Fifty Years Ago: Apollo 13 Launch Date Reset
Following a highly successful 1969 that saw four Apollo missions, including the first human Moon landing, 1970 began on a less rosy note. On Jan. 4, NASA Administrator Thomas O. Paine announced the cancellation of the final Moon-landing mission, Apollo 20, due to reductions in the agency’s budget. The schedule for the remaining Moon-landing missions would be stretched out, lengthening the interval between flights from four to six months. Scientists examining the samples returned from the Moon actually preferred the longer gaps between flights, since it allowed them more time to analyze the results and better plan future missions to increase the scientific return from the program.
As the first step in that rescheduling, on Jan. 7, NASA announced the delay of the launch of Apollo 13 from March 12 to April 11. The Saturn V rocket topped with the Apollo spacecraft had rolled out to Launch Pad 39A the previous December, where workers began tests on the vehicle. The prime crew of Commander James A. Lovell, Command Module Pilot Thomas K. Mattingly and Lunar Module Pilot Fred W. Haise, backed up by John W. Young, John L. “Jack” Swigert and Charles M. Duke, continued to train for their 10-day mission, which included a landing in the Fra Mauro region of the Moon.
Left: Apollo 13’s Saturn V at Launch Pad 39A shortly after rollout. Middle: Aboard Motorized Vessel Retriever, Apollo 13 astronauts (left to right) James Lovell, Ken Mattingly and Fred Haise enter the boilerplate Apollo spacecraft for their water egress training session. Right: Apollo 13 astronauts (left to right in white flight suits) Mattingly, Haise and Lovell in the life raft after emerging from the boilerplate Apollo capsule. Image Credits: NASA
Apollo 13 prime crew members Lovell, Mattingly and Haise completed their water egress training in the Gulf of Mexico near the coast of Galveston, Texas, on Jan. 24. With support from the Motorized Vessel Retriever, the three astronauts entered a boilerplate Apollo Command Module. Sailors lowered the capsule into the water, first in the Stable 2, or apex down, position. Three self-inflating balloons righted the spacecraft into the Stable 1 apex up position within a few minutes. With assistance from the recovery team, Lovell, Mattingly and Haise exited the spacecraft onto life rafts. A helicopter lifted them out of the life rafts using Billy Pugh nets and returned them to Retriever. Later that day, the astronauts returned to the Manned Spacecraft Center (MSC) in Houston, now Johnson Space Center, to examine Moon rocks in the Lunar Receiving Laboratory (LRL) that the Apollo 12 astronauts had returned that previous November.
During their 33.5 hours on the Moon’s surface, Lovell and Haise planned to conduct two four-hour spacewalks to set up the Apollo Lunar Surface Experiment Package (ALSEP), a suite of five investigations designed to collect data about the lunar environment after the astronauts’ departure, and conduct geologic explorations of the landing site. Mattingly planned to remain in the Command Service Module, conducting geologic observations from lunar orbit that included photographing potential landing sites for future missions. Lovell and Haise conducted several simulations of spacewalk timelines, fitting in activities like setting up the ALSEP equipment, taking core samples and photographing their undertakings for documentation purposes. With their backups, they conducted practice sessions with the Partial Gravity simulator, known as POGO, an arrangement of harnesses and servos that simulated walking in the lunar environment of one-sixth gravity. Lovell completed several flights in the Lunar Landing Training Vehicle, which simulated the flying characteristics of the Lunar Module for the final several hundred feet of the landing.
Apollo 13 astronauts practice walking and carrying equipment in the POGO partial gravity simulator: (left to right) Haise, John Young and Charles Duke. Image Credits: NASA
In the LRL, technicians began to prepare the Apollo Lunar Sample Return Containers (ALSRCs), or rock boxes, for Apollo 13. Like all missions, Apollo 13 carried two ALSRCs, with each box and lid manufactured from a single block of aluminum. Workers placed sample containers and bags, along with two 2-centimeter core sample tubes, inside the ALSRCs. Once loaded, technicians sealed the boxes under vacuum conditions so that they would not contain pressure greater than lunar ambient conditions. Engineers at MSC prepared the American flag that Lovell and Haise planned to plant on the Moon for stowage on the Lunar Module’s forward landing strut.
Left: Closed Apollo 13 rock box. Middle: Open rock box, partially outfitted with core sample tubes and a sample container dispenser. Right: A technician holds the American flag that flew aboard Apollo 13. Image Credits: NASA
As part of the rescheduling of Moon missions, NASA delayed the launch of the next flight, Apollo 14, from July to October 1970. The Command and Service Module and Lunar Module had arrived at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center late in 1969, and technicians conducted tests on the vehicles in the Manned Spacecraft Operations Building. On Jan. 12, workers lowered the ascent stage of the Lunar Module onto the Command and Service Module to perform a docking test. The next time the two vehicles would dock, they would be on the way to the Moon, and the test verified that they were compatible. Workers mated the two stages of the Lunar Module on Jan. 20. The three stages of the Apollo 14 Saturn V arrived in Kennedy’s cavernous Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) in mid-January. While workers stacked the first stage on its Mobile Launch Platform on Jan. 14, they delayed stacking the remainder of the rocket stages until May 1970. That decision proved fortunate, since engineers needed to modify the second-stage engines following the pogo oscillations experienced during the Apollo 13 launch.
Left: Apollo 14 Lunar Module ascent stage is lowered onto the Command Module in a preflight docking test. Middle: Apollo 14 Lunar Module descent stage is prepared for mating with the ascent stage. Right: The Apollo 14 Lunar Module ascent stage is prepared for mating with the descent stage. Image Credits: NASA
Left: First stage for Apollo 14’s Saturn V inside the VAB. Middle: Second stage for Apollo 14’s Saturn V arrives at the VAB. Right: Third stage for Apollo 14’s Saturn V arrives at Kennedy. Image Credits: NASA
Apollo 14 astronauts Commander Alan B. Shepard, Command Module Pilot Stuart A. Roosa and Lunar Module Pilot Edgar D. Mitchell, and their backups Eugene A. Cernan, Ronald E. Evans and Joe H. Engle, continued training for their mission. In addition to spending time in spacecraft simulators, the prime and backup commanders and Lunar Module pilots conducted suited vacuum chamber runs in MSC’s Space Environmental Simulation Laboratory (SESL) and completed their first familiarization run to deploy their suite of ALSEP investigations. The Apollo 14 astronauts were the first to make use of the Modular Equipment Transporter (MET), nicknamed “the Rickshaw” because of its appearance, a golf-cart-like wheeled conveyance they used to transport their tools and collected lunar samples. A team led by Project Design Engineer William K. Creasy developed the MET based on recommendations from the first two Moon-landing crews on how to improve efficiency on the lunar surface. Creasy and his team demonstrated the MET to Sally LaMere, editor of The Roundup, MSC’s employee newsletter. Three support astronauts, William R. Pogue, Anthony W. “Tony” England and C. Gordon Fullerton, tested the MET prototype in simulated one-sixth lunar gravity during parabolic aircraft flights.
Left: Apollo 14 backup Commander Eugene Cernan prepares for a vacuum chamber test in the SESL. Second from left: Apollo 14 backup Lunar Module Pilot Joe Engle during a vacuum chamber test in the SESL. Second from right: Engineer William Creasy (left) and MSC Roundup Editor Sally LaMere demonstrate the MET prototype. Right: Apollo 14 support astronaut William Pogue demonstrates the MET during parabolic flight. Image Credits: NASA
