Friday, April 13, 2012

"Houston, we have a problem"


Today marks the 42nd anniversary of the Apollo 13 Space Shuttle accident.  

"At 55 hours, 46 minutes, as the crew finished a 49-minute TV broadcast showing how comfortably they lived and worked in weightlessness, Lovell said, "This is the crew of Apollo 13 wishing everybody there a nice evening, and we're just about ready to close out our inspection of Aquarius and get back for a pleasant evening in Odyssey. Good night." 

Nine minutes later, oxygen tank No. 2 blew up, causing the No. 1 tank to also fail. The command module's normal supply of electricity, light and water was lost, and they were about 200,000 miles from Earth. 

The message came in the form of a sharp bang and vibration at 9:08 p.m. April 13. Swigert saw a warning light that accompanied the bang and said, "Houston, we've had a problem here." Lovell came on and told the ground that it was a main B bus undervolt."  (www.nasa,gov)

 Here's a interesting lesson over Apollo 13 from Scholastic: http://education.scholastic.co.uk/content/4824

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