![]() ![]() In this new, virtually uncharted world we would be moving at five miles per second.” This means that the decision-making processes had to be sped up as well. Kranz talks about how he “had left behind a world where airplanes were flying at roughly five miles a minute. This was a brand new world not just for the astronauts but for the flight controllers, too. But the command and control of NASA, the way Kranz describes it having been a part of Flight Control since before the first Mercury missions when it was just the Space Task Group, is supremely unique. ![]() That isn’t to say astronaut autobiographies like Aldrin’s or Collins’ don’t detail the support from Mission Control. ![]() There is so much that is covered in this book, and more to the point, there is so much in this book about process and decision making and support that is not covered in the astronaut recountings of missions. His book “ Failure Is Not an Option: Mission Control from Mercury to Apollo 13 and Beyond” is not only a vivid first-hand account of history as it happened, but the perspective is unique to mission control and not the same that you’ll get from the other books written either by astronauts or anyone outside of the Flight Director’s chair. As one of the early members of Flight Control, Kranz was there for Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo before moving up into more of a management role. There is much more to Gene Kranz than Ed Harris’s portrayal of the Flight Director in the movie Apollo 13. ![]()
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