<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0In Part 1 of Mission Control, we introduced Christopher Columbus Kraft, the man who guided the birth of \u2018Mission Control\u2019 for the United States space program.\u00a0 Kraft and his group invented the position that became commonly known as \u2018Flight\u2019.\u00a0 This call sign has been used for the director who rules over NASA\u2019s ground control team during all of the manned space missions.\u00a0 Gene Kranz, the Flight Director on duty at the time the Apollo 13 flight experienced an explosion en route to the Moon, may have become more famous than some FDs, but he was hired and trained by Chris Kraft.\u00a0 In Ron Howard\u2019s excellent movie (an adaptation of astronaut Jim Lovell\u2019s book, <\/span>Lost Moon<\/span><\/i>), actor Ed Harris (as Kranz) tells his team that, \u201cFailure is not an option\u201d – a quote that became almost as famous as Lovell\u2019s, \u201cHouston, we have a problem.\u201d\u00a0 In his book <\/span>Flight, <\/span><\/i>Kraft explains how even Lovell\u2019s account missed a couple of key points in his book.\u00a0 This tells us how much of an insider the man who helped invent Mission Control really was (we will get back to Apollo 13 in a bit).<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0As the 1950s gave way to the 1960s, NASA\u2019s idea about having a man in space before the end of the 50s decade had succumbed to reality:\u00a0 they just weren\u2019t ready.\u00a0 The Atlas rocket NASA was counting on was having problems that made putting a manned capsule on top of one a dicey proposition.\u00a0 The decision was made to give Werhner von Braun\u2019s rocket development team in Huntsville, Alabama a shot:\u00a0 why not use their Redstone rocket to do the job?\u00a0 While the rocket and Mercury capsule were being developed, NASA was screening hundreds of applicants looking for\u00a0 astronauts to train for the ride of a lifetime.\u00a0 On a third front, Kraft and members of the Space Task Group (STG) were writing the mission rulebook and designing the ground control stations that would guide the flights.\u00a0 The application pool was eventually whittled down to the finalists, dubbed the Mercury 7.\u00a0 The development phase of the program really didn\u2019t excite the American public until the astronauts were introduced.\u00a0 Suddenly, they had the \u2018All American Hero\u2019 tag attached to them and America went ga-ga over those daring young men destined to fly in space.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Even congress had a hard time knowing what to do with the program.\u00a0 They really didn\u2019t understand it even though they were the ones allocating the money to develop it.\u00a0 That all changed on May 16, 1963 when Alan Shepard made the first sub-orbital flight.\u00a0 Shepard was angry because he should have been the first man in space, but an overly cautious rocket development team decided they needed one more test flight.\u00a0 In the last test flight before Shepard was scheduled to go, Chimp-anaut Ham went higher and farther than he should have due to a minor malfunction.\u00a0 By insisting on one more Chimp flight, von Braun opened the door for the Russians to get Yuri Gagarin in space first.\u00a0 Just as the launch of the first satellite (Sputnik) gave the American public the mistaken idea the Soviet program was far more advanced than it really was, putting the first man in space doubled down on this idea.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0One person in a position of power can do wonders for a program under fire.\u00a0 President John F. Kennedy was enthralled by the Manned Space Program.\u00a0 He invited the Mercury 7 team to the White House right after Shepard\u2019s flight and listened intently to their description of a circumlunar flight planned for the future.\u00a0 Kennedy asked, \u201cWhy aren\u2019t you considering landing men on the Moon?\u00a0 If we\u2019re going to beat the USSR, don\u2019t we need to do something more than just flying around the Moon?\u00a0 What do you need?\u201d\u00a0 Program director Robert Gilruth told him, \u201cSufficient time, presidential support, and a congressional mandate.\u201d\u00a0 Kennedy followed up by taking a trip to Cape Canaveral to see what all the excitement was about.\u00a0 Kennedy quickly became a space cadet.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Literally weeks after the United States stuck a toe in the ocean of space, Kennedy gave his famous,\u00a0 \u201cWe don\u2019t do these things because they are easy, we do them because they are hard,\u201d speech.\u00a0 He told the nation, \u201cI believe this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to Earth.\u201d\u00a0 Kraft says, \u201cFor the minute, I was paralysed with shock.\u00a0 My mind was going off in a hundred directions and I was sorting through the most amazing thoughts.\u00a0 \u2018<\/span>The Moon . . . we have only put Shepard on a suborbital flight . . . an Atlas can\u2019t reach the Moon . . . we have mountains of work just to do the three-orbit flight . . . the Moon . . . men on the Moon, has he lost his mind? . . . Have I?\u2019\u00a0 <\/span><\/i>I wasn\u2019t alone.\u00a0 No one on the Mercury team was immune [to these panicky thoughts].\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Maybe it was a political move on Kennedy\u2019s part (as some have asserted) or perhaps it was the much needed kick in the pants the country needed at the time.\u00a0 Either way, JFK being a space fanboy gave NASA the support it needed to mount such an ambitious program.\u00a0 Even though Kennedy would be gunned down not long after committing the United States to a future in space, his legacy drove more than just the space program.\u00a0 As an elementary student, my classmates and I were the beneficiaries of Kennedy\u2019s space ambitions.\u00a0 Congress went on to allocate funding so schools could educate the engineers and scientists of the future.\u00a0 Watching the mission\u2019s lift off on a black and white TV in the school gym wasn\u2019t nearly the same as watching today\u2019s missions unfold on large screen color TVs, but it was exciting just the same.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The astronauts were given roles in the development of the capsules and mission systems.\u00a0 Each was assigned an area to follow and they weren\u2019t shy about putting their two cents in.\u00a0 Original plans called for them to simply be passengers (like the Chimp-anauts) until they made a case for the astronaut being able to take control of the spacecraft in certain situations.\u00a0 The first craft designs didn\u2019t even include a window and no self respecting pilot would want to pilot a craft blind.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0When Gus Grissom performed the second sub-orbital flight, a malfunction after splashdown caused the hatch on his capsule to blow open too soon.\u00a0 Gus had to abandon ship and watch the recovery helicopter try to recover the craft as it filled with sea water.\u00a0 When the helicopter\u2019s engine began to overheat, they had to cut it loose and watch it sink.\u00a0 Meanwhile, Grissom\u2019s suit was also\u00a0 taking on water through an open oxygen tube port.\u00a0 He feared he would follow his capsule to the bottom before they finally pulled him on board another helicopter.\u00a0 These were all things that were corrected in future flights but some singled out Grissom for \u2018losing his spacecraft\u2019, something that was an engineering problem and not the astronaut\u2019s fault.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Every flight was a learning experience and Kraft felt the only time they came close to losing an astronaut was during Scott Carpenter\u2019s flight.\u00a0 Carpenter was the only Mercury 7 astronaut without extensive experience flying jet aircraft.\u00a0 He didn\u2019t display the discipline needed to follow Mission Control\u2019s instructions.\u00a0 During his flight, he became distracted and burned too much of his maneuvering fuel even after being instructed to curtail the use of the thrusters.\u00a0 He nearly missed the necessary step of pointing the heat shield end of the capsule toward reentry and his craft wobbled dangerously during the hottest part of the trip through the atmosphere.\u00a0 Carpenter landed a long way from the primary recovery zone and still did not seem to grasp the serious nature of the problems he himself had caused.\u00a0 Kraft and Gilruth saw that he never flew in space again.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The other Mercury 7 astronauts performed their duties and their recommendations were included in the next generation spaceship, Gemini.\u00a0 The two man crews flying Gemini missions would test all of the steps necessary to get to the Moon.\u00a0 These included rendezvous with another craft, working outside of the capsule, and long duration flights.\u00a0 Two men sharing a space no larger than the front seat of a minivan was a challenge.\u00a0 Working outside the capsule turned out to be the most daunting task they had to overcome.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Working in space is unlike anything one experiences on the planet below where Earth\u2019s gravity rules.\u00a0 In space, a space capsule travels at the right speed to constantly \u2018fall\u2019 around the Earth, thus negating the pull of gravity.\u00a0 This means Newton\u2019s Laws of Motion reign supreme, especially the third one:\u00a0 \u201cFor every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.\u201d\u00a0 An astronaut trying to tighten a nut, for example, finds the nut exerting an equal force that causes the astronaut to turn the opposite way.\u00a0 Without being properly secured to something, working in space puts the astronaut in an exhausting wrestling match with themselves.\u00a0 It would take a while to master this part of working in space.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0When the Mercury program wound down, it was up to the Gemini flights to test out the rest of the techniques needed to travel to the Moon.\u00a0 The Russians never did rendezvous in space -but they\u00a0 did have two capsules in orbit at the same time.\u00a0 Their predetermined orbits brought them close together, but only briefly.\u00a0 Gemini showed that NASA had the calculations right so two spacecraft could meet and orbit together in space.\u00a0 They also perfected the art of docking two vehicles in space.\u00a0 Both of these skills would be needed for men to land on the lunar surface and then reconnect with the orbiting Command Module.\u00a0 Neil Armstrong and Dave Scott were practicing the docking maneuver on the Gemini VIII mission when one of their thrusters decided to fire on its own.\u00a0 The capsule was in a deadly spin which required the astronauts to shut down the primary thruster ring and activate the secondary system needed for re-entry.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Mission rules stated they had to come down immediately when the secondary ring was activated so NASA got another lesson – this one involving locating a craft that had to land somewhere other than the prime recovery area.\u00a0 The thruster problem showed the engineers that the crew needed to be able to selectively turn off each thruster if needed.\u00a0 When planned mission objectives went south, Mission Control had to adapt to the current conditions and rearrange the agenda.\u00a0 Keeping the astronauts alive was always number one on the checklist.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Concurrent with the Gemini missions, Kraft found himself deep into planning the next level of manned space exploration, Apollo.\u00a0 The new Manned Space Control Center was under construction in Houston and Chris had to move his family from their familiar Tidewater home to Texas.\u00a0 The need for Kraft to turn over more of his Gemini duties to someone else became clear as he assumed more responsibility for the Apollo program.\u00a0 Unfortunately, North American Aviation, the company that was building the Command Module, did not seem interested in using the knowledge Kraft\u2019s team had learned from the Mercury and Gemini programs.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Shoddy workmanship and lack of oversight would lead to astronauts Gus Grisson, Ed White and Roger Chaffee perishing in a flash fire that swept through their Apollo 1 craft during a \u2018plugs out\u2019 test run at the Cape.\u00a0 The Board of Inquiry charged with finding out what went wrong did just that.\u00a0 The findings declared there had to be a complete change in how NASA and its contractors did business.\u00a0 Had these issues been addressed earlier, perhaps the Apollo 1 crew would not have died.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The only \u2018good\u2019 Kraft could find in the aftermath of the tragedy was the fact that flying such a flawed vehicle would have uncovered more problems.\u00a0 More problems would have slowed things to a crawl as they were fixed and the end result would have been, at best, slipping Kennedy\u2019s timeline well into the next decade.\u00a0 The worst case scenario would have been to lose a crew in space which may have killed the whole program.\u00a0 When the new Apollo craft was designed and assembled, Kraft said, \u201cIt was so good that I remain convinced that the tragic fire in fact gave us the tools to get to the Moon.\u00a0 Instead of delay after delay, we dove deep into the spacecraft problems and we fixed them.\u201d\u00a0 Gus Grissom had long said, \u201cIf an astronaut dies, the others will line up to take their place and the program will go on.\u201d\u00a0 He was right.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The boldest move NASA made was to send Apollo 8 to orbit the Moon before the Lunar Landing Module was complete.\u00a0 They thought, \u201cWhy do another around the Earth test flight?\u00a0 The craft was designed to fly to the Moon, so why not orbit the Moon and test the critical stages up to and after a Moon landing?\u201d\u00a0 It would be a critical test that would buy time until the lander was ready for a shake down flight in Earth orbit.\u00a0 The move proved all the theoretical parts of the Moon landing were possible. \u00a0 Confidence in both the machine and men who would carry out the mission peaked at just the right time to keep Kennedy\u2019s timeline intact.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0With all the pieces in place and the first Moon landing in the books, NASA should have been flying high (pun intended) through Apollo 20.\u00a0 Of course, mistakes made with the handling of an oxygen tank destined for the Apollo 13 spacecraft led to the explosion that crippled the ship.\u00a0 The <\/span>Apollo 13 <\/span><\/i>movie does an excellent job of explaining the whole affair even though it took a little license with how NASA dealt with the families.\u00a0 The job Mission Control did to get the crew home took the spotlight but Kraft felt they over dramatized some of the personal parts (which is what Hollywood does when cramming months of storytelling into a couple of hours).\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The major problem after Apollo 11 was public apathy – a \u2018been there, seen that\u2019 attitude that filtered down to the people funding the project – Congress.\u00a0 The Apollo 13 accident brought people\u2019s interest back temporarily, but funds were cut cancelling Apollo flights 18, 19 and 20.\u00a0 The amount of science that was planned for the later Moon flights was either crammed into the last few flights or dropped all together.\u00a0 Kraft knew a return to the Moon would take a while but even he was amazed that fifty years would pass without any manned Lunar Missions.\u00a0 As George Low told Stu Roosa when the program ended, \u201cThere will never be another Apollo,\u201d and sadly, he was correct. \u00a0 Fifty years on, we are just getting back to assembling the next Moon missions.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The zenith of the human experience in Chris Kraft\u2019s lifetime was the entire journey of man into space.\u00a0 He felt that hundreds of years from now, history will look back and say, \u201cWhy didn\u2019t they continue?\u00a0 What were they thinking?\u201d\u00a0 Indeed, it cost a lot of money to put twelve sets of human footprints on the Moon, but for every billion dollars spent, it generated tens of billions of dollars in technological advances on Earth.\u00a0 The space program\u2019s value went far beyond mere\u00a0 dollars and cents.\u00a0 Humans are explorers by nature and to quote our friends in the <\/span>Star Trek<\/span><\/i> universe, \u201cSpace is the final frontier,\u201d and there are still many, many aspects of the universe we need to explore.\u00a0 How long would it have taken for us to take those first steps into the cosmos if it weren\u2019t for people like Chris Kraft, the Father of Mission Control?<\/span><\/p>\n Top Piece Video:\u00a0 Commander Chris Hadfield performing David Bowie’s first hit, Space Oddity\u00a0<\/em>from the ISS orbiting the Earth.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0In Part 1 of Mission Control, we introduced Christopher Columbus Kraft, the man who guided the birth of \u2018Mission Control\u2019 for the United States space program.\u00a0 Kraft and his group invented the position that became commonly known as \u2018Flight\u2019.\u00a0 This call sign has been used for the director who rules over NASA\u2019s ground control […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,8,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3350","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-education","category-from-the-vaults","category-woas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3350","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3350"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3350\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3353,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3350\/revisions\/3353"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3350"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3350"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3350"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}