Apollo 1

“Take me out to the black, tell ’em I ain’t comin’ back…”

— Joss Whedon, The Ballad of Serenity

by Chris Tobias

On this date 53 years ago, a cabin fire during a launch rehearsal test at Cape Kennedy Air Force Station Launch Complex 34 killed all three Apollo 1 crew members– Command Pilot Virgil I. “Gus” Grissom, Senior Pilot Ed White II (the first American to walk in space), and Pilot Roger B. Chaffee.

The Apollo 1 tribute exhibit at Kennedy Space Center (NASA photo courtesy space.com)

In what can only be described as a cruel coincidence, the anniversaries of the other two most costly disasters in the history of the US space program both fall within a week of today’s. Tomorrow will mark the anniversary of the 1986 explosion during the launch of Space Shuttle Challenger that claimed the lives of her seven crew members– Commander Francis R. “Dick” Scobee, Pilot Michael J. Smith, Mission Specialists Ronald McNair, Ellison Onizuka, and Judith Resnik, Payload Specialist Gregory Jarvis, and Payload Specialist and pioneer teacher in space Christa McAuliffe. This Saturday will mark the anniversary of the disintegration of Space Shuttle Columbia during reentry, which claimed the lives of her crew of seven– Commander Rick Husband, Pilot William C. McCool, Payload Commander Michael P. Anderson, and Mission Specialists Kalpana Chawla, David M. Brown, Laurel Clark and and Ilan Ramon (the first Israeli in space).

The names of these heroes are always worth repeating, and we at Take Back the Sky have written at length about these catastrophes over the past eight years. If you’d like to read any of our previous posts during this rough week of remembrance, you’ll find them if you conduct a simple search of our January and February archives of years past. If you’ve already read our previous articles, then might I suggest you observe this year’s anniversary by reading an NPR feature that was written on the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 1 tragedy.

Though some of our younger readers may not have been born yet when these disasters occurred, those of us who were alive to experience the shock of hearing the news (or even seeing them live on television) will never forget where we were and what we were doing at the time. It would be easy to draw parallels to what many people experienced yesterday when they learned of the sudden and tragic deaths of NBA legend Kobe Bryant, his daughter and seven others in a helicopter crash in California.

However yesterday’s fatal crash, while equally tragic, will not lead to the grounding of all helicopter flights. The Apollo 1, Challenger and Columbia accidents did cause the suspension, at least temporarily, of the nation’s space program, and they certainly ignited debates as to whether or not sending men and women to space was too risky an endeavor.

In a 1962 speech at Rice University, President John F. Kennedy famously said of the Apollo program, “We choose to go to the Moon. We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.” President Kennedy understood that it would be a rough road that would lead to the stars, but that traveling that road would bring out the very best that America has to offer on behalf of all humanity. The astronauts who perished on the launchpad in the Apollo 1 capsule and in space aboard Challenger and Columbia understood it too.

Image credit: arstechnica.com

It is encouraging that SpaceX and Boeing will soon send US astronauts into space once again in American spaceships launched from American soil as part of the Commercial Crew Program, and NASA recently announced ambitious plans to return to the Moon and eventually press on to Mars. To those who would still insist that sending astronauts out to the black is too risky or too expensive, I can only respond that the risk and the expense are not only an investment in the future of mankind, but also the only truly fitting way to honor the memory of the brave men and women of Apollo 1, Challenger and Columbia. It will be the crews of ships like Crew Dragon, Starliner and Orion that will carry on their legacy, and as long as we let them take back the sky, then the crews of Apollo 1, Challenger and Columbia will not have died in vain.

Ad astra per aspera…

The real “Apollo 2,” Saturn 1B AS-203, was an unmanned mission that never landed. The rocket exploded in orbit. (image: Wikipedia)

by Chris Tobias

I thought I’d share a humorous little anecdote that is probably indicative of what the average American knows about our legacy in space. Before I do that, though, allow me to set the scene.

I am a high school teacher by trade, as are my two brothers and my youngest brother’s wife. For whatever reason, teaching runs in my family.

When you’re a teacher, one of the things that goes with the territory is unexpected days off. This week the Polar Vortex that has struck much of the country left most schools in our city closed for two consecutive days, something that the kids probably enjoy much more than the teachers, who have to figure out how to get their curricula back on track despite the lost instructional time. That said, we teachers are certainly not above trying to make the most of a sudden “mid-week weekend.”

This past Tuesday, my youngest brother Michael, who like his wife teaches high school English, talked me into going to Trivia Night at a local bar because school had already been cancelled for Wednesday due to the extreme cold. “You can sleep in Wednesday morning,” he said, “Come out and have some fun.”

I have to be honest– I don’t really like these trivia nights. The guy who runs them has all kinds of errors in his questions, and that damages my calm. For example, one question he asked recently was “Which birds are flightless?” along with these choices:

a) ostriches

b) emus

c) penguins

d) chickens

e) all of them

I immediately cried shenanigans, of course, because A through D are all correct, but E implies that every bird on the planet is flightless! “Calm down, language guy,” I heard from the rest of my team. But seriously, how hard is it to say “all of the above?!”

He also has the nasty habit of denying you a point for identifying a song that you obviously know without using the exact title down to the letter. For example, “Big Money” by Rush wouldn’t get you a point because the song’s official name on the album is “The Big Money.” I mean, come on! All Rush fans call it “Big Money,” just like they all say “Spirit of Radio” even though that song title does have the definite article in front of it.

You get my point.

But I know it means a lot to my brother for us to spend time together doing stuff like this, and the team’s captain is an old friend of mine from high school, so I go from time to time. Tuesday night I couldn’t think of a good reason not to go (other than the ice and snow, but hey, I’m a Northerner), so I went.

During the true/false section of Tuesday’s contest, “Trivia Joe” asked the following question (this is exactly how it appeared on the screen):

“Apollo II had just 20 seconds of fuel left when it landed. True or false?”

But he read the question as: “Apollo 2 had just 20 seconds of fuel left when it landed. True or false?” Well, when I heard Apollo 2 and saw the roman numeral II on the board, I immediately said to myself, “This is a trick.” I confidently told my team it was false.

Joe’s M.O. is to put the answers up on the screen at the end of the round while he tallies the points for each team. Then he reviews the answers after he returns the teams’ score sheets. Well, when the answers flashed on the screen, the answer to the Apollo question was listed as “True.”

I’d had enough.

Joe was still busy tallying the points for the round, so I went up to talk to him and engaged him in the following conversation:

“Hey, Joe, I have a question about that Apollo 2 true/false question.”

“What’s that?”

“You said it was true that Apollo 2 had only 20 seconds of fuel left when it landed, but how could they know that when the mission was cancelled?”

“Huh?”

“Two days ago was the anniversary of a flash fire that killed the crew of Apollo 1. When that happened, NASA cancelled Apollos 2 and 3. The first manned Apollo mission to go into space was actually Apollo 7.”

(Pause for processing. Understanding creeps in.)

“Oh, man, I bet that was supposed to be Apollo 11, and I read it as Apollo 2.”

“Well, that would make more sense.”

“I’m sorry. I guess I’ll have to disqualify that question then.”

“Well, I appreciate that, because it certainly was misleading. Thanks.”

That’s an eleven, not a Roman numeral two. (image: nasa.gov)

I didn’t have the heart to tell him that it still should have been written with Arabic instead of Roman numerals, and that Apollo missions technically didn’t “land,” but splashed down. I was just happy to take one little victory and bear it graciously.

In case you’re wondering, we were the runners-up for Trivia Night on Tuesday. We have finished second every gorram time I’ve gone. I swear when my brother asks next time, I might say, “Just tell Joe to give us second place already so I can stay home and watch Nathan Fillion in The Rookie.”

But my point in telling this humorous little tale, aside from giving space enthusiasts something to chuckle about, is to show that most Americans have lost touch with our legacy in space. Heck, I wonder how many Americans under the age of thirty even know that tomorrow is the anniversary of the loss of the Space Shuttle Columbia and her crew.

But I think SpaceX is the perfect company to change that. Not only is their founder and CEO, Elon Musk, equally well known for his work with Tesla and the Boring Company, but he’s also developed quite the reputation as the “billionaire genius playboy” who was the inspiration for the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Tony Stark as portrayed by Robert Downey, Jr. Just think about it– how many CEO’s in America do you know who could get away with selling custom flamethrowers?

Musk has a history of naming SpaceX’s ships after spaceships from science-fiction. His rocket booster is named after a ship from Star Wars. His flat-top drone ships that serve as landing zones at sea are named after the sentient ships in Iain M. Banks’ The Player of Games. His future Mars Colonial Transport ship is named after a ship in Douglas Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

“So what?” you ask. Well, I think these names are meaningful because each comes with a built-in fan base that will take pride in a ship that is named after something they know and love. That makes those fans all that much more likely to follow the real ship’s progress and accomplishments. In “Cap’n Dummy talk,” as Malcolm Reynolds would say, it makes people care.

You know what I’d like to see? I’d like to see Trivia Joe post this question some Tuesday night a few years from now:

“The private spaceship that finally returned US astronauts to space after launching from American soil in 2019 was named after the ship in Joss Whedon’s Firefly. True or false?”

And of course I want that answer to be “true” (even if we do finish second again). I think it would help raise awareness of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program if the first Crew Dragon were named after a ship from pop culture, just as the first space shuttle was named Enterprise after the starship from Star Trek. And while Serenity may not be the most high-profile ship in science-fiction, Elon Musk has already demonstrated that this is hardly necessary for it to qualify as a name for a SpaceX ship.

So if you’re a Browncoat, and if you agree with me, please write a letter or postcard to Elon Musk and CEO president and chief operating officer Gwynne Shotwell and let them know as much. All the information you need to do that can be found on the Take Action page of this site.

Please join me in calling for a SpaceX Crew Dragon named Serenity— because making history is hardly trivial.

Peace, love and rockets…

by Chris Tobias

Today begins a week on the calendar which reminds us that going into the black is never something to be taken for granted. On this date in 1967, a flash fire in the command module during a test on the launch pad claimed the lives of Apollo 1 astronauts Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee. Tomorrow, January 28, will mark the 33rd anniversary of the loss of the Space Shuttle Challenger, which exploded 73 seconds after launch with the loss of her entire crew: Dick Scobee, Michael J. Smith, Ellison Onizuka, Judith Resnik, Ronald McNair, Gregory Jarvis and Christa McAuliffe. And Friday, February 1, will mark the anniversary of the 2003 loss of Space Shuttle Columbia, which disintegrated upon re-entry into Earth’s atmosphere, killing all seven crew members: Rick D. Husband, William C. McCool, Michael P. Anderson, Kalpana Chawla, David M. Brown, Laurel Clark and Ilan Ramon.

nasa-memorial-apollo-1-challenger-columbia

image: Space Safety Magazine

Over the years, I have written fairly extensively about these events and the astronauts whose lives they claimed, since I believe very strongly that it is indeed a rough road that leads to the stars, and if we do not continue to dare to push farther into the black, then these brave, extraordinary men and women will have died in vain. If you’d like to read any of my previous posts, just search the January and February archives on this site.

This year, however, I’d like to discuss, however briefly, this week of somber anniversaries within the context of our larger mission here at Take Back the Sky, which is to convince Elon Musk’s commercial space company SpaceX to name its first Crew Dragon after Serenity, the ship in Joss Whedon’s sci-fi television series Firefly and subsequent motion picture Serenity.

While it is true that we want SpaceX to name the first Crew Dragon Serenity after a ship from science-fiction, in much the same fashion that the first space shuttle was named Enterprise after the starship from Star Trek and SpaceX’s workhorse booster rocket the Falcon 9 was named after the Millenium Falcon of Star Wars fame, there is more to the name Serenity than a reference to a space western with a cult following, and at times like this, that becomes apparent.

If you google the noun “serenity,” you will find that it means “a state of being calm, peaceful and untroubled.” The word itself suggests balance and harmony, with no hint of turmoil or conflict. This is, of course, precisely the state of being we hope the late astronauts of the crews of Apollo 1, Challenger and Columbia have now found. Though the phrase “rest in peace” may have become almost cliché in this era of social media tweets and soundbites, when I hear the word “serenity,” I can’t help but be reminded of the words of Neil Peart, drummer and lyricist for the Canadian rock group Rush, who wrote in the song Presto, “I am made from the dust of the stars, and the oceans flow in my veins” or the words of the English poet Sarah Williams, who wrote, “I have loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night.” I believe that if the next spaceship to carry US astronauts into space from American soil were to bear the name Serenity, its name would, among other things, serve as a living, working memorial to the men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice to further our understanding of the stars. And as the first privately built, privately owned spaceship to carry US astronauts into space as part of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, it would send a message that we not only hope they are at peace, but that we, the people, fully intend to carry on their mission– that they can rest knowing we have the watch now.

SpaceX completed its static fire of the Falcon 9 and Crew Dragon on January 24, and the ship’s unmanned demonstration flight is expected to take place next month. If you agree with me that Serenity would be a good name for the Crew Dragon, to honor those astronauts we’ve lost or for any reason, now is the time to write a letter or postcard to SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk and SpaceX president and chief operating officer Gwynne Shotwell to let them know you want to see the ship bear that name. You can find the address for SpaceX as well as some tips for contacting them on the “Take Action” page of this site.

And whether you choose to contact SpaceX or not, don’t forget to say a prayer, light a candle, lift a glass or do whatever you personally find to be appropriate this week to honor the memory of the crews of Apollo 1, Challenger and Columbia.

Ad astra, per aspera.

“Take my love, take my land, take me where I cannot stand. I don’t care, I’m still free. You can’t take the sky from me. Take me out to the black, tell ’em I ain’t comin’ back. Burn the land and boil the sea, you can’t take the sky from me. There’s no place I can be, since I found serenity. You can’t take the sky from me.”– Joss Whedon, The Ballad of Serenity

NASA-memorial-patch-230x200

by Chris Tobias

Since the earliest days of this site, I have written annually about a very somber week in the space community. That week begins today, with the anniversary of the flash fire that occurred on the launch pad during an Apollo 1 test 51 years ago, killing astronauts Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee. Tomorrow will mark the 32nd anniversary of the mid-launch explosion of the Space Shuttle Challenger, which claimed the lives of astronauts Christa McAuliffe, Gregory Jarvis, Judith Resnik, Francis (Dick) Scobee, Ronald McNair, Mike Smith and Ellison Onizuka. Just four days later, on February 1, we will see the 25th anniversary of the loss of the Space Shuttle Columbia, which disintegrated during re-entry with the loss of astronauts David Brown, Rick Husband, Laurel Clark, Kalpana Chawla, Michael Anderson, William McCool, and Ilan Ramon.

Over the years I have written so much about these men and women, their bravery, their sacrifice and their willingness to give their lives if it meant that humanity would come one step closer to a future in which living and working out in the black was a regular part of our daily existence. (If you’d like to read any of it, simply search this site’s archives for any given year in the months of January and February.) As this week of remembrance approached again this year, I realized that I really didn’t have anything new to say that hadn’t already been said about them. I felt that at this point, if there is any one thing that bears repeating, it is that they should be remembered as heroes. Big. Damn. Heroes. Every one of them.

So this year, I would simply like to call your attention to how NASA has decided to honor these astronauts, the crew of Challenger in particular.

Ad Astra Per Aspera: the Courage to Die Trying

Posted by Chris Tobias on February 1, 2017

Posted in: Ad Astra Per Aspera, Articles. Tagged: Apollo 1, Cape Canaveral, Challenger, Columbia, Kennedy Space Center, NASA. Leave a comment

News of the loss of Space Shuttle Columbia, as America first saw it on CNN. (Many of us saw it live.)

by Chris Tobias

Every year, we observe a week of very rough anniversaries in the space community. It begins on January 27, the anniversary of the flash fire that killed three Apollo 1 astronauts in the cockpit of their capsule during a launch pad test in 1967. The following day, January 28, is the date on which the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded during launch in 1986, killing all seven crew members aboard. The week of remembrance concludes today– February 1, the date on which the Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated during reentry in 2003, again claiming the lives of all seven crew members.

This year, the brave astronauts who were lost in all three of these accidents were remembered at a special ceremony at Cape Canaveral on the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 1 tragedy, at which the original hatch from that Apollo 1 capsule, long kept in storage and out of the public eye, was unveiled for the first time as part of a new display at the Kennedy Space Center Visitors Complex designed to honor America’s fallen astronauts and remind all of us that it is indeed a rough road that leads to the stars.

The three-part hatch of Apollo 1 is now on display at Kennedy Space Center (NASA photo).

Over the past four years, we at Take Back the Sky have written at length about these tragedies and the brave men and women who lost their lives as a result of them. (You can find those posts by searching the January/February archives on the home page.) As we honor their memory again this year, it’s both appropriate and important that we recognize that their bravery went beyond a mere willingness to risk their lives, and was instead a willingness to die trying on behalf of the whole human race.

Of course, a large part of the legacy of Apollo 1, Challenger and Columbia is that they led to improvements in the vehicles and techniques used to send people into the black, which in turn made subsequent missions both safer and more efficient. But their legacy also serves as a reminder to us that if we are to become a multi-planet species, then going to space has to be something for which we’re willing to pay the ultimate price. We will always mourn the loss of brave, intelligent men and women, but if we as human beings truly wish to live among the stars, then we must believe that doing so is important enough that we are also willing to die there. Fortunately for us, and especially for future generations, the men and women of NASA’s Astronaut Corps understand that and still hold to it with every fiber of their being. That’s just one of the many things that makes them the “Big Damn Heroes” that they are.

So, as we honor the memory of Roger Chaffee, Gus Grissom, Ed White, Dick Scobee, Michael Smith, Judy Resnik, Ellison Onizuka, Ronald McNair, Gregory Jarvis, Christa McAuliffe, Rick Husband, William McCool, Michael Anderson, Ilan Ramon, Kalpana Chawla, David Brown and Laurel Clark, let us be thankful that their are still men and women like them, heroes whose mettle is summed up so eloquently in the words of the English poet Sarah Williams:

“Though my soul may set in darkness, it will rise in perfect light; I have loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night.”

Ad Astra Per Aspera: the Lost Lessons

Posted by Chris Tobias on January 30, 2016

Posted in: Ad Astra Per Aspera, Articles. Tagged: Apollo 1, Challenger, Challenger Center, Christa McAuliffe, Columbia, NASA, Teacher in Space Project. Leave a comment

NASA-memorial-patch-230x200

“Take me out to the black. Tell ’em I ain’t comin’ back…” — Joss Whedon, The Ballad of Serenity

by Chris Tobias

If you’re a space enthusiast like us, the days between January 27 and February 1 are a difficult stretch. That’s because each year we’re forced to observe a hat trick of anniversaries we wish we didn’t have to see on the calendar– a somber series of dates that remind us that it is indeed a rough road that leads to the stars.

This past Wednesday, January 27, was the anniversary of the flash fire on the launch pad during a test in 1967 that claimed the lives of Apollo 1 astronauts Virgil “Gus” Grissom, Edward H. White II and Roger Chaffee. And last Thursday, January 28, marked the 30th anniversary of the day on which Space Shuttle Challenger exploded during launch, killing astronauts Michael J. Smith, Dick Scobee, Ronald McNair, Ellison Onizuka, Gregory Jarvis and Judith Resnik, as well as Christa McAuliffe, a New England school teacher who was to have become the first educator in space as part of NASA’s Teacher in Space Project. This Monday, February 1, will be thirteen years since Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated upon reentering Earth’s atmosphere and astronauts Rick Husband, William McCool, Michael Anderson, Kalpana Chawla, David Brown, Laurel Clark and Ilan Ramon perished.

Here at Take Back the Sky, we’ve written at length about these tragedies and the heroes we lost as a result of them. (If you’d like to read more, check out our archived blogposts from October 2012 and January 2015.) This year however, we’d like to honor the memory of all of these brave men and women by taking a look at the groundbreaking work that one of them was to have done out in the black.

A Week of Rough Rememberin’: Apollo 1, Challenger and Columbia

Posted by Chris Tobias on January 27, 2015

Posted in: Ad Astra Per Aspera, Articles. Tagged: Apollo 1, Challenger, Columbia, Space Shuttle, Virgin Galactic, World Space Week. Leave a comment

by Chris Tobias

Over the next six days, there will be three very somber anniversaries in the space community. That six-day stretch began today, as on this date in 1967, three Apollo 1 astronauts died in a flash fire during a launch pad test. Tomorrow will mark the anniversary of the Space Shuttle Challenger’s explosion during launch in 1986, a tragedy that claimed the lives of all seven astronauts on board. And then of course this Sunday, February 1, will be the twelfth anniversary of the loss of the Space Shuttle Columbia and the seven astronauts of her crew, all of whom perished when the vehicle disintegrated during reentry.

For more about these tragedies and the heroes we lost as a result of them, you can read our World Space Week blog post from October 8, 2012.

These tragic accidents, like the one that claimed the life of a Virgin Galactic test pilot last year, serve as a reminder that leaving this planet is never easy, and that traveling and working in space will never truly be “safe.” But each of these men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice in the name of space exploration believed that going out to the black was something worth risking their very lives for, and ultimately they did it for us, for our children and for those future generations for whom travel into Low Earth Orbit will be no more extraordinary than an airline flight from New York to Berlin is today.

And for those of us who will never know what it’s like to break atmo, the least we can do to show our gratitude is honor their memories. May they rest in peace.

Ad astra per aspera…

Take Back the Sky

"If something is important enough, even if the odds are against you, you should still do it." — Elon Musk

All posts tagged Apollo 1

A Rough Road Leads to the Stars

Our Legacy in Space Really Isn’t Trivial

A Manned US Spaceship Named Serenity Would Be a Unique Way to Honor the Memory of the Crews of Apollo 1, Challenger and Columbia

Ad Astra Per Aspera: Honoring Our Heroes through Education

Ad Astra Per Aspera: the Courage to Die Trying

Ad Astra Per Aspera: the Lost Lessons

A Week of Rough Rememberin’: Apollo 1, Challenger and Columbia

Like us on Facebook

Follow us on Twitter

Follow Blog via Email

Categories

Archives

Search