The Hard-won Triumph of the Apollo 13 Mission – 45 Years Later
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Astronauts
Fred Haise (left), Jack Swigert and James Lovell pose with the Apollo
13 patch and spacecraft models the day before launch. Image Credit: NASA
The blast obliterated one of three fuel cells and an oxygen tank. Oxygen jetted into space from the command module’s remaining tank.
“Houston, we’ve had a problem here,” astronaut Jack Swigert told mission control in Houston at what was then NASA’s Manned Spacecraft Center (now Johnson Space Center).
“We’ve had a main B bus undervolt,” Mission Commander James Lovell said. One of the command module’s two main electrical circuits had experienced a drop in power.
From
their key positions in this control center at Goddard, the Manned Space
Flight Network operations director and staff controlled Apollo mission
communications activities throughout a far-flung worldwide complex of
stations. Image Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
Less than two hours after Swigert’s message was transmitted to Houston, mission control pronounced the command module mortally wounded. With only 15 minutes of power left, astronauts Swigert, Jim Lovell and Fred Haise escaped to the “life boat” of the lunar module.
President Richard Nixon learned of the crisis shortly after the explosion, and hemet with Goddard Center Director John F. Clark the following day for an update. William C. Schneider, director of NASA’s Skylab program, briefed the president on the status of the rescue mission in Goddard’s Manned Space Flight Network control room, through which communications to and from Apollo 13 passed.
Then-Goddard
Center Director John Clark greets President Richard Nixon, who visited
the center for an Apollo 13 briefing on April 14, 1970. At right is
Henry Thompson, deputy director of manned flight support at Goddard.
Image Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
The crew spent three-and-a-half grueling days in the lunar module. They rationed food and water, which mission designers had only intended to last two men a day and a half, not three men three days. Carbon dioxide reached dangerous levels in the lunar module before the team managed to convert square filters from the command module to fit in the round openings on the lunar module. When the crew shut the instruments off to conserve power, the inside temperature reached an icy 38 F.
But reorienting the lunar module to a return-to-Earth trajectory from a lunar landing course proved to be one of the most difficult and important obstacles to hurdle.
Navigation and targeting functions were unavailable. Debris from the explosion made it impossible for the crew to navigate by the stars using the on-board sextant. In a nail-biting maneuver, the astronauts improvised by using the limb of Earth, or the horizon where Earth meets the atmosphere, as a reference point. They were then able to perform a controlled fuel burn to shorten the time ’til splashdown on Earth.
Then-NASA
Administrator Thomas Paine (center), together with staff members from
NASA Headquarters and the Manned Spacecraft Center, applaud the
successful splashdown of the Apollo 13 mission. The splashdown occurred
at 12:07 p.m., April 17, 1970, in the south Pacific Ocean. Image Credit:
NASA
On April 17, 1970, the crew splashed down in the Pacific Ocean near Samoa.
The performance of Goddard’s Manned Space Flight Network contributed significantly to the safe return of the astronauts, said Dale Call, then-MSFN network director. He said the network performed better then than on any previous Apollo mission.
Houston’s flight operations director commended MSFN operators for their critical help with the mission.
Throughout the crisis, the network remained consistent and reliable in relaying communications to and from Apollo 13 despite the tracking difficulties imposed by the failure of the command module. As engineers on the ground hurriedly created workarounds for each challenge that arose, such as the carbon dioxide issue, they could only be communicated to the crew via the network.
Although the mission was not able to achieve its scientific goals, NASA’s rescue mission was an agency triumph.
“With astronauts Lovell, Haise and Swigert safely back on Earth, a surpassing human drama that gripped the world for three-and-a-half days at last has a happy ending,” President Richard Nixon said following the astronauts’ return. “Their safe return is a tribute to their own courage and also to the ingenuity and resourcefulness of those on the ground who helped transform potential tragedy into a heart-stopping rescue.”
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