Messages

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Apollo 13 Moments of Interest / 106:58:21 Jay Greene: "Hey babe, it's time to make another decision~"

« on: May 20, 2024, 11:22:41 am »

The sarcastic, singy-songy (if a bit sleepy) tone of this remark from FIDO Jay Greene to SELECT John Layton really drives home all of the difficult, sometimes hurried, oftentimes no-win choices that the flight controllers had to make, especially from a data and telemetry standpoint. There were several major decisions made over the past two days, including whether to power down the S-BAND transponder, when to power up the ranging, etc., and many of these decisions involved a lot of intense negotiation between dynamics, systems, and data branches. So you can just imagine Greene's elbow on the console as he leans his head on his hand, rolling his eyes, as he has to tell Layton it's time to make yet another decision.

Certainly it's not a trivial decision in this case: From this point in the mission, they have roughly 36 hours until EI (entry interface, the time at which the spacecraft programmatically enters Earth's atmosphere). With new procedures and new checklists that have to be devised, they have to cram simulations of both the LM and CSM, sometimes integrated, into this short time span to ensure that the procedures work in practice as they do on paper. In order to make the sims work, they need to also simulate the data. One can only imagine the computational requirements for flying an Apollo mission in one floor of the MOCR and simulating the same Apollo mission on a separate floor. The problem that Jay presents to Al is one of timing and logistics.

https://apolloinrealtime.org/13/?t=106:58:21&ch=20

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Apollo 13 Moments of Interest / Re: 027:43:54 "You don't want everything to fail, do you?"

« on: May 08, 2024, 08:57:22 am »

It's ironic indeed that Jack has this discussion; during the Black Team post-accident shift, he admits to a controller (I think someone in SPAN) that this is one of the most frightening moments he's ever been in, in his life. It's probably the only time you hear a controller admit this on a recorded loop.

These sorts of phone calls happen all over the place during the most quiet periods of translunar coast, which is quite amusing and reveals a heretofore unseen "human side" of the flight controllers. During the Gold Team shift at around ~46:00 GET, EECOM Charlie Dumis has a lengthy phone conversation with a woman (her name might be mentioned in the transcript) who went on a road trip through New Mexico. During the same Black Team shift as mentioned in the OP, FIDO Bill Stoval also makes a few calls, including one to Dave Reed.

The mushy phone calls definitely decrease in frequency after 55 GET.

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Apollo 13 Moments of Interest / 125:46:35 TELMU and SURGEON do horse-trading on drinkable water

« on: April 12, 2024, 02:25:50 pm »

As of 125:46:35 GET - still more than 12 hours away from entry interface and splashdown - the CSM is out of potable water in the surge tank, meaning now there are only two ways to get drinking water for the crew: the PLSS, which people are generally hesitant to use in case it's needed as a backup for the LM; and any water remaining in the LM descent tanks.

The conversation between TELMU and SURGEON on the MOCR loop is polite and considered, but there is obvious strain and tension in their voices as they negotiate between two competing needs - the desire to keep the crew alive by having sufficient water to power equipment in the LM, and the desire to keep the crew alive by having sufficient water to avoid dehydration.

Link 1 (SURGEON, 125:46:35): https://apolloinrealtime.org/13/?t=125:46:35&ch=13
Link 2 (SURGEON, 125:52:02): https://apolloinrealtime.org/13/?t=125:52:02&ch=13

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Apollo 13 Moments of Interest / 123:11:26 Flight dynamics assistant too tired to continue

« on: April 12, 2024, 02:00:27 pm »

A flight dynamics assistant during the Gold team shift just prior to re-entry at 123:11 GET calls up FIDO Bill Stoval essentially to ask if he can go home early due to fatigue. He had been off his game all night, including a really serious blunder earlier in the evening that resulted in GUIDO Bales and RETRO Spencer arguing over whether a REFSMMAT stored in the RTCC was the same one as earlier in the morning. It had been stored incorrectly.

Amidst all of the technical jargon on the FIDO loop, clips like these really show the human impact that the Apollo 13 incident had on the flight controllers who were trying to manage the situation on the ground, many of them not getting enough sleep or just outright pulling all-nighters.

Link: https://apolloinrealtime.org/13/?t=123:11:26&ch=20

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Apollo 13 Moments of Interest / 116:58:07 Trench creates the Flight Dynamics re-entry checklist

« on: March 22, 2024, 12:20:34 pm »

Apollo geeks and flight dynamics nerds brace yourselves - this is going to be your lucky day.

This is by far the highlight of the FIDO loop. During the Black Team shift starting at around 110-112 GET, FIDO Dave Reed, RETRO Chuck Deiterich and GUIDO Ken Russell are manning the trench along with YAW Will Pressley. This will also be the same group of personnel that works the White Team's shift during re-entry.

Dave, a stickler for organization and "doing the right thing", sets aside time with Chuck and Ken to draft a re-entry checklist for the flight dynamics team during the hours leading up to entry interface. This is required due to the massive amount of work needing to be done in a very short timespan, getting both the CSM reactivated and aligned, the service module and LM jettisoned, and the midcourse correction required to stay in the corridor.

What follows from this point on is truly remarkable: an unbroken three-way discussion that goes on for over an hour, essentially a planning meeting taking place on a live MOCR loop. During this time, Dave has backup personnel respond to inquiries from other flight controllers so that his team can focus on drafting the checklist. Presumably, he got permission from Lunney to do this since even FLIGHT avoids bugging him with questions. (AFD is not so lucky when he tries later on.)

RETRO: https://apolloinrealtime.org/13/?t=116:58:07&ch=19
FIDO: https://apolloinrealtime.org/13/?t=116:58:07&ch=20

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General Discussion / Re: Identifying speakers/ Mission Control teams

« on: March 20, 2024, 08:37:54 am »

It's a webhost issue; the files are still technically there, just inaccessible and locked off until the webhost makes them available again. I did save a local copy. Here it is: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1y9mjRT6vvmsq9Gy7xcAoAdRP8NM0d2Ko/view?usp=sharing

As others have mentioned, the MOCR manning situation is a mess post-accident and it's not out of the realm of possibility to hear two or more distinct voices on a loop during any given shift (Greene, Boone, Stoval, and Reed can all be heard on the FIDO loop throughout the GET 90+00 White team shift.

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Apollo 13 Moments of Interest / 089:30:00 Trench can't keep track of all the meetings going on

« on: February 21, 2024, 08:53:05 am »

It is now 8:43AM local time. FAO Bob Lindsey is reaching out to RETRO (but instead getting FIDO Bill Boone) to ask whether there's going to be an 8am re-entry meeting. Boone doesn't know about that - but he does know about Bill Tyndall's data priority meeting, and he wonders if perhaps that's what FAO means?

Link: https://apolloinrealtime.org/13/?t=089:30:00&ch=20

Apollo 13 was on its way back to Earth. Although the PC+2 abort burn was executed as correctly as could be under the circumstances (with subsequent tracking indicating that a MCC5 would still be necessary), flight control still had one major problem to contend with: re-entry - all the activities that would be needed in the last six hours of flight.

One of the most key aspects of Apollo 13 after the oxygen tank disaster is the total, industry-wide mobilization that occurred in order to solve rapidly-developing problems that urgently needed an answer by a certain timeframe. From one end of the Manned Spacecraft Center to the other, there was one practice that was a near-constant throughout the mission: Meetings. Meetings. Meetings. Sometimes planned, but more often improvised, all to tackle different problems, all vacuuming up different flight controllers with all of their varying levels of expertise.

This is why when listening to the FD loops after the abort burn, you sometimes can hear up to 3 or 4 different officers manning one station during a single shift. They frequently had to be swapped out as managers such as Gene Kranz, Bill Tyndall, Neil Hutchinson and Jerry Bostick yoinked controllers and brought them from one meeting to the next.

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Apollo 13 Moments of Interest / 061:27:28 Burn time freakout: "Is he loaded correctly?!"

« on: February 16, 2024, 02:44:11 pm »

Within three minutes of the free return burn, FLIGHT Glynn Lunney suddenly notices that the wall clock in the MOCR is off by a large amount. Once RETRO Tom Weichel provides a countdown from his retro clock indicating the time left before the burn, Glynn suddenly becomes a lot more animated over the loop.

It was shortly thereafter determined that the wall clock had been improperly set by the comm staff, and that both the spacecraft and the retro clock were properly synchronized to the burn time.

Link: https://apolloinrealtime.org/13/?t=061:27:28&ch=19

As an addendum, later before the PC+2 burn, FIDO Bill Stoval (also in the MOCR at the time of the free return burn, sitting next to Bill Boone) reminds Bobby Spencer to check the wall and retro clock to make sure both are aligned - "I'd hate to get zapped on that one again."

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Apollo 13 Moments of Interest / 110:32:09 GUIDO gives the first words on CSM alignment techniques to CAPCOM

« on: February 05, 2024, 09:53:53 am »

This is prompted by a question from Jim Lovell, who wanted to know how the command module will be aligned for re-entry, particularly with the LM still hanging onto it. As far as I know, these are the absolute first ever words spoken over the Flight Director loop regarding the actual techniques involved. It comes across as a somewhat informal conversation, with GUIDO Gary Renick essentially walking through the process and CAPCOM Jack Lousma repeating his own interpretation of the words back to him (off the loop), to make sure that his understanding is correct for when he passes it up to the crew.

There's a lot of background noise on the GUIDO and CAPCOM loops, so for the sake of ease on the ears, this is just the isolated flight director loop.

LINK: https://apolloinrealtime.org/13/?t=110:32:39&ch=50

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General Discussion / Re: Accurate edition of Apollo 11 (2019) movie?

« on: November 27, 2023, 09:30:18 am »

Documentary authors have to weave a difficult line between being making a film that is appealing and compelling in the narrative sense, which does involve taking creative liberties, versus being as historically accurate as possible. Once upon a time, I thought it was more important to adhere to the latter principle, but I've come to realize that when most film reviewers - be they a professional like Roger Ebert or just the word of a friend whom you trust - scrutineer documentaries about topics such as the space program, they're not so concerned about whether or not the biomed readings were accurate. They are more focused on ensuring that the drama, ambition, wonderment, and scientific innovation of that time period was successfully captured on film so that the viewer can relive an enthralling and engaging if not believable simulation of those pivotal moments in human history.

Frankly, compared to other frequently-espoused historical myths, the implications of that rather pales in comparison to something like the infamous "the two stood eye to eye and the other fellow blinked" in reference to the Cuban Missile Crisis, a myth that persists in popular AND historical media to this day. 😁 I'd say "Apollo 11" gets a pass.

For strictly reliable secondary sources of the events that took place during the Apollo program, the best place to go would probably be the Apollo Flight Journal - and as for primary sources, I would say those would be the MOCR tapes themselves. It's wonderful that NASA had such a keen eye towards posterity particularly in those days.

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Apollo 13 Moments of Interest / Re: 033:56:11 Recovery team bartering. Beer vs. Pineapples

« on: November 21, 2023, 08:23:41 am »

https://apolloinrealtime.org/13/?t=033:56:11&ch=33

Recovery Houston (id unknown) offers Recovery Pacific (id unknown, but likely on a ship in the Pacific) a trade of a six pack of "Cold Pearl" for two pineapples on return. Haggling ensues.

To further emphasize the human quality of what these ironclad-willed flight controllers do on a daily basis, you want to know what EECOM John Aaron was doing at the exact same time that RECOVERY was making a trade for pineapples?

Looking for a trash can.

Link: https://apolloinrealtime.org/13/?t=033:57:52&ch=17

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Apollo 13 Moments of Interest / Re: 033:56:11 Recovery team bartering. Beer vs. Pineapples

« on: November 21, 2023, 08:19:26 am »

I found this particular gem because it's just one minute past a much more important historical artifact: confirmation that the IRIG-B time signal encoded on the MOCR tapes is lock-step with the clocks used by the human controllers and support crew. Just a minute before this barter there is an exchange between Houston Recover and Pacific Recovery where Houston clearly counts down the GMT and GET clocks so that Pacific Recovery can adjust their ship clocks to match.

In the attached annotated spectrogram, the speaker speaks the phrase "eight, nine, MARK, 50 seconds". Below each utterance are the time code markers output by the IRIG-B decoder software that we wrote for Apollo In Real Time. The "MARK" phrase lines up perfectly with the GET timestamp "33:53:50" / GMT timestamp "1970-04-14T05:06:50".

https://apolloinrealtime.org/13/?t=033:53:36&ch=33

This is an absolute gem of a find. Thanks for locating this. It really truly drives home how history was made 53 years ago, and how we sometimes take for granted that what we're listening to is just the digital facsimile of the media of that era.

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General Discussion / Frank Borman

« on: November 09, 2023, 05:03:00 pm »

And now Frank Borman. One of the most accomplished astronauts, including CDR of Apollo 8, has passed away at the age of 95.

https://www.wsj.com/business/airlines/frank-borman-who-led-historic-flight-around-the-moon-in-1968-dies-at-age-95-489afa09

Ad Astra. *

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Apollo 13 Moments of Interest / Re: 140:03:43 RETRO Chuck Deiterich gets spooked by YAW

« on: November 02, 2023, 12:57:47 pm »

What I plan to do at some point, as I have time, is just a few compilation YouTube videos (or well, audios) of some of the Trench officers - Reed, Deiterich, Bales, possibly even Boone - just as a highlight reel of stuff they say on the loops. Each compilation video would probably be themed in some way. Perhaps Bales would be a mix of him being overly enthusiastic versus quiet and somnolent; Reed would be all the times he lost his temper, etc.. 

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Apollo 13 Moments of Interest / Re: 133:58:34 Reed: "If this damn PGNS gets in the way, I'm gonna raise hell!"

« on: October 31, 2023, 10:38:03 am »

Oh yes, I've listened to him in some of the prelaunch dialogue; he does have a little bit of a temper, yes. 

Listen carefully in this one, when he speaks to Gary again (he slams the desk!): https://apolloinrealtime.org/13/?t=134:14:44&ch=20

I've regarded him as probably one of the most senior FIDOs in the Trench, particularly after Bostick and Shaffer became leaders of the Flight Dynamics branch. Jay Greene was brilliant, of course, but Reed had all the confidence in the world - a must when dealing with other members of his cohort.