(left to right) Lt. Colonel Edward Higgins White (USAF), Lt. Colonel Virgil Ivan "Gus" Grissom (USAF) and Lt. Commander Roger Bruce Chaffee (USN)In Memorium
Forty years ago today - January 27, 1967 - the men of Apollo 1 died in a tragic fire during a grounded test.
In a what in hindsight was an amazing series of oversights, NASA learned the in the worst possible terms the cost of placing so many flammable items -- primarily plastics -- in an enclosed, pressurized, oxygen rich environment with partially exposed wiring, and moreover with inadequate means of escape for the crew.
A needless waste of human life in the specifics of the incident, though the aims of the space program were noble and necessary to both the human spirit and that of the nation. In many ways what they were engaged in helped to make the 1960s perhaps the finest peacetime decade for the United States of America. The U.S. and the U.S.S.R. were each driven to greatness - and, yes, to the occasional tragedy - in one of the finest competitions in human history. Compare that with the virtual waste that was the 1980s, where the race became one almost entirely of arms build-ups.
Tags: Apollo 1
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Here's hoping.
To White, Chaffee and Grissom. To the Russians lost in that one Soyuz flight. To the Challenger 7. To the Columbia 7.
To those who've survived.
Thank you all.
I can picture Paul Spiegel bursting into the lab with news of the Challenger disaster.
Not to mention the eBay ghouls cashing in on Columbia 4 years ago.
All in all, a bad time of year for the American space program.
C.L.: Oh, neither did mine, I must admit. Even when the Moon landing was televised a little over three years later I remember being almost dismissive. Fiction had me impatient with what felt like baby steps. The Challenger disaster - during a day I was largely free - stands out much more starkly in memory.