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mabfanAPOLLO 13 LAUNCHED TO MOON:
April 11, 1970
On April 11, 1970, Apollo 13, the third lunar landing mission, is successfully launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida, carrying astronauts James A. Lovell, John L. Swigert, and Fred W. Haise. The spacecraft's destination was the Fra Mauro highlands of the moon, where the astronauts were to explore the Imbrium Basin and conduct geological experiments. After an oxygen tank exploded on the evening of April 13, however, the new mission objective became to get the Apollo 13 crew home alive.
***
At 9:00 p.m. EST on April 13, Apollo 13 was just over 200,000 miles from Earth. The crew had just completed a television broadcast and was inspecting Aquarius, the Landing Module (LM). The next day, Apollo 13 was to enter the moon's orbit, and soon after, Lovell and Haise would become the fifth and sixth men to walk on the moon. At 9:08 p.m., these plans were shattered when an explosion rocked the spacecraft. Oxygen tank No. 2 had blown up, disabling the normal supply of oxygen, electricity, light, and water. Lovell reported to mission control: "Houston, we've had a problem here," and the crew scrambled to find out what had happened. Several minutes later, Lovell looked out of the left-hand window and saw that the spacecraft was venting a gas, which turned out to be the Command Module's (CM) oxygen. The landing mission was aborted.
As the CM lost pressure, its fuel cells also died, and one hour after the explosion mission control instructed the crew to move to the LM, which had sufficient oxygen, and use it as a lifeboat. The CM was shut down but would have to be brought back on-line for Earth reentry. The LM was designed to ferry astronauts from the orbiting CM to the moon's surface and back again; its power supply was meant to support two people for 45 hours. If the crew of Apollo 13 were to make it back to Earth alive, the LM would have to support three men for at least 90 hours and successfully navigate more than 200,000 miles of space. The crew and mission control faced a formidable task.
To complete its long journey, the LM needed energy and cooling water. Both were to be conserved at the cost of the crew, who went on one-fifth water rations and would later endure cabin temperatures that hovered a few degrees above freezing. Removal of carbon dioxide was also a problem, because the square lithium hydroxide canisters from the CM were not compatible with the round openings in the LM environmental system. Mission control built an impromptu adapter out of materials known to be onboard, and the crew successfully copied their model.
Navigation was also a major problem. The LM lacked a sophisticated navigational system, and the astronauts and mission control had to work out by hand the changes in propulsion and direction needed to take the spacecraft home. On April 14, Apollo 13 swung around the moon. Swigert and Haise took pictures, and Lovell talked with mission control about the most difficult maneuver, a five-minute engine burn that would give the LM enough speed to return home before its energy ran out. Two hours after rounding the far side of the moon, the crew, using the sun as an alignment point, fired the LM's small descent engine. The procedure was a success; Apollo 13 was on its way home.
For the next three days, Lovell, Haise, and Swigert huddled in the freezing lunar module. Haise developed a case of the flu. Mission control spent this time frantically trying to develop a procedure that would allow the astronauts to restart the CM for reentry. On April 17, a last-minute navigational correction was made, this time using Earth as an alignment guide. Then the repressurized CM was successfully powered up after its long, cold sleep. The heavily damaged service module was shed, and one hour before re-entry the LM was disengaged from the CM. Just before 1 p.m., the spacecraft reentered Earth's atmosphere. Mission control feared that the CM's heat shields were damaged in the accident, but after four minutes of radio silence Apollo 13's parachutes were spotted, and the astronauts splashed down safely into the Pacific Ocean.
***
Personal stuff:
The Apollo 13 mission happened in April 1970, and I was born in February 1970. Therefore, I have no personal memory of the event. However, my Mom has told me about watching the mission unfold on the television news with me sitting on her lap. So perhaps that was one of the first, early influences on my life, getting me interested in science and science fiction. Who knows?
In 1995, the movie Apollo 13 was released, a dramatization of the events of the mission. (I think they're releasing a tenth-anniversary special edition DVD.) I loved the film, especially how it made engineers out to be heroes. But I was astonished by a few moviegoers interviewed on the news, who dismissed the movie as "science fiction" and apparently had no idea that the film was about history.
I was also surprised when the film was nominated for a Hugo in 1996. I'm one of the people who rejected the idea that the film was science fiction; after all, it was a historical drama, and no one considered the films about Columbus released circa 1992 to be science fiction despite Columbus's own dependence on the technology of the time. (Just to give an example.) And yet, the Hugos tend to go by "Vox Populi, Vox Dei," which makes sense -- the Hugo Administrators aren't about to take the position that some work isn't SF if enough Worldcon members felt it was. So the movie got nominated for the Hugo, but lost to an episode of Babylon 5.
For more information:
Reference: This Day in History at http://www.historychannel.com/tdih/tdih.jsp?category=leadstory
Wikipedia entry can be found here
April 11, 1970
On April 11, 1970, Apollo 13, the third lunar landing mission, is successfully launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida, carrying astronauts James A. Lovell, John L. Swigert, and Fred W. Haise. The spacecraft's destination was the Fra Mauro highlands of the moon, where the astronauts were to explore the Imbrium Basin and conduct geological experiments. After an oxygen tank exploded on the evening of April 13, however, the new mission objective became to get the Apollo 13 crew home alive.
***
At 9:00 p.m. EST on April 13, Apollo 13 was just over 200,000 miles from Earth. The crew had just completed a television broadcast and was inspecting Aquarius, the Landing Module (LM). The next day, Apollo 13 was to enter the moon's orbit, and soon after, Lovell and Haise would become the fifth and sixth men to walk on the moon. At 9:08 p.m., these plans were shattered when an explosion rocked the spacecraft. Oxygen tank No. 2 had blown up, disabling the normal supply of oxygen, electricity, light, and water. Lovell reported to mission control: "Houston, we've had a problem here," and the crew scrambled to find out what had happened. Several minutes later, Lovell looked out of the left-hand window and saw that the spacecraft was venting a gas, which turned out to be the Command Module's (CM) oxygen. The landing mission was aborted.
As the CM lost pressure, its fuel cells also died, and one hour after the explosion mission control instructed the crew to move to the LM, which had sufficient oxygen, and use it as a lifeboat. The CM was shut down but would have to be brought back on-line for Earth reentry. The LM was designed to ferry astronauts from the orbiting CM to the moon's surface and back again; its power supply was meant to support two people for 45 hours. If the crew of Apollo 13 were to make it back to Earth alive, the LM would have to support three men for at least 90 hours and successfully navigate more than 200,000 miles of space. The crew and mission control faced a formidable task.
To complete its long journey, the LM needed energy and cooling water. Both were to be conserved at the cost of the crew, who went on one-fifth water rations and would later endure cabin temperatures that hovered a few degrees above freezing. Removal of carbon dioxide was also a problem, because the square lithium hydroxide canisters from the CM were not compatible with the round openings in the LM environmental system. Mission control built an impromptu adapter out of materials known to be onboard, and the crew successfully copied their model.
Navigation was also a major problem. The LM lacked a sophisticated navigational system, and the astronauts and mission control had to work out by hand the changes in propulsion and direction needed to take the spacecraft home. On April 14, Apollo 13 swung around the moon. Swigert and Haise took pictures, and Lovell talked with mission control about the most difficult maneuver, a five-minute engine burn that would give the LM enough speed to return home before its energy ran out. Two hours after rounding the far side of the moon, the crew, using the sun as an alignment point, fired the LM's small descent engine. The procedure was a success; Apollo 13 was on its way home.
For the next three days, Lovell, Haise, and Swigert huddled in the freezing lunar module. Haise developed a case of the flu. Mission control spent this time frantically trying to develop a procedure that would allow the astronauts to restart the CM for reentry. On April 17, a last-minute navigational correction was made, this time using Earth as an alignment guide. Then the repressurized CM was successfully powered up after its long, cold sleep. The heavily damaged service module was shed, and one hour before re-entry the LM was disengaged from the CM. Just before 1 p.m., the spacecraft reentered Earth's atmosphere. Mission control feared that the CM's heat shields were damaged in the accident, but after four minutes of radio silence Apollo 13's parachutes were spotted, and the astronauts splashed down safely into the Pacific Ocean.
***
Personal stuff:
The Apollo 13 mission happened in April 1970, and I was born in February 1970. Therefore, I have no personal memory of the event. However, my Mom has told me about watching the mission unfold on the television news with me sitting on her lap. So perhaps that was one of the first, early influences on my life, getting me interested in science and science fiction. Who knows?
In 1995, the movie Apollo 13 was released, a dramatization of the events of the mission. (I think they're releasing a tenth-anniversary special edition DVD.) I loved the film, especially how it made engineers out to be heroes. But I was astonished by a few moviegoers interviewed on the news, who dismissed the movie as "science fiction" and apparently had no idea that the film was about history.
I was also surprised when the film was nominated for a Hugo in 1996. I'm one of the people who rejected the idea that the film was science fiction; after all, it was a historical drama, and no one considered the films about Columbus released circa 1992 to be science fiction despite Columbus's own dependence on the technology of the time. (Just to give an example.) And yet, the Hugos tend to go by "Vox Populi, Vox Dei," which makes sense -- the Hugo Administrators aren't about to take the position that some work isn't SF if enough Worldcon members felt it was. So the movie got nominated for the Hugo, but lost to an episode of Babylon 5.
For more information:
Reference: This Day in History at http://www.historychannel.com/tdih/tdih.jsp?category=leadstory
Wikipedia entry can be found here
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no subject
Date: 2005-04-11 01:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-04-11 02:12 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-04-11 03:05 pm (UTC)Which was completely appropriate. I often think that fans nominate a film or TV show to acknowledge it, but vote for the most appropriate production.
Except for the whole J.K. Rowling/George R. R. Martin thing. Railroad wuz robbed!
no subject
Date: 2005-04-11 03:17 pm (UTC)Besides, didn't the Apollo 11 coverage win a Hugo?
no subject
Date: 2005-04-11 03:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-04-11 03:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-04-11 03:28 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-04-11 06:00 pm (UTC)