WI: Apollo 11 ends in tragedy

July 16 1969, the much anticipated Apollo 11 moon mission begins.

The Saturn V rocket lifts off from Kennedy Space Center, and all seems to be going well.

Then... exactly 90 seconds after liftoff, Apollo 11 goes up in flames and is consumed by a massive explosion. The moment is caught live by multiple cameras and witnessed live by millions across the US and and the world.

Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins are all tragically killed in the tragedy, a traumatic blow to the American psyche.

In the aftermath of this tragedy, what shall happen to NASA? How does America and the World react? What effects will the fallout have on the Nixon administration? How viciously would the incident be mocked by the Soviets? And what effect would it have overall on history?
 
July 16 1969, the much anticipated Apollo 11 moon mission begins.

The Saturn V rocket lifts off from Kennedy Space Center, and all seems to be going well.

Then... exactly 90 seconds after liftoff, Apollo 11 goes up in flames and is consumed by a massive explosion. The moment is caught live by multiple cameras and witnessed live by millions across the US and and the world.

Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins are all tragically killed in the tragedy, a traumatic blow to the American psyche.

In the aftermath of this tragedy, what shall happen to NASA? How does America and the World react? What effects will the fallout have on the Nixon administration? How viciously would the incident be mocked by the Soviets? And what effect would it have overall on history?

First the astronaut corps will publicly volunteer to keep going, and mean it. They were all test pilots after all, and dying violently was an routine part of that life. A quarter of all US Navy carrier pilots died in peacetime accidents over the course of a career, test flying was worse. See "The Right Stuff" for details.

This being the second team of astronauts to be killed will result in a serious investigation. The Apollo 1 fire and deaths caused a total redesign of the capsule and a seven month delay to the program. Losing a Saturn V and crew will mean a longer and more serious investigation. That will happen regardless of decisions about how to proceed with the moon landings.

The soviets will try to make capital out of it - no pun intended - but how much they can get away with in the long run is debatable. Did they have the ability to go to the moon first given the US program was held up with its second enquiry into a disaster in a few years? I don't think so, but maybe someone on the list has a detailed knowledge of the USSR's program and can tell us.

Nixon will try to do something to make up for this. Something to boost America's image, its sense of pride of place. Question: What can he do that won't seem obviously a distraction, or be undermined by the loss of prestige? Open up China early? Can he do that after a humiliating public disaster?

Sign the peace treaty the North Vietnamese are clearly not serious about negotiating on? The treaty signed in 1973 was apparently only superficially different from the one offered in 1968, nothing that happened at the Paris 'peace talks' had substantial effect. Peace in Vietnam might a big enough distraction, but will it look like desperation?
 

SsgtC

Banned
Not really plausible. Unlike the shuttle, Apollo had a usable abort system. At the first sign of a catostrophic failure, the crew would have activated the emergency escape tower and launched the command module away from the rocket. You're much more likely to see a failure like what happened to 13, but without the successful resolution. Or just as likely, a problem actually landing on the moon
 
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First the astronaut corps will publicly volunteer to keep going, and mean it. They were all test pilots after all, and dying violently was an routine part of that life. A quarter of all US Navy carrier pilots died in peacetime accidents over the course of a career, test flying was worse. See "The Right Stuff" for details.

This being the second team of astronauts to be killed will result in a serious investigation. The Apollo 1 fire and deaths caused a total redesign of the capsule and a seven month delay to the program. Losing a Saturn V and crew will mean a longer and more serious investigation. That will happen regardless of decisions about how to proceed with the moon landings.

The soviets will try to make capital out of it - no pun intended - but how much they can get away with in the long run is debatable. Did they have the ability to go to the moon first given the US program was held up with its second enquiry into a disaster in a few years? I don't think so, but maybe someone on the list has a detailed knowledge of the USSR's program and can tell us.

Nixon will try to do something to make up for this. Something to boost America's image, its sense of pride of place. Question: What can he do that won't seem obviously a distraction, or be undermined by the loss of prestige? Open up China early? Can he do that after a humiliating public disaster?

Sign the peace treaty the North Vietnamese are clearly not serious about negotiating on? The treaty signed in 1973 was apparently only superficially different from the one offered in 1968, nothing that happened at the Paris 'peace talks' had substantial effect. Peace in Vietnam might a big enough distraction, but will it look like desperation?[/QUOTE
I'm not totally sure that the astronauts would be killed. The main source the blast would come from behind the heat shield not sure at that point if they've Jets and their emergency escape Rockets and should be high enough to do an ocean Landing. Not guaranteeing it I wouldn't be surprised if they made it. Which would just enhance the Apollo and Beyond Space Program.
 
Nixon has the fail speech all ready in case

Though that was a failing to land on the Moon and dying in the attempt speech

It was a good speech
 
NASA would probably be likely to track down the cause of the accident fairly quickly. If it is something that could be resolved easily, Apollo 12 still might go ahead in November 1969. If it takes longer, it might push the Moon landing into 1970. There would be controversy if the landing occurred "before this decade is out" or not. Either way, at least one landing would be made. If an accident occurs on the lunar surface after the EVA, that might affect the psyche more. They would be left there, and when people looked at the Moon, they would do so knowing there were two dead astronauts up there. We would still try for a successful landing and return, but a lot of the glory would be taken out of it.
 
The soviets will try to make capital out of it - no pun intended - but how much they can get away with in the long run is debatable. Did they have the ability to go to the moon first given the US program was held up with its second enquiry into a disaster in a few years? I don't think so, but maybe someone on the list has a detailed knowledge of the USSR's program and can tell us.

The Soviets did have a secret lunar program, but it wasn't a great shape and OTL the N1 rocket explosion and the death of Sergei Korolev, the mind and motivation behind the program, killed it.

At the time NASA had enormous resources (4% of the federal budget), without counting the much larger and more reliable US industrial base, so even with a 2 year delay I doubt it would have done them much good.

The Soviet space program had its budget split between several ministries and everything had to be vetted by the military, which had its own agenda.
Furthermore, after Korolev's death the helm passed to his arch-enemy Valentin Glushko, who was notoriously partial to military interests and favoured rockets that were more suitable to launching warheads than putting people in orbit (Korolev did the opposite, there's a short story about him if you care to read it: http://will.tip.dhappy.org/blog/Com...esigner/Andy Duncan - The Chief Designer.html).

In short, no. There weren't more firsts to be obtained short of a human landing and the Soviets would have been dragged in a competition their economy and industry couldn't sustain.
 
I'm thinking this means Conrad & Bean get to walk first, & they're the last, too. I'm picturing Congress getting fed up with the cost, saying, "Kennedy's honor is satisfied, but we're not paying to risk men getting blown sky high at $10 mil a shot, so don't even ask." That kills MOL, Skylab, & STS on the drawing board.:eek:
 
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