Apollo 13, We Have a Solution

[nacnud]

35 years after the landing of Apollo 13 the IEEE Spectrum Online takes a look at what happened.<font color="yellow"><br /><br />Apollo 13, We Have a Solution<br />By Stephen Cass<br /><br />Rather than hurried improvisation, saving the crew of Apollo 13 took years of preparation<br /><br /><b>13 April 2005—"Houston, we've had a problem."</b><br /><br />Thirty-five years ago today, these words marked the start of a crisis that nearly killed three astronauts in outer space. In the four days that followed, the world was transfixed as the crew of Apollo 13—Jim Lovell, Fred Haise, and Jack Swigert—fought cold, fatigue, and uncertainty to bring their crippled spacecraft home. <br /><br />But the crew had an angel on their shoulders—in fact thousands of them—in the form of the flight controllers of NASA's mission control and supporting engineers scattered across the United States. More. </font>/safety_wrapper>

 

[claywoman]

It is so hard for me to realize that its been thirty-five years ago, my son was a baby, and I was pregnant with my second child due in September. I remember this as happening yesterday!!! I was one of those that dropped everything to watch the TV when it was on TV whether or not it was my time or if I had to get up in the middle of the night. I never took things for granted because on launches, I remembered all those films of blow-ups!! I may not have been a scientist, but I knew all of these trips were a gamble.<br /><br />I also remember barely sleeping until they came home. I remember barely breathing and thinking they'd died when it took so long for them to respond when they entered the atmosphere. This is still almost a nightmare....