Apollo 13 Engineers to be Honored 183
sconeu writes "Yahoo! News is carrying a story that the engineers who helped save the crew of Apollo 13 will be honored by GlobalSpec.
The article mentions the jury rigged air scrubbers, and gives duct tape its due." Here is our coverage of the 35th anniversary.
The real hero was of course (Score:5, Funny)
Obligatory duct tape joke (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Obligatory duct tape joke (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Obligatory duct tape joke (Score:3, Funny)
I hate when that happens...
Re:Obligatory duct tape joke (Score:1)
Who? (Score:5, Insightful)
No criticism to the Apollo 13 engineers. What they did was amazing. But what's this story got to do with them?
Re:Who? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Who? (Score:2, Interesting)
i) a publicity stunt for themselves
ii) an attempt to improve the standing of engineering (and engineers) as a profession.Apparently so.
Re:Who? (Score:4, Informative)
Actually,
"GlobalSpec is a rapidly growing B-to-B, Internet-based, 'media-model' business linking buyers and sellers in the $500 billion electrical, mechanical and optical products markets." [globalspec.com]
You must have mistaken their front page search links to mean they actually had something to do with those things?
They do seem to be good at generating hot air and pageviews with press releases, anyway.
Re:Who? (Score:2)
Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Who? (Score:2)
We'd like you to uh... "accept" our "crystal enema" award on primetime TV in front of millions of viewers.
Re:Who? (Score:2)
Re:Who? (Score:2)
An engineering search engine. They claim to offer loads of useful stuff, like parametric search of numerous manufacturers for a wide range of products. In reality they have an annoying website which never quite seems to tell you what you want to know and bombards you with crap if you subscribe.
I would like somewhere where I can find suppliers for a 52mm galvanized obtuse flange-compressor and compare prices, but using GlobalSpec is little better than typing "52mm galvanized obtuse flange-compressor" into any other search engine.
Duct tape saves the day (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Duct tape saves the day (Score:2)
Duct tape transcends metric and imperial, and eschews units altogether.
Put a slightly-too-large bolt over your slightly-too-small thread, tighten close enough, seal with duct tape.
There is no need to convert between units, merely provide an interface between the two.
Duct tape is good.
Thing I'd like to know is... (Score:5, Interesting)
That aside, it is good to see these guys being recognised.
Re:Thing I'd like to know is... (Score:5, Informative)
So it could well be the case that since 2 different companies built the 2 different air systems, they used 2 different shapes of CO2 filters because no-one bothered to make them the same (after all, it didnt matter much at the time)
Re:Thing I'd like to know is... (Score:5, Informative)
Contrary to popular belief, NASA does very little itself. Pretty much everything is done by subcontractors.
Re:Thing I'd like to know is... (Score:5, Funny)
And not just any subcontractors, mind you... but the lowest bidders.
Re:Thing I'd like to know is... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Thing I'd like to know is... (Score:1)
You're forgetting the NASA mantra during the Apollo era -- Waste anything but time They threw a lot of money at the problem of putting a man on the moon.
Re:Thing I'd like to know is... (Score:3, Informative)
Please name some of these feats. If you're thinking of the Pyramids, BTW, you're wrong. [harvard-magazine.com]
Re:Thing I'd like to know is... (Score:1)
When was the last time you saw major building project that exhaulted the efforts of the working grunts on the ground?
Re:Thing I'd like to know is... (Score:2)
Re:Thing I'd like to know is... (Score:2)
Cathedrals in Europe were built as a matter of civic pride by the various cities. A cathedral would bring pilgrims to the city. Those pilgrims would carry money that they would spend in the local shops. If you were a stoneworker or other craftsman, it was a prestigious thing to contribute to the building of the cathedral.
(Note: I am not an expert, so someone else could probably give better details.)
Re:Thing I'd like to know is... (Score:2)
And I imagine slave labor might have been used in the building of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, but for all I know that's just as bogus as slaves with the pyramids..
Re:Thing I'd like to know is... (Score:2)
Re:Thing I'd like to know is... (Score:5, Funny)
It should also be pointed out that Tom Hanks is a robot specifically made to star in Apollo 13, which explains his meteoric rise to acting stardom. In fact, Bosom Buddies was created to serve as his vehicle by NASA.
NASA has more plans in place for both Ron and Tom in further upcoming movies about the "moon landings". Just you wait.
Re:Thing I'd like to know is... (Score:2)
You also have to think, it's not like these 2 engineering teams e-mailed each other daily and sat in on video conferences and such. Phone calls probably could have been made, but I doubt that they did much more than discuss the manner in which the 2 craft would be docked together. And I seriously doubt that either company flew their engineers out to the other's site to view what was going on. All of these things take place in our world, but back then they probably operated mostly in their own vacuums.
Damn it (Score:5, Funny)
I knew they didn't get a fair trial...
Re:You can joke about it... (Score:2)
Good training and preparedness (Score:5, Interesting)
Bravo to them and the Apollo 13 crew. Well done!
Re:Good training and preparedness (Score:3, Interesting)
All with computer systems with less power than the C64 and slide-rules...and yes, duct-tape!
I'm in awe of these guys.
Re:Good training and preparedness (Score:2, Informative)
The "LEM as a lifeboat" scenario was pretty thoroughly considered a few times. While they did have some "real-time problems" to solve, the general approach had been worked out ahead of time.
Re:Good training and preparedness (Score:4, Informative)
And they did have a bunch of mainframes on the ground for the heavy lifting with the trajectory calculations.
While there was some brilliant improvisation (the LM controllers hack to power up the LM for example), the controllers were by no mean 'winging it': thanks to leadership, teamwork, dedication and skill, when it came to crunch time, they'd already had a lot of the work done.
Disclaimer: I'm the author of the Spectrum article!
Re:Good training and preparedness (Score:2)
Re:Good training and preparedness (Score:2)
Re:Good training and preparedness (Score:3, Informative)
I'll add to this another example:
In the movie the over-dramatized manual burn is proceeded by Tom Hanks figuring out that they can use the Earth's terminator as a reference point they would be able to burn, an idea that fully escaped Houston.
In real life, the whole (or at least most of the) procedure was tested during Apollo 8, which, coincidentally, Lovell was also on. When 13 was faced with that problem, Mission Control called up the procedure to 13, and Lovell responeded with something like "hey, that sounds like what we did on Apollo 8", and Mission Control responded "we were wondering if you would recognize that."
The movie is pretty accurate if you ignore the things that are pretty much obviously dramatized (VERY accurate by Hollywood standards), but you should still read up on what happened, for things that are both changed and left out of the movie. I can't speak to the quality of the Spectrum article because I haven't read it (sorry!), but I strongly recommend Lovell's book. Depending on when it was printed and whether you have paperback or hardcover, it might be titled either Lost Moon or Apollo 13; in either case, it served as the basis for the movie.
Engineering 101 (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Engineering 101 (Score:2)
It doesn't hold the plant together, but it has multiple uses for contamination control.
Re:Engineering 101 (Score:1)
Good Idea (Score:4, Funny)
They should do something like this every year. They have the Grammies, Emmys, etc., why not the Nerdies? They could use Slashdot sections as the categories.
Great quote about duct tape... (Score:4, Funny)
That's so cool, but obviously means I'll never want to visit the South without my own personal surgeon.
Re:Great quote about duct tape... (Score:1)
Don't worry. From what I've seen in Atlanta, we seem to be importing them. I don't think I've had a doctor with a Southern accent since the Reagan administration.
News? (Score:1)
Re:News? (Score:4, Funny)
I'd have to say... (Score:1)
"plastic bags, cardboard and duct tape"
I shall go nowhere without them.
A couple days late? (Score:1)
do they deserve it? (Score:2)
The term is jerry rig (Score:2, Interesting)
Jerry rig comes to us from World War II. The Germans were known amongst the allies, ever quick and able with a good racial nickname, as "Jerry". Toward the end of the war, with German industrial productivity crushed and little supplies available, the Germans had to improvise with scraps of whatever they could scrounge. Somehow, mostly by sheer guts, they managed to keep on fighting with their jerry-rigged junk.
Re:The term is jerry rig (Score:3, Informative)
jury-rig (jr-rg) tr.v. jury-rigged, jury-rigging, jury-rigs
To rig or assemble for temporary emergency use; improvise: The survivors of the wreck jury-rigged some fishing gear.
Re:The term is jerry rig (Score:3, Informative)
Incidently, Google returns 173,000 hits for "jerry rig", while coming up with only 109,000 for "jury rig".
Re:The term is jerry rig (Score:3, Informative)
But the term is far older than WWII. It was in common usage in the British navy in the 1700s. One posible origin is the old Frence 'ajurie' - to help.
Sorry - you're WWII origin is an urban myth.
no, it's "jury rig" check wikipedia (Score:1, Informative)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jury_rigged [slashdot.org]
On sailing ships, the jury rig is a replacement mast and yards improvised in case of loss of the original mast. The term "jury" is believed (Skeat) to have its source in a Latin and Old French root meaning "aid" or "succour".
Although ships were observed to perform reasonably well under jury rig, the rig was quite a bit weaker than the original, and the ship's first priority was normally to steer for the nearest friendly port and acquire replacement masts. The term "jury-rigged" has since passed into general usage, denoting some improvised substitute was employed temporarily or in an emergency.
Houston We('ve) ha(d/ve) a problem? (Score:5, Interesting)
As for which was uttered on Apollo 13, I think the latter phrase is the one that accompanied the eponymous movie about the troubled flight (IMDB confirms this) and so has become more well known amongst a certain generation than the original.
As someone who used to teach English, hats off to Swigert, who in his moment of crisis used the more appropriate present perfect tense (have + past participle) to suggest an incident that happened in the (recent) past but is still (extremely) relevant now.
Sorry.... I really should get out more.
McF
Re:Houston We('ve) ha(d/ve) a problem? (Score:5, Informative)
02 07 53 12 CMP Okay. Stand by.
02 07 55 19 LMP Okay, Houston - -
02 07 55 20 CDR I believe we've had a problem here.
02 07 55 28 CC This is Houston. Say again, please.
02 07 55 35 CDR Houston, we've had a problem. We've had a MAIN B BUS UNDERVOLT.
02 07 55 42 CC Roger. MAIN B UNDERVOLT.
Re:Houston We('ve) ha(d/ve) a problem? (Score:1)
Re:Houston We('ve) ha(d/ve) a problem? (Score:3, Informative)
Remember! (Score:2)
How about we honor them... (Score:3, Funny)
DaGoodBoy
What about the engineer... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:What about the engineer... (Score:1)
I was the film but can't remember (Score:4, Interesting)
As a result here's my executive summary:
- oxygen tank exploded
- 2 of 3 fuel cells lost
"Houston, we've had a problem."
- Ed Smylie, engineer at home watching TV disaster rushes into the centre
- O2 buildup fixable with lithium hydroxide canisters to help CO2 buildup...
but some of the backup square canisters were not compatible with the round openings in the lunar module
"If you saw the movie (`Apollo 13'), it wasn't like that," Smylie said, adding there wasn't any hollering and screaming. "Everything is pretty calm, cool and collected in our business."
- used duck-tape to convert the backup square canisters to fit the round lunar module fittings
- this allowed the astronauts to breath just that little bit longer
Long Overdue... (Score:3, Interesting)
Kudos to the often-uncelebrated ground crew and their determination to get Lovell and crew back safely.
It was a saint (Score:1, Funny)
Re:It was a saint (Score:1)
The fumes are getting to you.
Re:It was a saint (Score:2)
But Swigert and the rest of the crew powered up the Odyssey, seemingly effortlessly. "Therein lies the reason we chose test pilots" to be astronauts, says Kraft. "They were used to putting their lives on the line, used to making decisions, used to putting themselves in critical situations. You wanted people who would not panic under those circumstances. These three guys, having been test pilots, were the personification of that theory," explains Kraft.
Nor are the facts "highly classified". You can read them in excruciating detail here [nasa.gov], and the air to ground audio is also available, as is quite a bit of the mission control loop audio.
They did get lucky, but as the saying goes "chance favors the prepared mind." The huge amount of preparation, skill and teamwork, onboard and on the ground, made the difference between success and failure: the gods help those who help themselves, after all.
Disclaimer: I'm the author of the Spectrum article
What about the... (Score:2, Interesting)
I mean, I figured when the movie came out that no one was going to mention that little "goof up" that NASA had - you know, it's not all good having your measurements and projections corrected by some teacher and his students from a junior high school while they're out stargazing with whatever telescopes their money could buy them - but I would love to see this at least mentioned somewhere.
They each got a certificate and I think even perhaps a hand-shake.
Ah, the little forgotten unsung heros of history.
P.S. Yes, I do rant about this everytime anything with Apollo 13 comes up in conversation.
Re:What about the... (Score:1)
http://www.news.utoronto.ca/bin/gopher/Aug21-95/n
Re:What about the... (Score:2)
NASA never planned to fire any thrusters until *after* Apollo 13 was *already* rounding the moon. (The PC+2 burn.) Earlier burns were considered but quickly dropped.
Not to mention the fact that is NASA had missed the moons 'alginment' (whatever the hell that means), they'd have never gotten to the right place for the PC+2 burn in the first place. (Or even entered orbit or landed as was originally intended.)
Re:What about the... (Score:2)
There was, of course, a fly in the ointment. During earlier Apollo missions, the outgoing trajectory of the spacecraft had been selected so that if the service module's main engine failed for any reason, the slingshot effect would aim the command and service module perfectly at Earth, a so-called free-return trajectory. But this trajectory put very tight constraints on the mission timeline, and for Apollo 13, it had been abandoned.
"We were on a non-free-return trajectory. If we did nothing, we'd whip back towards the Earth but miss it by several thousand miles," the Trench's Bostick explains.
"In 2 or 3 hours we were able to come up with a free-return maneuver. I think it made everybody feel a lot better--including the astronauts." Bostick remembers talking to the crew after the mission. "When we executed the free-return burn it made them feel that they might get out of this thing alive," he says.
Re:What about the... (Score:2)
Come to think of it, they'd have already rounded the moon before any school class could have made an observation post-accident. (Unless you make the (huge) assumption that the moons 'alignment' was miscalculated pre-mission.)
Its obvious... (Score:2, Funny)
A Top Ten Geek Movie (Score:5, Interesting)
The reason this is such a wonderful geek film is that there is no bad guy. No evil to overcome. It's not even man versus nature. It's man versus The Problem, and man, brandishing a slide rule and some duct tape, triumphs.
Re:A Top Ten Geek Movie (Score:2)
I know I do.
Re:A Top Ten Geek Movie (Score:2)
Trajectory calculations (Score:2)
Re:Trajectory calculations (Score:2)
Disclaimer: I'm the author of the Spectrum article!
Lesson learned here... (Score:2)
Engineer recognition...what a concept!! (Score:2)
That said, I wonder if it would even be possible to pull off something like this in the US anymore. With such low interest in math and science, and a low level of education, how would we find people qualified enough to think through things like this?
A little late... (Score:2)
Re:Duct tape.. (Score:2)
Duct Tape == Sticky backed plastic
Val Singleton - you shaped my childhood!
Re:Duct tape.. (Score:2)
Re:Duct tape.. (Score:3, Interesting)
I've seen doors hinged on that stuff alone, it leaves duct tape for dead.
Re:Duct tape.. (Score:2)
Re:damned grammar. (Score:2, Informative)
Wow... did you take the time to look that up first (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:damned grammar. (Score:5, Informative)
"Jury rigged" implies a kludge that allows you to survive (say, if your ship got dismasted, or something). "Jerry built" applies mostly to extremely poorly built houses (the kind that has mortar made of flour paste).
Re:damned grammar. (Score:2)
Surely they aren't referring to German concrete structures in WWII? Yea they looked ugly as hell but just you try to get rid of 5 foot thick rebar concrete in a dome shape.
Re:damned grammar. (Score:2)
Re:damned grammar. (Score:2)
Re:Redundancy (Score:1, Funny)
Re:Redundancy (Score:2)
I've seen this situation in the regular office world as well. It's amazing the amount of stuff that gets junked simply because one part has broken, and it's quicker to go across the street to buy a new item at the computer store, or to open a web-browser and make an online purchase, than it is too open the machine up and replace the broken component.
The most obvious example - my cousin had a portable CD-player that had crackly audio (the headphone socket had worn away). So she decided to throw out both the headphones and the player...
Or the computer with a broken video card - the maintenance company send a technician to replace the entire computer: desktop, keyboard, mouse and monitor.
My personal gripe is with headphones - usually it's the wire that goes first, while the speakers are working perfectly. Unfortunately, because it's a once piece component, I have to throw everything out. However, if the headphones had a socket for the wire (and the wire then became a patch cable), then I could just replace the wire.
Re:Redundancy (Score:2)
Re:The 13th hour of the 13th day of the 13th missi (Score:1)
Re:What about Ed Harris (Score:1)
It's Kevin Bacon, goddamnit. The poor bastard never gets any respect. Come on now, try to remember his name.
Oh, and don't mention that other guy. He sucks.
Re:Ob. QDB ref (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Ob. QDB ref (Score:2)
Re:Dammit, they misspelled jerry-rigging (Score:2)
It's probably all a tangled mess involving the English use of 'jerry' to refer to germans and and fixing jurries in currupt trials and multiple versions of the 'english' language in use.
Mycroft