Today in History: Apollo 13 returns to Earth
With the world anxiously watching, Apollo 13, a U.S. lunar spacecraft that suffered a severe malfunction on its journey to the moon, safely returns to Earth on April 17, 1970.
On April 11, the third manned lunar landing mission was launched from Florida, carrying astronauts James A. Lovell, John L. Swigert and Fred W. Haise. The mission was headed for a landing on the Fra Mauro highlands of the moon. However, two days into the mission, disaster struck 200,000 miles from Earth when oxygen tank No. 2 blew up in the spacecraft. Swigert reported to mission control on Earth, “Houston, we’ve had a problem here,” and it was discovered that the normal supply of oxygen, electricity, light and water had been disrupted.
The landing mission was aborted, and the astronauts and controllers on Earth scrambled to come up with emergency procedures. The crippled spacecraft continued to the moon, looped around it, and began a long, cold journey back to Earth.
The astronauts and mission control were faced with enormous logistical problems in stabilizing the spacecraft and its oxygen supply, as well as running on batteries due to the loss of the fuel cells to allow successful reentry into Earth’s atmosphere. Navigation was another problem, and Apollo 13‘s course was repeatedly corrected with dramatic and untested maneuvers. On April 17, tragedy turned to triumph as the Apollo 13 astronauts touched down safely in the Pacific Ocean.
Also on this day:
1917: Second Battle of Gaza begins
1941: Yugoslavia surrenders to the Nazis
1942: General Henri Giraud makes his great escape from the Nazis
1945: Americans seize 1,100 pounds of uranium in effort to prevent Soviets from developing A-bomb
1961: The Bay of Pigs invasion begins
1964: Ford Mustang debuts at World’s Fair
1969: Architect of Czechoslovakia’s Prague Spring forcibly resigns
1975: Cambodia falls to the Khmer Rouge
1989: Chinese students protest against government
2002: “General Hospital” airs 10,000th episode
The Funnies:
Thought of the Day:
The human brain named itself.
Quote of the Day:
“Most of you are familiar with the virtues of a programmer. There are three, of course: laziness, impatience, and hubris.” - Larry Wall
“The speed of the boss is the speed of the team.” - Lee Iacocca
Video of the Day:
Comic of the Day:
Mouseover: “Our anti-de Sitter club is small at the moment, but I’ve started corresponding with the conformal field theory people.”
Credit: XKCD
Inspirobot Always Controversial, Occasionally Inspirational Quote of the Day:
Read @dailyllama’s Spark! from yesterday here Spark! Pro series - 16th April 2025
Don’t forget to leave some spice right here ↓
