. Carl Henize. H-E-N-I-Z-E. He was the one that I worked with on the early Apollo airlock experiment and then he later became an astronaut himself.
DUPREE: Were there any people with which you worked that made a significant impact on you personally? We already spoke about a couple.
BALLINGER: Just the fact that some of the Flight Operations people, like Glynn Lunney, and some of the crew members who showed how hard, diligent that they really worked in order to get a job done. They were very impressive.
DUPREE: And tell me about some of that hard work. Did you guys go days and days?
BALLINGER: Oh yeah. [sigh] Not only days and days, but you were out on the road a lot. You spent a lot of time traveling. When I was working with some of the Space Shuttle crew, you’d fly out commercially and then drive over to the airport to pick them up and haul them around. It was long days and nights away from the family and kids – really tough on you at times.
DUPREE: So your family was stationed in Houston?
BALLINGER: Yes.
DUPREE: And what were some of the places you traveled?
BALLINGER: All over the United States, Mexico, Jamaica, Alaska.
DUPREE: Were you involved in helping construct some of the parts of the modules?
BALLINGER: Physically, no. It was mostly engineering management position.
DUPREE: Which involved what?
BALLINGER: Which, well again there in most cases, you’re working the schedules to see that all the pieces get to right place at the right time. You’re working to assure [insure?] that you have to establish interfaces or what they call interface control documents between all the payloads and the spacecraft, the Space Shuttle, wherever it’s going to be. Your interest was to assure [sp?] those things happened. And then from a program office standpoint, you were concerned about the funding to assure the program continued on unto its completion.
DUPREE: So, the different companies that were making the parts, did they know what they were designing, the actual people that were hammering out the steel and rivets?
BALLINGER: They knew it because from a program office standpoint, we established what they were going to build. Anytime they changed that, they had to come back to us to change the interface or the equipment or the hardware. We talked earlier about the weight. There’s always a concern for increased weight, everybody was always wanting more weight for their particular piece of equipment, whether it was a lunar excursion module or the command service module or the boosters. And you had to concern yourself with assuring that they stayed within the limits that had been established earlier. Otherwise, your whole program had no control. So that was one of the major things that I worked with was from a program office standpoint, to control the hardware interfaces, weight, schedule and so on, until they were delivered according to the specifications that you’d given them.
DUPREE: In the Apollo One, the accident, were you part of the team that went through what was left to try and figure out what went wrong exactly?
BALLINGER: No, I did not participate in that. There was another group that did that. Luckily, I didn’t have to do that.
DUPREE: Okay, let me pause for a minute. I was wondering if we could talk a bit more about the Earth Resources? I was interested in exactly who used the information?
BALLINGER: There were different people across the United States that used it. Some of the schools and universities used it. The U.S. Geological Survey used some of the data. The Department of Agriculture used some of the data. You could spot a lot of the industrial pollutants. In some cases, you could see where it would come into the rivers and bays. It was very evident that what they were doing was affecting the ecology.
DUPREE: What kind of instruments were picking up?
BALLINGER: We had, of course different instruments. The basic instrument for this use was a camera. But there were radars and of course the multi-spectral scanner, which we installed in the C-130. [It] covered the entire electro-magnetic spectrum. In this one you could spot heat sources, heat, cold – any thermally different temperature was evident from the scanner. It depended upon what you were looking for, what the data was used for.
DUPREE: What else could the multi-spectral scanner pick up? It sounds like it has a lot of jobs.
BALLINGER: Well, I’d have to remember back to a lot of the things we did. One of the things we looked for was in, over flying Jamaica, they were concerned about the loss of all the fresh water, the rainfall. They have a tremendous amount of rainfall in the year, but it all goes into the ground and comes out as freshwater up-wellings offshore in Jamaica. So, the Jamaicans use the data there to pin-point exactly where the up-wellings were occurring. Then I didn’t follow up on it but I assume that they tried in some manner to maintain the freshwater that came into the island and not let it just up-well into the ocean. That was one of the big jobs that they were looking for there at the time. I’m trying to remember some of the others, but right now. Offhand, I can’t.
DUPREE: Okay, well then, let’s talk a little about your post-NASA work.
BALLINGER: The consultant work was much more enjoyable to me. You weren’t working directly for a NASA boss that was demanding that certain things be done on a certain time scale. You could sit back and look at what was being done and make your recommendations from a standpoint, either to the Air Force or to NASA. In this case my consultant work, I was working on the Air Force payloads and you could make your comments to either organization. We had some considerable, say, interface between the two that wasn’t exactly good. So you could sit back as a consultant and make your comments to both of them as to what they should and shouldn’t do without worrying about your job. That made it much better.
DUPREE: So, in other words when you were working for NASA you had to be more careful about how you expressed what you thought needed to be done.
BALLINGER: That’s true. You had to do what they wanted you to do. Once you started consulting, you’re a little more free about giving your opinion on what should and shouldn’t be done without feeling that your job was in jeopardy.
DUPREE: Anything else you would like to share?
BALLINGER: I can’t think of anything else.
DUPREE: Thank you so much, sir. I appreciate this.
BALLINGER: You’re most welcome.