I remember very well the Apollo I fire and the loss of Grissom, Chafee and White. It was the day before my birthday, and it was a shock to the nation. But it was different than the later losses of Challenger (a quarter of a century ago tomorrow) and Columbia (seven years on Monday), because they were Cold-War warriors, and, unlike today’s human spaceflight program, what they were doing was important to the nation. So instead of shutting things down for years, as we did with the Shuttle each time, they overhauled the management at the contractor (even though it was really NASA’s fault) and a little less than two years later, we had sent men around the moon, and won the space race.
8 thoughts on “Forty Four Years”
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For All Mankind
RIP Harrison Storms.
Happy Birthday, Rand!
But it was different than the later losses of Challenger (a quarter of a century ago tomorrow) and Columbia (seven years on Monday), because they were Cold-War warriors
A small nitpick — the Challenger accident was also during the Cold War.
So instead of shutting things down for years, as we did with the Shuttle each time, they overhauled the management at the contractor (even though it was really NASA’s fault) and a little less than two years later
A bigger nitpick. The nearly two-year stand-down after the Apollo fire wasn’t much different from the two-year stand-down after the Challenger accident.
And if getting to the Moon had been the primary goal, NASA would have allowed the Gemini program (which was much farther along than Apollo) to proceed. Spending a lot of money in Houston was more important than just getting to the Moon quickly, however.
The Challenger flight occurred during the Cold War, but it wasn’t part of it in the sense that Apollo was.
I was nine years old at the time of the Apollo 1 fire. I vaguely remember watching the TV news coverage that night. As I recall, the initial reports said that some workers on the pad were killed. It took a little time before they announced that it was the astronauts.
I also remember my dad calling Western Union later that evening to send a condolence telegram to Gus Grissom’s dad. They both worked for the B&O Railroad and knew each other. I don’t know whether they were friends or just acquaintances, but my dad was very gregarious and could make friends with anybody. See Gus’ Wiki page.
And if getting to the Moon had been the primary goal, NASA would have allowed the Gemini program (which was much farther along than Apollo) to proceed. Spending a lot of money in Houston was more important than just getting to the Moon quickly, however.
I’ve read quite a bit about the Gemini lunar landing idea … You want to talk about one and done! That was it … And kind of scary to boot.
“So in the end, the first lunar landing would have been moved up by six months at best. There would have been a cost savings, but again analysis of the detailed cost breakdowns for Apollo indicate the savings would have been on the order of ‘only’ $4 billion out of the NASA $18 billion project share. So in retrospect it would seem that NASA’s management was correct, for the Apollo missions flown were much more capable than a Gemini-based approach would have been.” http://www.astronautix.com/craft/gemnilor.htm
“for the Apollo missions flown were much more capable than a Gemini-based approach would have been.”
In the short term. Long term, it was partly Apollo reliance on HLV bankrupted it.