Rocket Men: The Daring Odyssey of Apollo 8 and the Astronauts Who Made Man's First Journey to the Moon

by Robert Kurson

Beneath them, the United States is fracturing. The year 1968 has seen killing, war, protest, and political unrest unlike any in the country’s history, from the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr., and Robert Kennedy to the unraveling of Vietnam to the riots in Chicago.

Apollo had a single goal, perhaps the greatest and most audacious ever conceived: to land a man on the Moon and return him safely to Earth. In 1961, President John F. Kennedy had committed the United States to achieving this goal by the end of the decade. Never had a more inspiring promise been made to the American people—or one that could be so easily verified.

Now, Kennedy’s end-of-decade deadline was in jeopardy. Design and engineering problems with the lunar module—the spidery landing craft that would move astronauts from their orbiting ship to the lunar surface and back again—threatened to stall the Apollo program and put Kennedy’s deadline, just sixteen months away, out of reach.

Donald Kent “Deke” Slayton was in charge of managing astronaut training and choosing crews for manned space missions. If an astronaut flew on board a NASA spacecraft, it was because Slayton had chosen him to go.

Still, Borman knew he hadn’t been summoned for nothing. The last time he’d received a “drop everything” call had been the darkest day in NASA’s history. It had happened about a year and half earlier, on January 27, 1967, when a fire broke out in the spacecraft during a simulated countdown on the launchpad in Florida. The Apollo 1 rehearsal should have been safe and routine for the three astronauts inside, who were preparing for the actual flight about four weeks later. But a spark occurred in the electrical system and the men were trapped as the sudden fire spread in pure oxygen. Even Ed White, the strongest of all NASA’s astronauts, couldn’t muscle open the command module’s hatch as flames spread through the spacecraft.

“Frank, we’ve had a bad fire on Pad Thirty-four and we’ve got three astronauts dead—Gus Grissom, Ed White, and one of the new boys, Roger Chaffee. Get to the Cape as quick as you can; you’ve been appointed to the investigative committee.” The news

“We just got word from the CIA that the Russians are planning a lunar fly-by before the end of the year. We want to change Apollo 8 from an Earth orbital to a lunar orbital flight. A lot has to come together. And Apollo 7 has to be perfect. But if it happens, Frank, do you want to go to the Moon?”

“I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth. No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important for the long-range exploration of space; and none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish.”

While Americans buzzed about Kennedy’s plan, the Soviet Union yawned. It remained far ahead in the Space Race, and had even sent a probe 42.5 million miles away, which had passed by Venus a few days before Kennedy’s speech. In June, Khrushchev bullied Kennedy during a two-day summit in Vienna at which the men discussed Communism and democracy and the relationship between the two superpowers. “Worst thing in my life. He savaged me,” Kennedy told a New York Times writer. “I’ve got a terrible problem if he thinks I’m inexperienced and have no guts.”

A year after Tsar Bomba, Khrushchev placed nuclear missiles in Cuba. Kennedy demanded they be removed. Khrushchev refused, but in October 1962, he was facing a different kind of president. Kennedy ordered a naval blockade of the island. For thirteen days, the United States and the Soviet Union stood on the brink of nuclear war. But Kennedy refused to call off the blockade. Just as it seemed both sides had no choice but to use their nuclear weapons, Khrushchev backed down and removed the missiles. The Cuban Missile Crisis had been among the most tense and dangerous events in American history, but when it ended, the world had a different opinion about the will of John Fitzgerald Kennedy. —

In mid-November 1963, Kennedy visited Cape Canaveral, where he was briefed on America’s developing colossus, the Saturn V, the 36-story-tall three-stage booster being built to take Americans to the Moon. Standing outside with rocket designer Wernher von Braun, Kennedy shook his head in wonder at it all. These men in shirtsleeves and ties were building machines to take human beings to new worlds.

At 6:31 P.M., one of the astronauts screamed into his microphone a word that sounded like “Fire!” Two seconds later, another cried out. His first word was unclear—either “I” or “We” —but the rest was unmistakable: “got a fire in the cockpit!” That was followed by garbled, desperate words and an agonized scream. Some thought they heard an astronaut saying “We’re burning up!” After that, there was nothing but silence. Flames spread through the capsule. None of the astronauts could overcome the cabin’s highly pressurized atmosphere and move the inward-opening hatch. Seconds later, the capsule ruptured. Technicians rushed to the scene but were beaten back by heat and fire; almost six minutes passed before they could get inside. Rescue personnel found the crew, already expired from asphyxiation, their space suits fused to the melted interior of the spacecraft. Seven hours passed before the bodies could be removed.

Media reports blamed an electrical spark for igniting the pure oxygen environment of the spacecraft’s cabin. But to many, there seemed a more basic explanation. “There’s reason to believe that establishing a deadline of 1970 for the Moon flight contributed to their deaths,” said NBC News anchor Frank McGee. Like many, he thought that by rushing, NASA was risking safety.

NASA had no plans to send men to the Moon in 1968. The soonest they’d be ready to try was mid-1969, when Apollo 10 would orbit the Moon—a test run before Apollo 11 attempted a landing.