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35th Anniversary of Apollo 13 Splashdown
orac2 writes "35 years ago today, the crew of the Apollo 13 mission splashed down in the Pacific, after a harrowing four days following an oxygen tank explosion aboard their spacecraft. If you've only seen the Ron Howard movie, IEEE Spectrum has an article about what really went on in mission control to save the crew, with interviews with Gene Kranz, etc,and including a previously unreported hack the lunar module controllers had to come up with in real-time just to turn on the LM."
There's no lieing in movies!
Slashdot, we have a problem.
The old NASA geeks were true geeks. They had to solve incredible problems on the fly. For example, like in the film, where a roomful of geeks sit down at a table, a bunch of random stuff is dumped on a table, and they have to get a square peg into a round hole using nothing but what was there. Imagine having to debug a remote system failure that's floating in space, using nothing but radio communications and screw instrumentation data?
The movie is a dramatization as Ron Howard points out, but I saw an Apollo 13 documentary that played actual recordings from the transmissions, and the film used a lot of the dialogue word-for-word. "Let's not make things worse by guessing."
So, will we have to see this article every 5 years now?
-stalefries
My favorite scene is when Tom Hanks says to the President over the radio to Houston: "I gotta pee", at which point his 55 IQ-lets him open the airlock to step outside. He had that horrid urine problem at least until John Coffee cured it.
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
Convert a LEM into a lifeboat, work out the proper equipment sequence to keep the power drain down to a minimum level, determine the correct trajectory with a "computer" roughly as powerful as a modern wristwatch, cobble together some CO2 scrubbers to fit where they weren't supposed to, and save three lives in the process. Tops pretty much anything else I've seen.
Paleotechnologist and connoisseur of pretty shiny things.
Now we're looking at Mars, but there's only so much duct tape we can wrap around these shuttles. I wish some of the enthusiasm and can-do attitude towards space that we had in the early days would return so that this next trek could be adequately funded and researched.
I never vote for anyone. I always vote against.
-- W.C. Fields
...and was born after the actual mission, that movie is "what I remember" about the Apollo 13 mission. Thankfully, it was well done, and reasonably accurate. It's good to see that we've got further background thanks to the Slashdot story.
DBA? Software Engineer? My company is hiring! Click
You bourgeois capitalist Amerikan's make me sick; stealing surpluss labor from the masses for your precious French perfume. BAH! Against the brick wall for you!
*bang!*
It always amazes me how much more interesting and captivating a truthful and detailed account is, than any kind of "sexed up" hollywwod adaptation of it!
I have proof. In the 2002 playboy, NFL running back Marshall Faulk dispells all the myths about landing on the moon. We were in an arms race, and the US government turned to hollywood insiders to produce films that made it appear we were more advanced than the USSR, in a hopes the USSR economy would implode. Think about it, this is a football player poking holes in the NASA propoganda.
According to Faulk, there is no wind on the moon. But if you look at the picture of the two astronots with the flag, there is a breeze shown in the picture.
If you look at many of the pictures taken while on the moon, you will notice no stars. That is because all these pictures were taken indoors, in a studio in hollywood.
There is also a picture of a rock on the moon with the letter "C" on it. Obviously, every rock in the studio was lettered and was meticulously put in place.
Now the truth is, we are not alone in the universe. Aliens have visited earth, and we even have one of their spaceships. It is kept in Area 51, in the Nevada desert at a top secret Air Force base. How secret is it, not even you elected Senators can gain access. Before his death, US Senator Paul Simon asked for all information about area 51, his request was denied. He traveled to the gates of the compound with another senator, a US Army General, and 3 memebers of congress, and they were all turned away at gunpoint. Furthermore, the people who work there are not regular Air Force enlisted and officers. They all come from a seperate agency, on the public does not know about.
I'll leave one more bone to chew on. If NASA could make a space ship, fly it to the moon, develop suits for astronots to be protected from extremem heat and cold, along with radiation, how come the camera's they took with them are all so shitty? The video is horrible. It is like someone made it that way on purpose, like someone who counterfits money and then rubs dirt on it and tries to make it look used.
Rosco: "If brains were gunpowder, Enos couldn't blow his nose."
I was going to MIT in 1995 when the film was released. Everybody at the adjacent Sloan School of Management was talking about it and called it a perfect case study of great project management and team work. The article confirms that - great read.
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.
I wish that NASA of today was as exciting and had the same respect as back then. The leadership did not say, "Sorry Apollo 13, you're dead, and we won't spend any resources in a futile attempt to save you." Two shuttle disasters later due to bureaucracy and they don't even have the balls to save Hubble let alone mount a human trip to Mars.
Do I dare to watch it or should I just delete it?
We didn't go to the moon! The shadows aren't parallel! The Van-Allen belt would have fried them all instantly! Why is there no huge flame coming out of the bottom of the lander? Last time I set fire to some petrol it burnt with a fire, what, is the petrol they used not flammable or something? Why no photographs of the stars? Why not point a telescope at the moon and look at the flag? We can see stars literally hundreds of miles away, why not a flag on the moon?
Shitram Brown, PhD
Professor of Mathematics
The best part of that movie was when he up-chucked... it was so nasty. Oh, the drama!
Linux blog http://nsajeff.com/blog
Failure is not an Option By Gene Kranz -- the link goes to a google search for the book. (Choose your own bookseller - no amazon link whoring).
Gene Kranz (the guy with the serious crewcut) tells the whole story of how they got to the point to where the "geeks" could make a life and death difference in this situation, and then how they managed to pull it off. Its a great study of real engineering by real engineers under incredible time pressure, with the lives of people and the hopes of the nation in their hands.
Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo! http://goo.gl/J9bkO
...now all of our science is just to build better weapons systems. Sigh.
Civilians are normally denied access to secure military areas. I'm sure your Senator wouldn't be allowed to wander around the Pentagon either, but I can't regard this as evidence of a big secret conspiracy.
God forbid if Senators knew the truth, if they could look around. What good is the Senators vote if they can't get access?
We have the new Patriot Act which gives the executive branch, the FBI and other agencies great new powers. They can listen in to any citizen, anywhere, without a warrent, for any reason. But our own Senators can't look around the Pentagon, they can't go to Area 51?
So, if YOU were ELECTED to the United States Senate, and were entrusted with the power of your office, to protect your constituents, and you requested to see Area 51 and were denied, you would be okay with that? Don't you have an ABSOLUTE right to know the truth, to see it with your own eyes? For god sake, you were ELECTED, and not some dopey office like mayor, but a person who can vote for war.
Then again, the whole Congress, both the House of Representatives and the United States Senate were lied to about Iraq, about wepons of mass destruction. Not one peep out of the senior membership. Obviously, they are under the control of someone, some agency. I wish I knew which agency, and how, but I am sure the truth is out there.
Rosco: "If brains were gunpowder, Enos couldn't blow his nose."
... did the LEM run Linux?
. . . for the HISTORY of mankind, those in power lied to everyone else. Gallileo was put in jail because of what he knew. Countless others were executed.
It is dangerous to be right in matters on which the established authorities are wrong. -- Voltaire
In the late 80's (Flight Test Engineer). A lot of the guys who worked on the LEM and where there during the accident were still around. Some sat next to me. I got to hear some really great stories about what happened, and the things they had to do.
My favorite was that they (Grumman) got everyone who had anything to do with the program rounded up, put in a large room, and then they put an armed guard at the door. You could leave to go to the bathroom, that was it. They all stayed in there working on solutions and answering questions until Apollo landed, and apparently noone even complained.(Try that these days!)
Also it was a tradition at Grumman to point to the LEM and what it did, and how well it was made. It set a very high standard that we were all expected to live up to, and were often reminded of.
If I were a mission controller and asked about this stuff, it would probably go like this:
asked within 5 years: good informative details
asked after 5-10 years: less details: you'd have more if you asked earlier
asked after 10-15 years: way less details: you'd have much more if you asked earlier
asked after 15-20 years: refuses to answer: this is pointless, you should have asked me when it was fresh in my mind
asked after 20-25 years: refuses to answer
asked after 25-30 years: refuses to answer
asked after 30-35 years: I don't remember anything significant, but let's talk about it, old people like to talk!!
It amazes me that there are still people who are gullible enough to believe we actually went to the moon. Amazing!
All those Apollo anniversaries make me sad. 35 years is my whole life, I was born the same year Apollo 13 made its epic return to Earth. And what happened through my whole life with space exploration? Are we further than we were in 1970? All that's left from the grand dreams of the period are some old shuttles, that make news when they fly at all, a space station which we wouldn't be able to operate without Russian (paid) help and a huge, costly government agency that produces lots of nice animations, small droids and very, very little substance - and tons of SF movies. In our silver screen dreams we have already conquered whole galaxy, in reality we hardly moved.
I know it's a harsh judgment. But technologically speaking we could have been walking on Mars a decade ago, we could have been visiting Moon regularly, we could have been sending dozens of automated probes each year not just a few. Isn't that sad?
I think it is each time I have to ask myself: will I live long enough to see anything to even match, let alone outshine Apollo achievements?
.. the US government in a lie? Ever? If you have, then why would you believe the government when they told you we actually landed on the moon. I don't know about you, but if I catch someone in a lie, their credibility is ruined and I can never trust anything they say.
Oh, we went to the moon? Yeah, sure.. and I have some ocean-front property in Arizona I'd like to sell you.
What a perfect little world you must live in where you can pick and choose what is true and what is not.
i cant believe people believe in cats, i mean kittens: yeh. but cats? how absolutely obsurd!
Are for sucks. Nobody gives a damn until 50 anyways.
> "Twelve amps is about as much power as a vacuum cleaner uses."
No, that's the amount of *current* a vacuum cleaner *might* use. It says nothing about its power at all.
I'm such a pedant.
Satire is alive and kicking here on /. So funny it it made me tear up. Me want OOG_THE_CAVEMAN return!!!
How the story of Apollo 13 is a glowing testament to the bravery and persistence of the human spirit, but there always has to be the few people that come in and say "OMG we never landed on teh moon!" and ruin it for everyone else. It makes me sick that you would disrespect the people who were involved in the Apollo missions like that. What about the three astronauts who *died* in the fire on Apollo 1? You want to piss on their graves by saying that the moon landings never happened? I'm ashamed to be of the same species as you. Fucking bottom-feeders.
Real_men_don't_need_spacebars.
1) I don't want to watch Apollo 13. I don't like Science Fiction movies.
2) Why don't they use the Space Shuttle to rescue the Apollo 13 crew?
you'd have made some sense.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
The Apollo crews used modified Hasselblad 500EL/M's loaded with 70mm film, not a standard 35mm SLR...
a po llo.photechnqs.htm
a 11 /a11-hass.html
http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/alsj/
http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/alsj/
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You know, when I first read your post I nodded my head understanding your position - though not really agreeing with it, I understood it. But the more I looked at everyone else's posts, the more I realize that your opinion is pretty widespread - and, in my opinion, it's a pretty cynical and clouded view.
I guess I see the state of space exploration differently. Instead of all the glitz and glamor of manned space flight from the past, the focus is shifting. Space exploration is undergoing a maturing phase. To the naked eye, I can see how it may look like things have stagnated, but that's really not true. Yes, the equipment is getting older. Yes, we've not bothered to repeat some of the past successes in favor of attempting new ones. And yes, NASA's goals are sometimes less obvious to the general public while the failures are more pronounced. But the dreams and the talent were not lost with the sixties! If you think that I can see why you'd be crying in your Cheerios.
Look - the focus has shifted some from manned space flight to research. The focus is shifting from a government run program to the private sector. Things can't always move at break-neck speed. But, if you look at the progress made in less than half a century, it adds up to more than was made in all humankind's existence prior. The dreams aren't dead and it isn't at all boo-hoo-sad. I believe your perspective, like many people's, is just narrowed to your acute view from your short lifetime. Look at it from a different standpoint - pushing aside all the mire of politics and funding and failure and memories of glamorous missions from the past - push all that aside and looking at it from what we as a species still dream to accomplish. And if history is any indicator, we'll keep finding a way to move forward. Maybe not fast enough for you to recognize it, but still faster than humanity has moved ever before.
I have to agree with the other anonymous coward: most people would have worked night and day in that situation.
I'd ask anyone who would not willingly do the same without complaint to remove themselves from the human population, but such a person doesn't exist (though a few might claim they would when not in that position) so there is no point.
Back when we first quit the migratory life to farm we made a lot of great strides, but what has changed since then? We still grow the same corn. Sure we have tractors now, but even they have not advanced in years again.
There are points in time where everything comes together and makes what seems like giant leaps. However they are not as much as they seem. Things have to build for a long time before the technology is ready for the leap. Then we make the leap quick, and have to settle down because there is very little more we can.
Computers have been advancing fast for years, but there is evidence that Moore's law is coming to an end. (though there is some hope that it might continue for a few more years) That is the way everything is.
He is joking.
He's raising the standard array of moon-hoax objections.
Sadly, they sound about that stupid.
Uh, you do realize don't you that the Hubble is a lifeless hunk of hardware? Oh, and Apollo 13 was a MANNED mission, and the rescue was about saving mens lives? We can always build another telscope.
Just a nit, but the LM was more popularly known as the Lunar Excursion Module.
Wait ... they performed no Excursions on this trip? >>>Never mind. >;-)
My sig is immuin to spel-cheks
Actually, by the time the LM flew, they'd officially lost the 'E' from the name, but everyone involved still pronounced LM as 'lem' anyway. But in the documentation, it's always written as LM.
"Just once, I'd like to meet an alien menace that wasn't immune to bullets." -- The Brigadier, Dr. Who
That nay be true for program documentation but NASA has traditionally called it the LEM as noted in this 1999 NASA press release.
Sigs? We dont need no steenking sigs!
One thing that struck me from reading that article is the enormous amount of flexibility in both materials and design of the spacecraft then compared to spacecraft now. I know many many people here on slashdot have pointed out that the escape systems on the shuttles were dropped in order to save money, but that's not the entire problem.
From what I gather, the guys in mission control had to jump through many hoops to get things to work after the explosion, but firstly, they had practiced almost every possible problem, (the use of LM power to run the mission shortly after launch although it was blocked because of dead CM batteries and the CO2 filters which were recognised as necessary immediatley by one guy as soon as he heard the LM was to be used).
The design and materials were extremely primitive by today's standards, but relays are a lot easier to reconfigure than a modern computer chip and the simplicity of the filters meant that with basic materials they could be reconfigured.
In other words, the machines were vastly more robust than modern systems.
And then there's the planning. They had actually taken, although not seriously enough initially, but later someone had decided to check that contingency out all the same.
With the shuttles, there has never been a way to fix anything if the machine would fuck up in orbit. Nada. Costs too much. And what really absolutely amazes me is that NASA, that spends around $400 million on a single shuttle launch never thought about renting or buying 2 or 3 Russian Soyuz craft to be ready on a permanent basis in case something happened in orbit, and that even though Soyuz launches only cost a tiny fraction of shuttle launches, are far easier and faster to prepare and launch, and don't even cost much at all if they aren't launched and everything goes well.
And no one, even after Challenger in 86, thought about checking out the shuttle regularly in orbit.
In some ways, it's almost criminal neglect. What happened to NASA?
I guess it's one of those six-of-one, half-a-dozen of the other things: for example in his book, Lovell calls it the LEM, while in his book Kranz uses LM.
"Just once, I'd like to meet an alien menace that wasn't immune to bullets." -- The Brigadier, Dr. Who
Since you're picking nits, the Lunar Excursion Module (LEM) was renamed to just the Lunar Module (LM, but still pronounced "lem") shortly before the first lunar flights.
Don't know why -- maybe to save ink, for all I know -- but LM is the correct terminology for the actual lunar flight era. Cute graphics on integrated circuits aside.
-- Alastair
This year marks the 35th anniversary of Apollo 13, but it's also the 10th anniversary of Ron Howard's "Apollo 13".
There's an Apollo 13 Anniversary Edition DVD out, which includes the IMAX version!
There's more info at IMDB and Google Reviews.
Good quote:
When the shuttle first flew, there was a concern about the tiles. I remember stories about how they flew the shuttle over a telescope in Hawaii to check the tiles. I also remember talk about a device that would squirt an ablative goo into the cavity of any missing tile. Lately, I hear that there's no way to repair tile damage in orbit. What ever happened to this device?
"I'm not impatient. I just hate waiting." - My Dad
the difference is, the aritcle was written for people like you or me, who can understand the technical intricacies.
However, joe public would not have understood, and woudl have simply turned off. Hence the dramatisation, and dumbing down, in the movie.
Have a nice day!
35 years? Geeze! I'm getting old.
"Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past." -- George Orwell
It amazes me that there are still people who are gullible enough to believe we actually went to the moon.
It's the same people who measure the distance variations between the earth and moon by hitting the laser targets left on the moon.
They did leave the reflectors behind.
The truth shall set you free!
I use this saying when helping someone with a very initial debugging and it seems it is not possible to get a program running without crashing or lockup.
By the way, NOVA did an Apollo 13 show with extensive interviews of Jim Lovell and Gene Kranz -- much like the Beatles documentary that gave a lot of airtime to George Martin -- and I never saw the need to see the Ron Howard film, although Harrison Schmidt, the geology PhD who went to the Moon, tells audiences of his talk to go see it. Who am I to argue with a guy who actually went to the Moon whether the Ron Howard film is worth seeing?
"Drivel?"
What, did you mistake this for Amazon.com? The big word to use here is "pedantic"
Elliot Gould will get to the bottom of this. (Capricorn One)
The best book on the Apollo 13 mission is 13: The Flight That Failed by Henry S. F. Cooper. (The link is to Amazon.com.)
I first read it in 1972, when it was first released. If you're interested in understanding the Apollo program, this book may be the best place to start. Telling the story of Apollo 13, Cooper introduces the flight controllers and explains how they work together. He provides a foundation for understanding ANY Apollo mission.
The official NASA line was always that we had detailed plans ready for any possible contingency. It wasn't true. Cooper's book shows how mortal men, armed with a slide rules, sharp intellects, and a deep understanding of their machines, invented their way out of a series of completely unforeseen problem.
I've read the book about five times. It never takes me much more than a day to read it, because once I've started, I just can't put it down. Highly recommended.
When all you have is an axe, everything looks like a grindstone.