From Air Force Space Command News Service:

CAPE CANAVERAL AFS, Fla. – What took years to build took seconds to knock down Aug. 6 when 171 pounds of strategically placed explosives were detonated, toppling the historic 179-foot mobile service tower at Launch Complex 13 here.

The 1,300-ton structure was used to launch Atlas/Agena space launch vehicles in the 1960s and 1970s. The most famous of those launches were five Lunar Orbiter missions for NASA in 1966 and 1967. Those missions photographed about 99 percent of the moon’s surface and helped pave the way to men landing on the moon in 1969.

The pictures are pretty cool, but it’s a little sad to see this. I’m sure it’s tough to have to maintain an unused launch tower, but this was a piece of history, one of the monuments to our nation’s continuing pioneer spirit.

Fortunately, the towers at Launch Complex 39 are a little bigger and would be harder to take down. 🙂