Jun 01

Space Rocket History #415 – Skylab – Skylab 3 – Rescue Mission Part 2

“Near the end of our preparation period, management said; Well, we believe, we can do this, now let’s set about to see how we can get them down without expending the resources for a rescue mission.  So just overnight we changed goals.” Vance Brand

Skylab Rescue Mission Patch

Crippled CSM Docked at Skylab

Garriott Exercises with the Cycle Ergometer

Nov 16

Space Rocket History #402 – Skylab – Training Part 2

The backup crew and some support crew participated in an interesting rescue scenario with 2 astronauts flying to Skylab to take back the crew of 3 onboard Skylab. This would mean 5 astronauts returning to earth in the command module.

Neutral Buoyancy Simulator at MSFC

Gibson Training at ATM Simulator

3rd Crew at Mission Training and Simulation Facility at JSC

Nov 02

Space Rocket History #401 – Skylab – Training Part 1

Aside from physically training for the longest crewed missions that the United States had ever attempted, the actual training program was developed simultaneously with the hardware and experiments for the mission.

Skylab 2 Crew Pre-launch Training

Conrad Training

Conrad Training in the MDA

Jun 20

Space Rocket History #259 – Apollo 13 – Introduction – Part 2

Just before the mission began things started to go wrong. The weekend before launch Charlie Duke, the backup lunar module pilot, came down with a case of German measles.

The original crew of Apollo 13

Apollo 13 backup crew

Apollo 13 actual crew, Lovell, Swigert, Haise