Gene Kranz - Failure Is Not an Option

When the two spacecraft were designed, it was never envisioned that we would need to charge the command module batteries from the LM. But now the controllers started looking at ways to use the LM heater cable in the reverse direction to charge the batteries for the final entry phase. Aaron and Aldrich now started bartering with Peters for the excess power in the LM batteries. The controllers were intensely debating the risks to both systems, trading off options but keeping an eye on the clock. Aaron finally resolved the issue: “We’re going to charge the CSM batteries. I can’t see leaving any power in the LM when we jettison it. I want a test rig set up to verify the procedures and to measure the power loss during charging.” With the decision made, he turned to the SPAN team to set up a test rig to prove the procedure.

While we labored in Mission Control, SPAN continued to dig out the answers and give us their best judgments about tough, critical questions that would lead to irrevocable decisions. “How cold can the thrusters get and still fire?” “How many amp hours are really in the battery beyond the spec values?” “We don’t want to chance skipping off the Earth’s atmosphere because our trajectory is too shallow—how critical is the reentry angle?” These questions triggered other questions; discussions of alternatives abounded; engineers wanted priorities. The engineers needed to know how their piece of data fit in to that of other engineers working on related problems.

A 100 percent correct answer, too late to be of use, was worthless. The White Team needed answers quickly to develop the procedures, integrate them in the simulators, and voice them up to the crew. Personally, I wanted a few hours to sit and think before the White Team and crew started the final eight hours of entry.

I don’t think Aaron got any sleep in the last forty-eight hours. He had delegated well, but he knew where the buck stopped. His intuition was incredible. He kept turning up at the place where the logjams were building. With a few words he cleared the jam, then moved to another room, another debate. His prescience was almost mystical.

Throughout this period, astronauts in simulators tested the entry procedures, looking for traps that could endanger a near-freezing, deadly tired, and dehydrated crew. We all knew that cold and dehydration impair cognitive and motor responses—and it was now damn cold in the spacecraft.

In the final thirty-six hours the White Team came together at four-hour intervals with Aldrich, Aaron, and Peters to review the progress. Buck Willoughby, my GNC officer, was concerned about his thrusters. The LM would provide attitude control until jettisoned, then control would switch to the CM. Without heat since the explosion, the CM thrusters were dangerously cold, the propellant valves sluggish. Willoughby wanted a “hot fire” test to make sure they were all working before separating from the LM. The Trench joined in supporting the request. Slayton lobbied to power up early, using excess power to warm the spacecraft and his crew.

I vetoed most departures from the agreed procedures, stating that we had to keep them simple, and I wanted to be able to function in case of an LM battery failure. I intended keeping everything possible in reserve until I knew we had it made. Then and only then would I consider other options. The flight planners started a shopping list to be used when power became available. The hot-fire and early power-up were put at the top.

Since the White Team would handle the final shift for reentry, my deadline to Aaron and Aldrich to complete the procedures was landing minus twenty-four hours. As the deadline approached, the crews in the simulators wanted more time to check out the “final-final” set of procedures, which were in the tenth revision. Thirty-nine pages in length and containing more than 400 entries, they were the ticket home for our crew. The astronauts in the simulator were bothered by the continual changes and the frequent updates. They wanted a run-through with the final set of procedures. I froze further changes to the procedures and agreed to give the simulator crews six more hours to give me their okay.

With this delay, Lovell finally showed his exasperation with the entire process. The crew had been living in an icebox that was hurtling toward the Earth. Other than a brief overview of the intended sequence of the final eight hours, Mission Control had given them nothing but the reassurances that “the procedures are coming along.” Lovell wanted specifics, not vague reassurances.

Aldrich kept the master copy of the procedures in his personal possession, identifying each update by a revision number. He guarded them as if they were the tablets Moses brought down from Mount Sinai. Others may have had mark-ups, but his procedures were the ones that would be executed. His great fear was that he would misplace them as he moved between the meeting areas. At the time of Lovell’s prodding, Aldrich was working on the third revision for Thursday, April 16. We were less than twenty-four hours from entry.

In the final hours the flight planners, John O’Neill and Tommy Holloway, became the last link in the chain to get the crew back to Earth. They established a loop between the crews in the simulators, the controllers, and the work being done by Aldrich and Aaron. They tracked the instructions voiced by the CapCom to the crew. Their checks and balances virtually guaranteed that in the rush to brief the crews nothing would be overlooked. They were the guardian angels, always hovering near and making sure that we gave the crew the right information at the right time.

Shortly after 5:00 P.M. CDT, the White Team took their positions next to Griffin’s Gold Team members. By now my guys had been working almost continuously for about eighty hours. We had had a brief rest for about four to six hours after we passed the Moon and then snatched rest when we could. I remember their eyes, dull with fatigue and shadowed by anxiety. But their confidence and focus never wavered. As controllers plugged in their headsets, they shifted the papers and notebooks on the consoles. It was tough to find a place to work. As soon as CapCom Vance Brand started the entry checklist read-up, I was bombarded by calls from the controllers. Then I realized that in the rush to start the read-up to the crew, we had not made copies of the procedures for every team member. I told Brand to stop while we went out for copies. This was a vexing time for the crew. Time was becoming the most critical element, and with exasperation, frustration, and exhaustion gnawing at all of us, we had to wait for another half hour while copies were made for the controllers. Aldrich took this brief opportunity to incorporate two minor revisions into the final procedures.

Slayton, standing by in the MCC, had sensed the pressure and came on line to the crew. With just the right tone, his reassuring presence calmed our deadly tired crew. Deke was a pilot’s pilot, an operator’s operator, a straight shooter. Deke reassured Lovell, Swigert, and Haise that all was well with the procedures, and he kept up the chitchat as the minutes passed with agonizing slowness. Coffee was the substance that kept us going. Our surgeons had offered us something stronger, but we were all concerned about our performance deteriorating when the stimulants wore off. Most of us decided to make it on caffeine and cigarettes.

Brand began the final read-ups eighteen hours prior to entry, continuing into Windler’s Maroon Team shift. Although I was concerned that something might get lost with three teams vying for the console, we had no option but to continue. A single slip anywhere could be fatal. We were out of time and out of options. This was our last shot. Ken Mattingly and Joe Kerwin, aces among aces as astronauts and my CapComs for the final shift, stood behind Vance Brand and Charlie Duke at their console during the read-up. They listened to the astronauts’ questions, their voices and inflections, making sure that they fully comprehended every step and the rationale behind it. The read-up to the crew was concluded six and a half hours before the final entry procedures were to begin, not enough time for any of us to get any rest, just time to back off a bit before the final charge. I went to the viewing room downstairs for a brief nap.