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The Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL), originally referred to as the Manned Orbital Laboratory, was part of the United States Air Force's manned spaceflight program, a successor to the cancelled Boeing X-20 Dyna-Soar military reconnaissance space plane project. The project was developed from several early Air Force and NASA concepts of manned space stations to be used for reconnaissance purposes. MOL evolved into a single-use laboratory, with which crews would be launched on 40-day missions and return to Earth using a Gemini B spacecraft, derived from NASA's Project Gemini. The MOL program was announced to the public on 10 December 1963 as a manned platform to prove the utility of man in space for military missions. Astronauts selected for the program were later told of the reconnaissance mission for the program. The contractor for the MOL was the Douglas Aircraft Company. The Gemini B was externally similar to NASA's Gemini spacecraft, although it underwent several modifications, including the addition of a circular hatch through the heat shield, which allowed passage between the spacecraft and the laboratory. MOL was cancelled in 1969, during the height of the Apollo program, when it was shown that unmanned reconnaissance satellites could achieve the same objectives much more cost-effectively. U.S. space station development was instead pursued with the civilian NASA Skylab (Apollo Applications Program) which flew in the mid-1970s. In the 1970s, the Soviet Union launched three Almaz military space stations, similar in intent to the MOL, but cancelled the program in 1977 for the same reasons. ==History== Test flight OPS 0855 for MOL was launched on 3 November 1966 at 13:50:42 UTC on a Titan IIIC-9 from Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 40. The flight consisted of a MOL mockup built from a Titan II propellant tank, and the refurbished Gemini 2 spacecraft as a prototype. After the Gemini B separated for a sub-orbital reentry, the MOL mockup continued into orbit and released three satellites. A hatch installed in the Gemini's heat shield—intended to provide access to the MOL during manned operations—was tested during the capsule's reentry. The Gemini capsule was recovered near Ascension Island in the South Atlantic by the after a flight of 33 minutes. The MOL was planned to use a helium-oxygen atmosphere. It used a Gemini B spacecraft as a reentry vehicle. The crew were to be launched with the Gemini B and MOL, and returned to Earth in the Gemini B. They would conduct up to 40 days of military reconnaissance using large optics, cameras, and side-looking radar. The USAF Astronaut Maneuvering Unit (AMU) was developed for the MOL project. NASA chief astronaut Deke Slayton later speculated in his autobiography that the AMU may have been developed for MOL because the Air Force "thought they might have the chance to inspect somebody else's satellites." In response to the announcement of the MOL, the Soviet Union commissioned the development of its own military space station, Almaz. Three Almaz space stations flew as Salyut space stations, and the program also developed a military add-on used on Salyut 6 and Salyut 7.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=The Almaz program )〕 In 2005, two MH-7 training space suits from the MOL program were discovered in a locked room in the Launch Complex 5/6 museum on Cape Canaveral. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Manned Orbiting Laboratory」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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