Prev Article Next Article

12. Apollo 13 Space Rescue

The 13th Apollo mission, launched in April of 1970, was supposed to study unexplored areas of the Moon over the period of four to six months. Unfortunately, just three days after takeoff, an oxygen tank exploded inside the cabin. NASA aborted the mission to focus on saving the astronaut’s lives, which was even more of a long-shot then reaching ‘the dark side’ of the Moon.

wikipedia.org

The oxygen leak depleted air and water supplies, overloading Apollo’s CO2 filters. With help from NASA’s best engineers, the spacecraft was repaired just in time. They reentered the atmosphere on April 17, splashing into the Pacific Ocean with about four hours of air left to spare.