Apollo 13 crew bobbing on the sea after splashdown. "Lost Moon" by Jim Lovell & Jeffrey Kluger. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., (1994).
Jack Swigert, Jim Lovell, and Fred Haise (at left, behind blurred figure of a frogman) bob safely in a life raft. Lovell, an inveterate naval officer, was the last of the three astronauts to leave the spacecraft.
In April 1970, during the glory days of the Apollo space program, NASA sent astronauts Jim Lovell, Jack Swigert and Fred Haise on America’s fifth mission to the moon. Only fifty-five hours into the flight of Apollo 13, disaster struck. A mysterious explosion rocked the ship, and soon its oxygen and power began draining away. Commander Lovell and his crew watched in alarm as the cockpit grew darker, the air grew thinner, and the instruments winked out one by one.
In “Lost Moon,” Lovell and coauthor Jeffrey Kluger tell the full story of the moon shot that almost ended in catastrophe. What begins as a smooth flight is transformed into a hair-raising voyage from the moment Lovell calls out, “Houston, we’ve got a problem.” Minutes after the explosion, the astronauts are forced to abandon the main ship for the lunar module, a tiny craft designed to keep two men alive for just two days. But there are three men aboard, and they are four days from home.
As the hours tick away, engineers on Earth search desperately for solutions. The entire nation watches as one crisis after another is met and overcome. By the time the ship splashes down in the Pacific, we understand why the effort to rescue Lovell and his crew is considered by many to be NASA’s finest hour. “Lost Moon” was the basis for the 1995 movie “Apollo 13” directed by Ron Howard and starring Tom Hanks, Kevin Bacon, Bill Paxton, Gary Sinise and Ed Harris.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEl0NsYn1fU
Apollo 13 crew bobbing on the sea after splashdown. "Lost Moon" by Jim Lovell & Jeffrey Kluger. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., (1994).
Jack Swigert, Jim Lovell, and Fred Haise (at left, behind blurred figure of a frogman) bob safely in a life raft. Lovell, an inveterate naval officer, was the last of the three astronauts to leave the spacecraft.
In April 1970, during the glory days of the Apollo space program, NASA sent astronauts Jim Lovell, Jack Swigert and Fred Haise on America’s fifth mission to the moon. Only fifty-five hours into the flight of Apollo 13, disaster struck. A mysterious explosion rocked the ship, and soon its oxygen and power began draining away. Commander Lovell and his crew watched in alarm as the cockpit grew darker, the air grew thinner, and the instruments winked out one by one.
In “Lost Moon,” Lovell and coauthor Jeffrey Kluger tell the full story of the moon shot that almost ended in catastrophe. What begins as a smooth flight is transformed into a hair-raising voyage from the moment Lovell calls out, “Houston, we’ve got a problem.” Minutes after the explosion, the astronauts are forced to abandon the main ship for the lunar module, a tiny craft designed to keep two men alive for just two days. But there are three men aboard, and they are four days from home.
As the hours tick away, engineers on Earth search desperately for solutions. The entire nation watches as one crisis after another is met and overcome. By the time the ship splashes down in the Pacific, we understand why the effort to rescue Lovell and his crew is considered by many to be NASA’s finest hour. “Lost Moon” was the basis for the 1995 movie “Apollo 13” directed by Ron Howard and starring Tom Hanks, Kevin Bacon, Bill Paxton, Gary Sinise and Ed Harris.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEl0NsYn1fU