posted 07-05-2012 09:51 AM               

Apollo flight controller Alan Glines (1943-2012)

Alan Glines, who was the lead Integrated Communications Officer (INCO) during NASA's Apollo 13 mission in April 1970 and rose to serve as assistant flight director for the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project in 1975, passed away Tuesday (July 3).

The following brief biography was prepared for Novaspace Galleries' Spacefest held in Tucson, Arizona last month, which Glines had been scheduled to attend before his health declined.

Alan Glines has 40 years of spacecraft systems engineering, and integration/operations development for manned space systems for NASA-JSC, Northrop Grumman /TRW, the European Space Agency and other aerospace contractors.

He has a B.S. degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Kansas and a Masters degree in Systems Management from USC. Also, he taught the same program at the USC Graduate school for two years.

During 15 years with Northrop Grumman (formerly TRW) he worked on projects for NASA and the Air Force including detailed mission scenarios and payloads for NASA: TDRS, The Gamma Ray Observatory, Chandra X-Ray Telescope, ORION and the ISS.

As a NASA employee at JSC in Houston, Mr. Glines did a variety of system engineering and operations tasks for Apollo preflight and mission execution from Mission Control. These evolved to the Lead Mission Control position for thr Apollo communications systems (title: INCO - for Integrated Communications Officer.) For his work on Apollo 13 he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

He also worked as INCO on all three manned Skylab missions.

He rose to the position of Assistant Flight Director in Mission Control, for the Apollo Soyuz Test Project (ASTP), with the Soviet Union.

His final assignment with NASA before joining TRW was as a member of the 2-person NASA Shuttle support team for astronauts during the Approach and Landing Tests (ALT) in 1976-78 at Edwards AFB.

In 2010, Glines' published his autobiography, A Kansan Conquers the Cosmos: or, "Spaced Out All My Life!"

posted 07-05-2012 08:15 PM               

Alan had a fascinating life and I recommend his book for a different view of the Apollo and Skylab years. He was not as well known as some of his colleagues but contributed to the overall effort. RIP.