"Okay. Houston We've Had A Problem Here!"

[Dain Arns]

It was 40 years ago, today, 'Odyssey' lifted off at 13:13hrs with it's LM 'Aquarius' for a landing on the Fra Mauro Highlands.
Of course Apollo 13 never made that landing.

"Houston we have a problem!" has become a commonly used phrase to indicate a problem by most folks even to this day.
Back then it was chilling statement that sparked a race for survival for 3 US Astronauts.

For the next week as the world looked on, a NASA ground team refused to 'Fail', with the only goal to successfully bring their 3 Astronauts home, James Lovell, John Swigert, and Fred Haise, on April 17th, 1970.

Hard to believe for me it's been 40 years already...



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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A82Ol8J1g_I&feature=player_embedded

[Clarke123]

I think I might just dig out my from the earth to the moon boxset now. :salute:

[Dain Arns]

I think I might just dig out my from the earth to the moon boxset now. :salute:

Yep. Rewatching my set too.

Remember to insert Ron Howard's "Apollo 13" into the viewing list. :icon_lol:
What a great "Guy" movie that is... :salute:

[HouseHobbit]

I was just a young hobbit during all of this, and the apollo project was the biggest thing in My Life then.( real space fan)

When i saw the problem with Apollo 13 I honestly Cried..
Now we have it all as history, and with a great ending..
I re-do this now in video, but as a child is was live and unbelieveable..

[Z-claudius24]

Hi,

Methink I will outdust my box of:

BUZZ ALDRIN'S
Race into the space
From Interplay
Minimum specifications:
IBM/Tandy and 100% compatible with DOS 3.1 or higher
16 Mhz 386 SX or faster
Require 4 MB of RAM
(565 K + 3Megs EMS)
Colour monitor required
VGA/MCGA Graphics required (320 X 200 256 colours)

:jump::jump::jump:

[Skittles]

In May I'm meeting Fred Haise :salute:

[Ken Stallings]

When you have an emergency in an airplane that requires an emergency landing, you at least have a plausible, and normally a likely, chance to survive the crash landing (or ditching) and survive.

In space, if your spacecraft fails, you simply die and have zero chance to seek an alternate outcome.

I think few people appreciate the enormity of the risks these men and women took, and continue to take, to explore and work in space. The rewards are worth every bit of the risk and that's why so many talented people volunteer.

Apollo 13 took it to the absolute limits of what can be recovered. It was a credit to everyone in NASA and the contractors, both on the ground and in the spacecraft.

Ken

[David_L6]

Well said Ken.


I remember the Apollo program, but just barely. I wasn't very old then. I do remember 11 and 13 well though.

[jmig]

Forty years ago!!! Thanks for making me feel old!

I cut my ROTC class to watch the splash down. The Professor gave me a "B" in the course because of that cut. Only "B" I made in ROTC.

I won't talk about the other classes. :d

[txnetcop]

The world held it's breath on that one! Thank God it had a great ending!
Ted
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[Lionheart]

I had read the book on it, 'Apollo 13, the Flight that Failed' and it was nothing compared to the movie with Tom Hanks and company. Man, that was one heck of an ordeal on those people and all of NASA and the country...

Soooo many things went wrong... Filters not fitting, switch breaking off, mixup in the flightplan that should have been missed and overlooked which would have caused them to skip the atmosphere or burn up, etc, etc, etc... Amazing they lived through the cold in there..

Thank the Lord they made it home safe and sound...


Bill

[Bjoern]

A prime example of keeping one's cool no matter what the situation.

I bet if Pete Conrad had been up there, there would have had been a lot of funny exchanges no matter how serious the situation. :icon_lol: