Skylab 4

Amazing vintage Skylab IV commemorative philatelic cover canceled February 8, 1974 on the USS New Orleans (LPH-11). The cover is hand signed by the full crew of Skylab IV including Jerry Carr, Ed Gibson and Bill Pogue. Skylab 4 (also SL-4 and SLM-3) was the fourth Skylab mission and placed the third and final crew on board the space station. The mission started November 16, 1973 with the launch of three astronauts on a Saturn IB rocket, and lasted 84 days, 1 hour and 16 minutes. A total of 6,051 astronaut-utilization hours were tallied by Skylab 4 astronauts performing scientific experiments in the areas of medical activities, solar observations, Earth resources, observation of the Comet Kohoutek and other experiments.