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Author
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Topic: Apollo 13 and Apollo 14 flight crew swap
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LM-12
Member Posts: 3635
From: Ontario, Canada
Registered: Oct 2010
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posted 04-17-2015 10:20 AM
  
This October 1969 Spaceport News article identifies Alan Shepard, Stuart Roosa and Ed Mitchell as the prime crew of Apollo 13.Wasn't the Alan Shepard/Jim Lovell crew swap made months earlier?  |
Headshot
Member Posts: 1098
From: Vancouver, WA, USA
Registered: Feb 2012
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posted 04-17-2015 11:25 AM
It would be interesting to determine the source for this article.The Fra Mauro landing target for Apollo 13 was not formally designated until 10 December 1969. Had Apollo 12 not successfully landed at ALS 7 in November 1969, Apollo 13 would have been retargeted to it. The exploration priority was two Mare landings, then Fra Mauro. As far as crew selection was concerned. Both Chaikin's and Slayton's books mention that by Spring 1969, the crew selection for 13 was "known" around the astronaut office. Neither gives the date when George Mueller rejected Shepard and company for 13. |
LM-12
Member Posts: 3635
From: Ontario, Canada
Registered: Oct 2010
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posted 04-17-2015 05:57 PM
The article seems to be too late for a Shepard crew and too early for a Fra Mauro landing site. |
Michael Cassutt
Member Posts: 374
From: Studio City CA USA
Registered: Mar 2005
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posted 04-18-2015 10:44 AM
The crews with Lovell as commander of 13 and Shepard of 14 were announced by NASA in the first week of August 1969. The original inside-the-office announcement of 13 with Shepard's crew was in late March 1969, and over-turned by NASA HQ by late April, early May. |
LM-12
Member Posts: 3635
From: Ontario, Canada
Registered: Oct 2010
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posted 04-18-2015 11:26 PM
Not surprisingly, that August 1969 news release does not mention the crew swap. A January 1970 news release explains why the planned March 12 launch date was rescheduled to April 11: With the prospective of lowering the rate of Apollo flights, the movement of Apollo 13 to April allows additional time for more detailed analysis of specific mission plans. Follow-on launches beyond April 13 are being analyzed to optimize the interval between launches for both operations and scientific return. |
Mike_The_First
Member Posts: 436
From: USA
Registered: Jun 2014
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posted 09-04-2017 03:15 AM
I'm watching "Apollo 13," the movie, again and a thought occurred to me — I couldn't find this on the boards already and I don't have my library handy to check the various reference materials:Why did the Apollo 13 crew get bumped to Apollo 14 (with the crew of 14 moving up to 13) instead of just keeping the same crew and putting the back-up Commander in for Alan Shepard? Isn't that the role of the back-up: to take over should their counterpart on the prime crew be unable to fly for any reason? If the Apollo 13 commander who couldn't fly wasn't someone with the clout of Al Shepard (one of the original 7, first American in space), would it have still been handled the same way? I suppose should also ask who made the decision; was it management or the crew themselves? Also, as an aside, when the prime crews of 13 and 14 switched, did the back-up crews also switch or was the Apollo 13 back up crew always the Apollo 13 back up crew, regardless of who made up the prime crew? Editor's note: Threads merged. |
Kite
Member Posts: 1039
From: Northampton UK
Registered: Nov 2009
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posted 09-04-2017 06:15 AM
I am pretty sure that Shepard chose his own crew, along with Deke Slayton, so that is why they stayed intact when management insisted he had more time to train by switching to Apollo 14. The back up crew remained with Apollo 13 as when selected training had not started. |
Tom
Member Posts: 1646
From: New York
Registered: Nov 2000
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posted 09-04-2017 09:21 AM
As I remember it, the main reason for switching the rotation for "13" and "14" was to give the Shepard crew more time to prepare. Shepard and his crew were picked as prime crew members without serving as a backup crew... thereby missing out on a lot of training. Deke Slayton felt that Lovell's crew was in better shape to fly the earlier mission. |
randy
Member Posts: 2586
From: West Jordan, Utah USA
Registered: Dec 1999
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posted 09-04-2017 09:49 AM
Didn't Shepard's ear condition also have something to do with it? |
Michael Cassutt
Member Posts: 374
From: Studio City CA USA
Registered: Mar 2005
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posted 09-04-2017 02:33 PM
Shepard's ear condition caused him to be grounded from March 1964 to late 1968. So while in some sense it had "something to do with this," it wasn't the reason for the swap of crews.NASA HQ, specifically George Mueller, AA for spaceflight, refused to approve Slayton's A13 crew (Shepard, Roosa, Mitchell) even though MSC director Gilruth had signed off on it. Mueller claimed that Shepard didn't have time to train to the level of other Apollo commanders. (In reality, he had already told people that Shepard wouldn't fly 13 and didn't want to be contradicted.) Slayton came up with the idea of swapping the 13 and putative 14 crews (Lovell, Mattingly, Haise) in order to give Shepard "more time', and to allow Mueller to save face. |
Skylon
Member Posts: 312
From:
Registered: Sep 2010
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posted 09-05-2017 07:17 PM
quote:
Originally posted by Mike_The_First:
I'm watching "Apollo 13," the movie...
As you can tell by the comments, "Apollo 13" really distorts the way the crew assignment occurred. The film makes it sound like Shepard's crew was assigned and in training then Shepard's ear infection "flare's up" — when that wasn't the case — as Lovell comments to some Congressmen about Shepard's assignment and how he needs to see Shepard to "get up to speed" when Lovell is assigned to Apollo 13. Shepard, Roosa and Mitchell were never formally assigned, neither was the backup crew. The "swap" occurred because Slayton had submitted a crew, got it rejected and needed to replace if with someone, and that turned out to be Lovell, Mattingly and Haise. I am curious when approximately Lovell found out 13 would be his flight. Was it while he was still serving as backup for Apollo 11, or very soon afterwards? |
Mike_The_First
Member Posts: 436
From: USA
Registered: Jun 2014
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posted 09-05-2017 09:06 PM
quote:
Originally posted by Skylon:
As you can tell by the comments, "Apollo 13" really distorts the way the crew assignment occurred.
There's very little about that movie that isn't a distorted version of events. For the heck of it, I pulled up the air to ground transcript when it got to the launch sequence. Everything from the quotes, to the people who said them, to the order of events changed.But, at the same time, it does paint a very general picture of a composite of the events and feelings at the time. So it makes for a good jumping off point for questions like this, where I never thought about it too hard before. What I hadn't realized, which I gleamed from the responses (thanks, all!), was that the "swap" happened at an early enough time that it ultimately didn't matter too much. As I now understand it (someone please correct me if I'm yet again wrong), everything was so preliminary at that point that it would've actually taken more effort to replace just Shepard than it was to just move the crew of 14 up and the crew of 13 back... yes? quote:
I am curious when approximately Lovell found out 13 would be his flight. Was it while he was still serving as backup for Apollo 11, or very soon afterwards?
Since the threads merged, Michael Cassutt answered above: quote:
The crews with Lovell as commander of 13 and Shepard of 14 were announced by NASA in the first week of August 1969. The original inside-the-office announcement of 13 with Shepard's crew was in late March 1969, and over-turned by NASA HQ by late April, early May.
That would seem to indicate that it was indeed during his time working on Apollo 11, which gives me a new question: Why assign Lovell, Haise and Anders (Mattingly) to the Apollo 11 back-up crew instead of Shepard, et al if the latter was being assigned to 13? Or would Mueller have blocked that too? |
LM-12
Member Posts: 3635
From: Ontario, Canada
Registered: Oct 2010
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posted 09-05-2017 09:35 PM
In the crew training summaries, the Apollo 13 (Lovell) crew training appears to begin on August 1, 1969. The Apollo 14 (Shepard) crew training appears to begin on August 15, 1969. There is an interesting typo on that page. The heading is "Apollo 14 Crew Training Summary" with the "4" heavily typed over a "3" in the mission number. |
moorouge
Member Posts: 2486
From: U.K.
Registered: Jul 2009
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posted 09-06-2017 02:29 AM
One wonders how seriously one should take these dates on when crew training began. In October '69 Lovell was in the UK meeting up with a ship launched by his wife in the previous April. |
Michael Cassutt
Member Posts: 374
From: Studio City CA USA
Registered: Mar 2005
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posted 09-06-2017 10:25 AM
quote:
Originally posted by Mike_The_First:
That would seem to indicate that it was indeed during his time working on Apollo 11, which gives me a new question: Why assign Lovell, Haise and Anders (Mattingly) to the Apollo 11 back-up crew instead of Shepard, et al if the latter was being assigned to 13? Or would Mueller have blocked that too?
Lovell, Anders and Haise were given the Apollo 11 backup assignment in late December 1968. At that time Shepard was newly-restored to Class I flight status and had not been involved in any of the prior Apollo missions — which was what Slayton wanted for the first lunar landing attempt(s).Four months later, call it late March 1969, Shepard has gotten a bit more up to speed on Apollo — and Slayton and the Apollo team have more information about their spacecraft and training effectiveness to where he felt confident about slipping "rookie" astronauts like Worden and Mattingly into vital CMP jobs. |
LM-12
Member Posts: 3635
From: Ontario, Canada
Registered: Oct 2010
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posted 09-06-2017 09:55 PM
From the JSC Oral History interview with James Lovell in May 1999: Now you have to realize that Al Shepard was a — the ultimate politician. Very well respected for his flight he did, so he talked NASA into giving him — talked [Donald K.] Deke Slayton into giving him the very next flight, which was Apollo 13. And then after he started working 13 and I was getting my crew together for 14, I think that the NASA hierarchy — not Deke, I think the NASA — had second thoughts. They said, "Look it, Al's been grounded for, what, 8 or 9 years and you're going to give him the very next flight? And he only made a 15 sub—minute suborbital flight into space? Now come on. Let's get serious about this thing." So, Deke said, "Okay, I'll slip him one." And so, one day when I was training for 14, Deke came in and said, "Jim, how would you like to take 13 and we'll give Shepard 14." I was delighted. I said, "Hey, yes!" I mean I — you know, I was on 8, backup on 11, and I'm all set to go! I mean, you know, I needed the training. I needed to know where I'm going to, you know, experiments and things like that. But, I'm ready! So, that's how it came to pass. |
alanh_7
Member Posts: 1259
From: Ajax, Ontario, Canada
Registered: Apr 2008
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posted 09-07-2017 07:43 AM
The TV miniseries "From the Earth to the Moon" - though slightly distorted - goes into this in some detail. Shepard had never been on a backup crew and was flying with two astronauts who had never flown. I suspect any other astronaut would never had been assigned a mission commander without having worked a backup mission first. But this is Al Sheppard we are discussing. I think Andrew Chaikin discusses this in detail in his book "A Man on the Moon." |
Rusty53
Member Posts: 50
From: Rochester, NY USA
Registered: Jun 2010
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posted 09-07-2017 02:51 PM
It's no wonder that Slayton supported Shepard's quest to command a landing mission after being grounded for so long. After all, he himself was hoping to get reinstated and get right back in line. Didn't Slayton pencil himself in as CDR for ASTP? |
Michael Cassutt
Member Posts: 374
From: Studio City CA USA
Registered: Mar 2005
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posted 09-07-2017 05:49 PM
Slayton concocted a rule — self-serving in his case, but real nonetheless — that went like this: if an astronaut got kicked off a prime crew assignment for medical reasons, when restored to flight status said astronaut would get the next available assignment.Hence Mike Collins into Apollo 11 after losing his Apollo 8 prime crew assignment. Hence Shepard into Apollo 13 after losing his prime GT-III assignment. (The fact that it was never announced publicly doesn't diminish the fact that he had it.) Hence Slayton into ASTP. I'm not saying this was fair, just saying this was how Deke chose to operate. |
Mike_The_First
Member Posts: 436
From: USA
Registered: Jun 2014
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posted 09-07-2017 06:09 PM
If Shepard, et al really were as unprepared as we're discussing here (Shepard being out of the game for years with no practical Apollo hardware experience and the other two never being in the game at all), why did Gilruth sign off on their crew/mission combination? Is the training/experience issue being overstated? |
Michael Cassutt
Member Posts: 374
From: Studio City CA USA
Registered: Mar 2005
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posted 09-07-2017 06:14 PM
Shepard was quite unprepared compared to Borman, McDivitt, Stafford, Conrad or other Apollo commanders and, indeed, all crew members.But Gilruth and Slayton assumed, with some confidence, that Shepard could be trained in a year. As it turned out, he had close to two years before 14 flew. |
LM-12
Member Posts: 3635
From: Ontario, Canada
Registered: Oct 2010
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posted 09-07-2017 10:30 PM
In mid-1969, the tentative landing target for Apollo 14 was the highland region near Censorinus Crater, is that correct? |
Skylon
Member Posts: 312
From:
Registered: Sep 2010
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posted 09-08-2017 05:11 AM
I find Lovell's oral history comments interesting in that he recalls "training" for 14 when it seems likely (based on this threads comments) he was in the backup cycle for 11 when the decision was made - since Mattingly was serving as an alternate backup at the time, you could say Lovell was indeed getting his prospective crew ready. Because of Deke's "system" of backup to prime did the lines tend to get blurred like this? Obviously the training got more specific once they officially became prime crews, but did the backup crews that cycled to prime (like the 13, 15, 16 and 17 crews) tend to just keep training without any real break as they transitioned between the two assignments? |
Headshot
Member Posts: 1098
From: Vancouver, WA, USA
Registered: Feb 2012
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posted 09-08-2017 08:00 AM
NASA had considered Censorinus Crater for Apollo 14 in mid-1969. By Oct 1969 NASA intended to send Apollo 14 to the Littrow area (near Taurus Littrow where A17 would land in 1972). Shepard and Mitchell actually performed a few landing simulations for the Littrow Area. I do not know when those sims occurred.Censorinus Crater was the favored target for the H-4 Apollo 15 mission during late 1969 planning sessions, but by March 1970 it had lost favor to the Davy Chain Area. As far as I know, no formal choice was ever made. |
Michael Cassutt
Member Posts: 374
From: Studio City CA USA
Registered: Mar 2005
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posted 09-08-2017 10:13 AM
quote:
Originally posted by Skylon:
I find Lovell's oral history comments interesting in that he recalls "training" for 14...
I don't have any hard evidence on this, but I believe that Lovell was operating on the assumption that he had 14, and was thus "in training" for it, when Slayton dropped the 13/14 swap on him.(For example, Tom Stafford knew that he had Apollo 10 as a prime crew assignment all through his Apollo 7 backup work.) The new crews were announced August 6, 1969. Slayton would only have have told Lovell about the swap and new mission sometime after the July 21 landing, very possibly in mission control (as he was known to do). So somewhere in those three weeks... |
LM-12
Member Posts: 3635
From: Ontario, Canada
Registered: Oct 2010
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posted 09-08-2017 10:52 AM
Maybe that period could be narrowed down a bit further to sometime between the landing and August 1, since August 1 seems to be the first date mentioned in the Apollo 13 crew training summary. |
Fra Mauro
Member Posts: 1739
From: Bethpage, N.Y.
Registered: Jul 2002
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posted 09-08-2017 11:00 AM
The topic is Shepard's assignment is one of continual scrutiny and fascination. Maybe NASA brass didn't mind a "name" being on the third/fourth mission in an attempt to keep public interest.Slayton's rule seems similar to one held by many coaches — you don't lose your job due to injury. |
heng44
Member Posts: 3604
From: Netherlands
Registered: Nov 2001
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posted 09-08-2017 01:51 PM
There is a series of photos of Shepard and Mitchell participating in crew compartment fit and function (C2F2) for LM-7 in the Manned Spacecraft Operations Building at KSC on July 11, 1969. LM-7 was being processed for Apollo 13, so apparently Shepard and Mitchell were still assigned to that flight at the time. |
LM-12
Member Posts: 3635
From: Ontario, Canada
Registered: Oct 2010
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posted 09-08-2017 06:14 PM
July 11 is well after the date (late April, early May per Michael Cassutt) when the Apollo 13 Shepard crew was disapproved by NASA.Shepard and Mitchell may have been training with LM-7 because it was, I believe, the only lunar module in the MSOB at the time. LM-8 for Apollo 14 was delivered to KSC in December 1969. |
YankeeClipper
Member Posts: 632
From: Dublin, Ireland
Registered: Mar 2011
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posted 09-09-2017 07:21 AM
quote:
Originally posted by Kite:
I am pretty sure that Shepard chose his own crew, along with Deke Slayton, so that is why they stayed intact...
I once asked Ed Mitchell how he came to be the Apollo 14 LMP. Smiling gently, Ed said that Al Shepard chose him because he was smart and Al wanted to be sure of getting back home from the Moon.In Apollo 14 backup commander Gene Cernan's book "The Last Man on the Moon," Gene refers to both Ed Mitchell and Joe Engle as being so good that their attention wandered. Brilliant Ed was an acknowledged LM expert, but was experimenting with ESP much to the annoyance of Deke and Al, and Ed had resisted a backup role on Apollo 16. Joe was a magnificent natural aviator and the better pilot but wasn't devoting as much time to mastering the LM systems as Gene would have liked, although Gene knew the systems well from Apollo 10. Gene describes how Deke was seriously considering replacing Ed with Joe but eventually decided that the crew disruption would not be worth it. |
Michael Cassutt
Member Posts: 374
From: Studio City CA USA
Registered: Mar 2005
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posted 09-09-2017 05:39 PM
quote:
Originally posted by LM-12:
...was disapproved by NASA.
"Overturned by HQ" doesn't necessarily mean that Slayton had acted. As other information suggests, he didn't talk to Lovell about a swap until late July/early August. It's very possible that, given his other distractions in June-July 1969, Slayton let Shepard and his crew continue on 13. |
C2Ag93
Member Posts: 13
From: Houston, TX
Registered: Jun 2019
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posted 07-24-2022 03:55 PM
Al Shepard as you probably know had an ear disease that grounded him. After a procedure, he as returned to the flight rotation and Slayton initially scheduled him for Apollo 13. In reading a book, the author seemed to say he simply was moved from Apollo 13 to Apollo 14 as some political pressure mounted regarding the optics in the event something went wrong. So the decision was made to give Shepard more training time. I just noticed watching "Apollo 13" (for the Nth time... haha) that when Jim Lovell comes home to tell Marilyn that he is going on Apollo 13, he said "Al Shepard's ear infection flared up again." Does anyone have any documented sources on what the true story of Al being bumped was? The book I read purported to be historical with a couple of the Apollo astronauts calling it good. And the "political" reason sounds the most feasible. I note that the Lovells did in fact have plans to go to Acapulco in real life before Lovell moved to Apollo 13 (as is mentioned in the movie). The only explanation I can think of is that perhaps NASA preferred the public reason for the switch be an ear infection rather than express doubt about the amount of time Shepard had for training. But would be interesting if someone had a reference to that hunch specifically. Editor's note: Threads merged. |
Robert Pearlman
Editor Posts: 48765
From: Houston, TX
Registered: Nov 1999
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posted 07-24-2022 04:22 PM
Merging your post with an existing thread as it answers your question(s): namely that the line in "Apollo 13" (the movie) is incorrect. As noted by Michael Cassutt above, NASA headquarters did not (and would not) sign off on Shepard flying on Apollo 13 and so Slayton proposed swapping the Apollo 13 and Apollo 14 crews. |
C2Ag93
Member Posts: 13
From: Houston, TX
Registered: Jun 2019
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posted 07-24-2022 04:47 PM
Thanks Robert! By the way, I briefly met you once at SCH. I volunteer there. |
Space Cadet Carl
Member Posts: 293
From: Lake Orion, MI
Registered: Feb 2006
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posted 07-25-2022 07:36 AM
Ron Howard would have been the first to tell you that "Apollo 13" required a lot of poetic license in the script to be made in the first place... otherwise it would never have been released. Just one of the countless examples was the crew members yelling at each other in the film. Lovell said that never happened. |
ejectr
Member Posts: 1922
From: Killingly, CT
Registered: Mar 2002
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posted 07-25-2022 08:00 AM
I could have lived without that scene. Here are three of the top educated and professional people entwined in a life and death situation, and they're yelling at each other? I don't think so. Didn't add anything but a phony session to the movie. |
MartinAir
Member Posts: 202
From:
Registered: Oct 2020
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posted 07-25-2022 08:48 AM
Inaccurate, but I guess it worked. Not sure if it is due to the movie, but Apollo 13 is by far the most popular NASA mission ever, at least according to Google trends... |
Captain Apollo
Member Posts: 327
From: UK
Registered: Jun 2004
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posted 07-25-2022 09:46 AM
Weren't 13 the all Rookie crew? |
Robert Pearlman
Editor Posts: 48765
From: Houston, TX
Registered: Nov 1999
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posted 07-25-2022 10:03 AM
Getting back on topic, the line from "Apollo 13" is a good demonstration of how impossible it is quickly summarize the move of Alan Shepard and his crewmates to Apollo 14.Unless you're addressing an audience who are already well-versed on the history leading up to that point, including Shepard's struggle with Meniere's disease and the inter-office politics between the Manned Spacecraft Center and NASA Headquarters, then there really is no way to boil down the decision to a single sentence or two. |
Blackarrow
Member Posts: 3485
From: Belfast, United Kingdom
Registered: Feb 2002
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posted 07-25-2022 12:07 PM
A good summing-up, Robert. Let me add, referring back to the original post by LM-12 on 17th April, 2015, that NASA's press release of 6th August, 1969, left no room for doubt. As from that date it was in the public domain that Jim Lovell would command Apollo 13 and Al Shepard would command Apollo 14. That makes it all the more inexplicable that "Spaceport News" could report, on 23rd October, 1969, that Apollo 13 would be flown by Shepard, Roosa and Mitchell. Don't believe everything you read in the press (even specialist publications which should know better)! |
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