The 7th manned mission launched on the 11.04.70. This was to be the third moon landing. On board were James Lovell, John Swigert and Fred Haise.


Approximately 56 hours into the mission, (about 205,000 miles from Earth), the astronauts heard a loud bang. Oxygen tank 2 immediately went to 0, and within 3 minutes tanks 1 and 3 also were depleted. The oxygen tank in the SM had exploded. The CM had to be shut down to conserve energy for a return home and in effect the LM had become a lifeboat.


The consequences were far reaching, there was a resultant loss of heat, a shortage of water and oxygen. The CO2 scrubbers were modified to allow for more conversion into oxygen. The modification relied on equipment on board that could be hastily modified to perform a new role.


The ground crew carried out an assessment of the damage and with Flight Director Gene Kranz at the helm, came up with a recovery plan. They decided that the best way to effectively get the crew back to Earth would comprise using the gravity of the moon to sling shot the craft back to Earth and use lunar module’s Descent Propulsion System (DPS) to guide it on the correct trajectory.

However at the angle of descent they were at, the CM would ‘bounce’ straight back into space. To correct for this, the crew had to burn the engines for an allotted time to change the trajectory to allow for the correct angle of entry into the Earth’s atmosphere.

Swigert would time the burn using his Speedmaster- the Speedmaster would get its 14 seconds of fame. And an award- the famous Snoopy award.

The mission lasted till the 17.04.70 – successfully returning the crew home alive. It may not have been a success in the mission sense, but certainly was a huge success in the resourcefulness of human endeavour.

Speedmaster was naturally the choice of chronograph. Although likely to be a ref 105.012 it is unclear which variant was worn by James Lovell.

However, will the real Snoopy Speedmaster please stand up! YES- we know the REAL SNOOPY reference- Swigert wore a reference 105.012-66 CB case!

THE ORIGINAL SNOOPY is a CB case!!!!!

This must make this case reference now a legendary reference.


Haise also wore a ref. 105.012-66 CB case.


In summary:


James Lovell: probably a variant of the reference 105.012- unclear

John Swigert: “Snoopy” ref. 105.012-66 CB

Fred Haise: ref: 105.012-66 CB
Pic Credits NASA

 

@Omega1967
Your second photo shows Apollo 13 CMP John "Jack" Swigert during training as his spacesuit doesn't carry the A13 mission logo on the heart.
Let's mention the fact that Swigert was the first to carry his personal Rolex GMT-master aboard an Apollo lunar mission
More NASA photos in this month contribution at:
https://moonwatchuniverse.tumblr.com/archive
...
And here the Swigert You were looking for... launchday April 11, 1970
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@SpeedyPhill ..looks like more of the yellow "e" tape or what ever NASA calls it. It's not just for attaching watches to Velcro anymore.

have fun
kfw

 

Photo credit NASA for this 'Champion' picture :0) @Omega1967 Thanks for the thread

 

The 105.012-66CB, with its distinctive flat facets on the lugs, seems to be turning up regularly on the Apollo lunar missions.

This includes the Apollo 12 Al Bean Speedmaster, at least 2 of 3 Apollo 13 Speedmasters, as well as the last two Speedmasters worn on the moon: Gene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt’s Apollo 17 Speedmasters:

https://airandspace.si.edu/collection-objects/chronograph-cernan-apollo-17

https://airandspace.si.edu/collection-objects/chronograph-schmitt-apollo-17

Note the Smithsonian photos of the Schmitt Speedmaster actually include a photo of the caseback removed showing the inside engraving, including the CB hallmark.

 

@SpeedyPhill - good point. Each Apollo astronaut was assigned three space suits: a flight unit, a training unit, and a flight spare. All three were built identically, with the difference being that the training unit was used routinely for various training events to limit opportunities for wear and tear to the flight unit or its spare.

Do you have more information regarding Jack Swigert’s personally-owned GMT? I seem recall seeing a photo of him with it, and it was a yellow gold model. Jim Lovell also had (and has) a GMT, but Lovell’s is a stainless steel Pepsi model.

 

I always wondered about the 14 second burn time... I dove into the mission transcripts for Apollo 13, to see the historical accuracy of the movie scene.
And so after that endeavor my understanding is that it wasn’t a one single 14 second run, but several more adjustments less than that. Or have I missed when they did it in the transcript?

 

@ext1 There were multiple correction burns along the way but the final course correction burn that makes Speedmaster history occurs at 105:18:28 GET and is a final 15 second burn shut down manually at 14 seconds timed with the Speedmaster by Swigert.

If you have read the book Lost Moon Lovell describes the burn like this:

"Jack, since we don't have any countdown clock, you time the burn with your watch"

This conversation may have happened but it does not appear in any transcripts because it was communication between the crew and not the ground. The only place you will find any reference to the 14 second burn is when Jack Lousma sends up the instructions for the burn to Fred Haise who then repeats them back to Jack.

Here is the Apollo 13 transcript (page 519) where the 14 second instructions come up:



While the 14 second burn gets all the glory, technically the most important burn occurs on April 14 at 8:42:43 GMT. That is when the burn to re-establish the free return trajectory is done to get Apollo 13 back to Earth. If a successful free re-return trajectory was not established then they most likely never would have made it back at all and the 14 second final burn would never have occurred.

Here ends the lesson for the day.

 

Thank you Master @TLIGuy ! My curiosity ever since middle school has been finally answered....!
Likely when I was looking through the transcript I was focusing too much on the correction burn and never got to find the 14 second one. Maybe I should have just ctrl+F’d “14 seconds”...

 

Amazing information!! I was just watching a lecture by Jim Lovell last night about the Apollo 13 mission, so great timing!!
Love these pictures!!

 

Here's an amazing Apollo 13 NASA photo: it shows the Speedmaster on Jim Lovell's right wrist (Lovell always wears his watches on righthand wrist)
.

 

@g-boac
Jack Swigert donated his space-flown Rolex GMT-master to Rolex, and Rolex CEO René Jeanneret offered him a Gold version instead...
An interesting fact: Swigert official WSS - White Space Suit portrait was taken post-mission in December 1970, so he wore the Gold Rolex
This Gold version Rolex GMT-master was auctioned at the Nate Sanders auction in October 2017;
https://natedsanders.com/blog/2017/09/apollo-watch/
&
https://omegaforums.net/threads/another-auction-with-a-little-astro-provenance.65246/
.

.

 

Looks like Jack wanted to be cool like Jim too. He also wears his on the right arm over the undergarment sleeve.

 

Thank you!! That was exactly where I remember seeing the yellow gold GMT - in Captain Swigert’s official portrait. You’ll also note that he is wearing an A7LB - this is a later spacesuit that was used on Apollo 15-17. The primary changes were to allow sitting in a seated position to drive the rover. The quickest way to tell at a glance is that the earlier AL7 has connectors arranged in two parallel rows, while the A7LB has its connectors arranged in two triangular groups. (Reference top photo with Captain Lovell wearing an A7L).

That is very interesting history about Rolex presenting Captain Swigert and the exchange for the yellow gold GMT. Ironically enough, Captain Swigert’s stainless steel Pepsi, depending on the year, could possibly even be worth more today than the yellow gold piece!!

 

And the more recent topic... on which astronaut with what Speedmaster timed the 14 seconds LM DPS burn
( CMP Jack Swigert with his own NASA-issued Speedmaster chronograph #69 )
https://omegaforums.net/threads/specific-reference-worn-on-the-apollo-13-mission.112176/

 

Great thread!

 

Everyone takes the picture of the watch and the patch but no one ever sets the time.

Since Lovell's book references everything to Houston time this is what Swigert's Speedmaster would have looked like at the the end of the famous 14 second burn at (105:18:42.0 GET) 10:31:42 p.m. Houston time, April 15, 1970.

Happy 14 second burn day!!

 

Hah, love it!

 

Apollo 13-wise, there's a lot more fame than the well-known 14 seconds LM DPS burn !
While, on the one hand, Apollo 13 might have sped up the cancellation of Apollo 18 & 19 in September 1970 ( Apollo 20 was already cancelled January 4, 1970 ), on the other hand it triggered Omega to grab the opportunity to get its Speedmaster chronographs on the other side of the Iron Curtain !