Apollo 13 was NASA's third moon-landing mission, but the astronauts never made it to the lunar surface. During the mission's dramatic series of events, an oxygen tank explosion almost 56 hours into the flight forced the crew to abandon all thoughts of reaching the moon.
Walter Cunningham, the last surviving astronaut from the first successful crewed space mission in NASA's Apollo program, died Tuesday in Houston.
The crew returned safely to Earth on February 9, 1971, landing in the Pacific Ocean near Samoa after a flight of 9 days and 2 minutes.
The next two missions, Apollos 18 and 19, were later canceled after the Apollo 13 incident and further budget cuts. Two Skylab missions also ended up being canceled. Two complete Saturn V rockets remained unused and were put on display in the United States.
On Christmas morning, Apollo 8 left its lunar orbit and began its journey back to Earth, landing safely in the Pacific Ocean on December 27. On July 20 of the following year, Neil A. Armstrong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin, astronauts of the Apollo 11 mission, became the first men to walk on the moon.
At approximately 4:46 p.m. EDT Aug. 7, Apollo 15 splashed down in the Pacific Ocean, about 335 miles north of Honolulu, ending a flight of 12 days, seven hours.
The command module of Apollo 13 entered Earth's atmosphere and splashed down on target on April 17 at 1:07 PM Eastern Standard Time. The mission has been referred to as a successful failure, in that all the crew members survived a catastrophic accident.
Schirra really wasn't on us as bad as it seemed at the time. ... Bottom line was, even with a grumpy commander, we got the job done as a team." None of the Apollo 7 crew members flew in space again.
Apollo 2 and 3: There were no craft named Apollo 2 or 3. Apparently after the Apollo-1 craft was destroyed during a pre-flight test at Cape Canaveral, the first few mission (through Apollo-6) were unmanned missions to test various aspects of the Apollo program - Launch vehicle, CSM, LM, and their inter-play.
Apollo 13 was to be the third lunar landing attempt, but the mission was aborted after rupture of service module oxygen tank.
After orbiting the Moon 31 times, Apollo 10 returned safely to Earth; its success enabled the first crewed landing during Apollo 11 two months later.
With the world anxiously watching, Apollo 13, a U.S. lunar spacecraft that suffered a severe malfunction on its journey to the moon, safely returns to Earth on April 17, 1970. On April 11, the third manned lunar landing mission was launched from Florida, carrying astronauts James A.
According to George Mueller, who was associate administrator of NASA's Office of Manned Space Flight at the time, “There had been some speculation about whether or not the crew might have landed, having gotten so close. They might have wanted to, but it was impossible for that lunar module to land.
On April 28, 2021, Collins died of cancer at his home in Naples, Florida, at the age of 90. Buzz Aldrin, who became the last survivor of Apollo 11, said that "wherever [Collins has] been or will be, you will always have the Fire to Carry us deftly to new heights and the future."
APOLLO 1. The first manned Apollo mission was scheduled for launch on 21 February 1967 at Cape Kennedy Launch Complex 34. However, the death of the prime crew in a command module fire during a practice session on 27 January 1967 put America 's lunar landing program on hold.
Apollo 8 splashed down in the Pacific Ocean at 10:51 a.m. EST Dec. 27. The splashdown was about 5,100 yards from the recovery ship USS Yorktown, 147 hours after launch and precisely on time.
We'll spoil it for you, now: It totally worked. (meaning: It didn't explode.) Using the same Apollo Guidance Computer (the brains of the operation) created by Draper for the Apollo 1 mission, the Apollo 4 mission launched without any “major” issues from Kennedy Space Center.
Burns suffered by the crew were not believed to be major factors, and it was concluded that most of them had occurred postmortem. Asphyxiation occurred after the fire melted the astronauts' suits and oxygen tubes, exposing them to the lethal atmosphere of the cabin.
Mattingly's first prime assignment was to be the Command Module Pilot on the Apollo 13 mission. Three days prior to launch, he was removed from the mission due to exposure to German measles (which he never contracted) and was replaced by the backup CM pilot, Jack Swigert.
Just 18 hours after launch, Apollo 8 experienced a major problem: Borman fell ill and struggled through vomiting and diarrhea. The commander felt better after getting some sleep, but as a precaution, the other crewmembers radioed to Earth on a private channel and explained Borman's predicament.
The mission concluded on March 13 and was a complete success. It proved the LM worthy of crewed spaceflight, setting the stage for the dress rehearsal for the lunar landing, Apollo 10, before the ultimate goal, landing on the Moon.
At the outset of the program, NASA had formally established the target probability of overall success for each Apollo mission—a landing and return—at 90 percent. Overall crew safety was estimated at 99.9 percent.
Apollo 12 survived a lightning strike during its launch on Nov. 14, 1969, and arrived at the Moon three days later. Astronauts Charles Conrad and Alan Bean descended to the surface, while Richard Gordon remained in lunar orbit aboard the Command Module.
3.5 Apollo 13
During the second period, the Commander, Command Module Pilot, and Lunar Module Pilot slept 5, 6, and 9 hours, respectively. The third sleep period was scheduled for 61 hours, but the orygen tank incident at 56 hours precluded sleep by any of the crew until approximately 80 hours.
An explosion 56 hours into the mission happened before the command module and lunar module had separated, so the crew were able to use the intact lunar module as a lifeboat with its own power sources, rockets and oxygen supply.