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Apollo 13 Engineers to be Honored

Posted by samzenpus on from the duct-tape-to-the-rescue dept.

sconeu writes "Yahoo! News is carrying a story that the engineers who helped save the crew of Apollo 13 will be honored by GlobalSpec. The article mentions the jury rigged air scrubbers, and gives duct tape its due." Here is our coverage of the 35th anniversary.

27 of 183 comments (clear)

  1. The real hero was of course by beders · · Score: 5, Funny

    An inanimate carbon rod

    --
    Brocklesby Park Cricket Club
  2. Obligatory duct tape joke by gowen · · Score: 5, Funny

    Duct tape is like The Force. It has a light side, a dark side, and it's used to bind the universe together.

    --
    Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
  3. Who? by FTL · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Who the heck are GlobalSpec? Is it news when some random company decides to award someone famous? Can I get also get front-page Slashdot story if my company gives "a crystal globe" to Linus Torvalds and/or Bill Gates?

    No criticism to the Apollo 13 engineers. What they did was amazing. But what's this story got to do with them?

    --
    Slashdot monitor for your Mozilla sidebar or Active Desktop.
    1. Re:Who? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful
      Who the heck are GlobalSpec [globalspec.com]?
      They are, according to themselves "The Engineering Search Engine".
      Is it news when some random company decides to award someone famous? Can I get also get front-page Slashdot story if my company gives "a crystal globe" to Linus Torvalds and/or Bill Gates?
      No you probably wont get front page Slashdot publicity if you try and do something similar to what Globalspec has done. If only because they thought of it before you did. Unfortunately, for your company, this is how the world works.
    2. Re:Who? by artifex2004 · · Score: 3, Informative
      They're an engineering company.


      Actually,

      "GlobalSpec is a rapidly growing B-to-B, Internet-based, 'media-model' business linking buyers and sellers in the $500 billion electrical, mechanical and optical products markets."

      You must have mistaken their front page search links to mean they actually had something to do with those things?

      They do seem to be good at generating hot air and pageviews with press releases, anyway.
    3. Re:Who? by houghi · · Score: 5, Funny

      Can I get also get front-page Slashdot story if my company gives "a crystal globe" to Linus Torvalds and/or Bill Gates?

      No, but give either/both an enema and it will be frontpage news.

      --
      Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
  4. Duct tape saves the day by kiljin · · Score: 5, Funny

    Now we just have to figure out how to use duct tape to convert from english to metric units.

  5. Thing I'd like to know is... by Smiffa2001 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    ...why the air scrubbers were different shapes in the first place? Was it because of an engineering reason (room/volume to fit into) or because two different teams were working on the designs of the two modules? Seems daft that on essentially the same spacecraft, there are two devices that do the same job with different designs. It's always bothered me...

    That aside, it is good to see these guys being recognised.

    1. Re:Thing I'd like to know is... by jonwil · · Score: 4, Informative

      The command module was build by North American Aviation and the Lunar Module was built by Grumman Aerospace.
      So it could well be the case that since 2 different companies built the 2 different air systems, they used 2 different shapes of CO2 filters because no-one bothered to make them the same (after all, it didnt matter much at the time)

    2. Re:Thing I'd like to know is... by macpeep · · Score: 4, Informative

      Because the command module was made by a different company than the lunar module and nobody thought about coordinating / unifying components between the two since nobody ever envisioned that there would actually be any need to use parts from one as spare parts for the other.

      Contrary to popular belief, NASA does very little itself. Pretty much everything is done by subcontractors.

    3. Re:Thing I'd like to know is... by CausticPuppy · · Score: 4, Funny

      done by subcontractors

      And not just any subcontractors, mind you... but the lowest bidders. :-)

      --
      -CausticPuppy "Of all the people I know, you're certainly one of them." -Somebody I don't know
    4. Re:Thing I'd like to know is... by Steven+Edwards · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Yes I laugh whenever I hear/read someone bitch about lowest bidders on a contract. The most impressive enginering feats were done with slave labor. Throwing money at a problem solves nothing.

      --
      Why clone Unix when I can clone Windows instead. http://www.reactos.org
    5. Re:Thing I'd like to know is... by Illserve · · Score: 4, Funny

      The obvious answer is because the entire thing was a hoax. Ron Howard was contacted at the time (he was already 15 and NASA computers predicted he would be a great film director) and asked what would make his movie (already planned for production in 1995 back in the 70's) dramatic, and he came up with this idea.

      It should also be pointed out that Tom Hanks is a robot specifically made to star in Apollo 13, which explains his meteoric rise to acting stardom. In fact, Bosom Buddies was created to serve as his vehicle by NASA.

      NASA has more plans in place for both Ron and Tom in further upcoming movies about the "moon landings". Just you wait.

  6. Damn it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny
    "the jury rigged air scrubbers"

    I knew they didn't get a fair trial...

  7. Good training and preparedness by GomezAdams · · Score: 5, Interesting
    One of the processes of setting up any critical mission whether for space or here below is doing the 'what if' drills. As a former submariner we trained to do our jobs under normal circumstances, then drilled even more for doing that job and several others under duress. Same with the space program. They have procedures for every almost every contingency and drill the crew and staff untl they could handle stress and deliver.

    Bravo to them and the Apollo 13 crew. Well done!

    --
    Too lazy to create a sig...
    1. Re:Good training and preparedness by orac2 · · Score: 3, Informative

      Actually, if you read the original article in Spectrum, you'll see that a lot of it was simulated: in particular critical lifeboat procedures (including the important power-the-CSM-from-the-LM-through-the-umbilicals bit) were developed after an Apollo 10 sim where three fuel cells were failed at almost the same point that they did on 13.

      And they did have a bunch of mainframes on the ground for the heavy lifting with the trajectory calculations.

      While there was some brilliant improvisation (the LM controllers hack to power up the LM for example), the controllers were by no mean 'winging it': thanks to leadership, teamwork, dedication and skill, when it came to crunch time, they'd already had a lot of the work done.

      Disclaimer: I'm the author of the Spectrum article!

      --
      "Just once, I'd like to meet an alien menace that wasn't immune to bullets." -- The Brigadier, Dr. Who
  8. Engineering 101 by jag2k · · Score: 5, Funny

    No engineering project is complete unless it's held together by copious amounts of duct tape. No exceptions.

  9. Good Idea by lbmouse · · Score: 4, Funny

    Congratulations to the Apollo 13 engineers.

    They should do something like this every year. They have the Grammies, Emmys, etc., why not the Nerdies? They could use Slashdot sections as the categories.

  10. Great quote about duct tape... by tyroneking · · Score: 4, Funny

    "One thing a Southern boy will never say is, 'I don't think duct tape will fix it.'"
    That's so cool, but obviously means I'll never want to visit the South without my own personal surgeon.

  11. Re:Duct tape.. by thevoice · · Score: 3, Interesting

    For that kind of industrial strength goodness you need gaffer tape.

    I've seen doors hinged on that stuff alone, it leaves duct tape for dead.

  12. Re:damned grammar. by Bush+Pig · · Score: 4, Informative

    No. It's "jury rigged" and "jerry built".

    "Jury rigged" implies a kludge that allows you to survive (say, if your ship got dismasted, or something). "Jerry built" applies mostly to extremely poorly built houses (the kind that has mortar made of flour paste).

    --
    What a long, strange trip it's been.
  13. Houston We('ve) ha(d/ve) a problem? by McFadden · · Score: 5, Interesting
    What I found most interesting from the Yahoo! article was the "Houston we've had a problem" quote. Assuming the journalist has done his homework (and a quick Google search would indicate that he probably has), it's interesting that the phrase "Houston we have a problem" seems to be the one that has entered the public consciousness (or at least amongst the crowd that I hang out with).

    As for which was uttered on Apollo 13, I think the latter phrase is the one that accompanied the eponymous movie about the troubled flight (IMDB confirms this) and so has become more well known amongst a certain generation than the original.

    As someone who used to teach English, hats off to Swigert, who in his moment of crisis used the more appropriate present perfect tense (have + past participle) to suggest an incident that happened in the (recent) past but is still (extremely) relevant now.

    Sorry.... I really should get out more.

    McF

    1. Re:Houston We('ve) ha(d/ve) a problem? by peshewa · · Score: 5, Informative
      From the actual air-to-ground transcript:

      02 07 53 12 CMP Okay. Stand by.
      02 07 55 19 LMP Okay, Houston - -
      02 07 55 20 CDR I believe we've had a problem here.
      02 07 55 28 CC This is Houston. Say again, please.
      02 07 55 35 CDR Houston, we've had a problem. We've had a MAIN B BUS UNDERVOLT.
      02 07 55 42 CC Roger. MAIN B UNDERVOLT.

  14. I was the film but can't remember by jago25_98 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Guess it was a while ago but I can't remember how they did it. That's Tom Hanks for you.

    As a result here's my executive summary:

    - oxygen tank exploded
    - 2 of 3 fuel cells lost
    "Houston, we've had a problem."

    - Ed Smylie, engineer at home watching TV disaster rushes into the centre
    - O2 buildup fixable with lithium hydroxide canisters to help CO2 buildup...
    but some of the backup square canisters were not compatible with the round openings in the lunar module

    "If you saw the movie (`Apollo 13'), it wasn't like that," Smylie said, adding there wasn't any hollering and screaming. "Everything is pretty calm, cool and collected in our business."

    - used duck-tape to convert the backup square canisters to fit the round lunar module fittings

    - this allowed the astronauts to breath just that little bit longer

    --
    A blog I run for the wealth
  15. Long Overdue... by IdJit · · Score: 3, Interesting

    These guys deserved special recognition decades ago. What they did for those guys up there was nothing short of remarkable, especially in a highly dangerous environment such as space, and most remarkably with the fledgling technology they had available.

    Kudos to the often-uncelebrated ground crew and their determination to get Lovell and crew back safely.

    --
    GET FREE APPLE STUFF!
  16. A Top Ten Geek Movie by theonetruekeebler · · Score: 4, Interesting
    Apollo 13 is easily one of the ten best geek movies out there. I really and truly admired the engineers the film portrayed---they were clever and resourceful, kluging up a solution to a life-threatening problem tens of thousands of miles away.

    The reason this is such a wonderful geek film is that there is no bad guy. No evil to overcome. It's not even man versus nature. It's man versus The Problem, and man, brandishing a slide rule and some duct tape, triumphs.

    --
    This is not my sandwich.
  17. Re:News? by AviLazar · · Score: 3, Funny

    When I first read this article on /. I was about to make a post "uhm hasn't this already been posted on /. before?" Then I realized I had read it on CNN one or two days ago...

    --

    I mod down so you can mod up. Your welcome.