Gene Kranz, NASA Mission Control Flight Director

How would you like to get this ass-chewing?

“Spaceflight will never tolerate carelessness, incapacity, and neglect. Somewhere, somehow, we screwed up. It could have been in design, build, or test. Whatever it was, we should have caught it. We were too gung ho about the schedule and we locked out all of the problems we saw each day in our work. Every element of the program was in trouble and so were we. The simulators were not working, Mission Control was behind in virtually every area, and the flight and test procedures changed daily. Nothing we did had any shelf life. Not one of us stood up and said, “Dammit, stop!” I don’t know what Thompson’s committee will find as the cause, but I know what I find. We are the cause! We were not ready! We did not do our job. We were rolling the dice, hoping that things would come together by launch day, when in our hearts we knew it would take a miracle. We were pushing the schedule and betting that the Cape would slip before we did.

From this day forward, Flight Control will be known by two words: “Tough” and “Competent”. Tough means we are forever accountable for what we do or what we fail to do. We will never again compromise our responsibilities. Every time we walk into Mission Control we will know what we stand for. Competent means we will never take anything for granted. We will never be found short in our knowledge and in our skills. Mission Control will be perfect. When you leave this meeting today you will go to your office and the first thing you will do there is to write “Tough and Competent” on your blackboards. It will never be erased. Each day when you enter the room these words will remind you of the price paid by Grissom, White, and Chaffee. These words are the price of admission to the ranks of Mission Control.”[1]

Gene Kranz is better known for the phrase “failure is not an option” and even though that is the title of his autobiography, he actually never said that – it was attributed to another member of the Apollo 13 rescue team. I’m okay with that, since I prefer the above lengthy quote – but it’s not a proper fit for a book title.

Gene is a genuine American hero – an Air Force fighter pilot who flew F-86 Sabres post Korean War before he became an aeronautical engineer and later national icon – I’d like to think my dad repaired his squadron’s jet engines when he was deployed. Gene went into the reserves and was actually still an Air Force Reservist during the time he had the reigns at NASA as a Senior Mission Control Flight Director of the Apollo program, retiring as a Captain in 1972 – everyone has an angle. Even this guy:

Brig Gen James M. Stewart, USAFR, Ret.

This guy also had the Right Stuff. I’m willing to bet beers or the cold frosty beverage of your choice that few of Vic’s young readers know this piece of history. Stewart started off as an AAC Officer in 1940, and retired in 1976. He was the second highest ranking actor in history, right behind the Gipper. During World War II he flew B-24 Liberators in Europe and North Africa, and was awarded two Distinguished Flying Crosses and four Air Medals, as well as the French Croix de Guerre with bronze palm. Since it is still around Christmas time, the next time chance you get to catch It’s a Wonderful Lifeon the tube, remember that he served, and continued to serve as long as he was allowed to – a good guy.

Gene Kranz is renowned in our history of spaceflight as the Mission Controller for Apollo 11 and 13 – he was the steely-eyed missile man personified. The Apollo 11 landing drama is riveting, but if you look more closely at it, it was just another test flight – albeit extreme considering the circumstances. People overlook the fact that Neil had overshot the preferred landing spot since he and Buzz were distracted by abstruse flight computer 1201 and 1202 warnings. But that is why we sent test pilots, and they landed the Eagle beautifully and walked away from it so to speak.

Apollo 13, on the other hand, was an engineering marvel of a rescue mission. It took a measure of concentration on the tasks at hand that goes beyond category, and it needed the consummate will power of determined Senior Mission Flight Controller to will that crippled spaceship home to splashdown and a happy ending.

Jim & Marilyn Lovell’s Resting Place – They Ain’t there yet…

Every January, my son’s Boy Scout Troop performs a community service project in clearing off the wreaths laid on the 2000 or so graves at the Annapolis National Military Cemetery. I always go and help out and pay homage to the graves of the Navy heroes interred there – but Jim is not one of them, yet. He could have been honored with a memorial service in absentia, lost in space or cremated during a botched re-entry, but he and his Apollo 13 crew escaped a tragic fate – like Naval Aviators have a knack for doing. Gene Kranz made the difference in my view, but there was another guy who had great impact in how that difference was executed, and that was John Aaron.

John Aaron – The Original Steely-eyed Missile Man

John Aaron grew up in western Oklahoma. His mother was a minister, and his father was a cattle rancher. After spending a year attending Bethany Nazarene College, he transferred to Southwestern Oklahoma State University, from which he graduated in 1964 with a degree in Physics. He was going to teach mathematics and science after graduating from college, but applied for a job with NASA. When he arrived at NASA, Aaron was trained as an EECOM, a flight controller with specific responsibility for the electrical, environmental and communications systems on board the spacecraft.[2] In that role, he knew more about the workings of the Apollo Command Module than any of the astronauts – we have all met those kinds of guys – call them geeks, but they are driven to perfection. It was John who discerned the meaning of the 1201 and 1202 codes popping up during the lunar descent of the Eagle during Apollo 11, recalled the right switch setting that saved Apollo 12’s mission, and figured out the power-up procedures to get the Apollo 13 Command Module to regain operational control for re-entry which saved the lives of those astronauts. Kranz may get the headlines, but John Aaron was doing the über professional system expert dirty work.

Tom Wolfe wrote the book “The Right Stuff” and it is a good read and later an entertaining movie. Astronauts in the 60s and 70s were rock stars, deservedly so, but Gene and John had all of that same quality as men ruling the missions at the consoles, in spades. So where am I going with this?
Last week, the National Defense Authorization Act (aka NDAA) created the long-anticipated Space Force, I’d rather they had called it the Space Corps, or even go all the way and call it Starfleet. At any rate, Gen Raymond will be the Chief of Space Operations, so there is a Navy slant to the whole Space Force Enterprise(like how I did that?). So, what does that really mean?

Dum de dah, de diddly dah…?

If duly implemented, the Space Force should be an amalgamation and tight integration of the uniformed service’s space operations and personnel, the NRO, academic research, and the rapidly emerging space technology sector of both the US and our allies, since we are all in this together. Sound easy? I predict it will take years, if not a decade or more. I’m not a nay-sayer – hell, I love the idea but it should have been done a lot earlier.

Alas, I’ll never get to be a member of Starfleet, since I’m getting to be too fucking old for playing the cosmic reindeer games of young men and women. I feel privileged that I got to witness the original Space Race of the 60s and 70s, as well as Star Trek but not sure what this latest Space Race is going to yield. I’m a little wary of the roles being played by the latest commercial superstars in that trade space – like Elon, Jeff, Richard, etc. I hope their motivations are not just some perverted ego trip, because like it or not, we are in space – it is important, and we have to play to win. And Boeing’s failure to achieve the proper orbit for the initial crewed Starliner launch last Friday was not a good start – and that’s being kind. NASA is trying to put lipstick on that pig –it sucked plain and simple. I note people at the top of Boeing are bailing for various reasons usually blamed on the 737 Max – don’t be fooled. The Starliner fuckup may prove to be a bigger deal…

Those who are going to be charged with architecting the Space Force need to be on their game, and have the Right Stuff, like Gene Kranz, Jimmy, and John. Take Gene’s words from the quote up front to heart – be tough and competent. The future depends upon it.

I remain your faithful servant.

P.S. And now a rebuttal from E, aka Pt. Loma, Junior, who wants to be a Space Force Starman in his own right:
“Boeing’s failure was probably just a few lines of code somewhere; nothing that couldn’t have been fixed with a human test pilot. Then again, it could’ve been worse with people on board. You learn more from failure, and in an un-crewed test flight, failure is an option.”

And this is from someone who likes SpaceX more than Boeing.

Copyright 2020 Point Loma
www.vicsocotra.com

[1]Source Wikipedia.org.
[2]Source: Wikipedia.com.