Astronaut Jim Lovell's notes, including a 70-page check list, from the famous Apollo 13 flight are up for auction at Heritage Auctions in Texas. Most expect the final price to go to six figures.
Who is Jim Lovell?
Lovell was the commander of the Apollo 13 mission, which suffered an accident in space and returned home with its astronauts safe and sound only due to great efforts by the crew and the members of mission control in Houston. Lovell also flew on the Apollo 8 mission, which orbited the moon during the Christmas holidays in 1968, and on Gemini 7, which established a long duration space flight record of 14 days in orbit, and on Gemini 12.
Why was the Apollo 13 mission significant?
Apollo 13 actually never made it to the moon, thanks to an exploding fuel tank in the Apollo spacecraft service module. The crew was forced to return to Earth, after having powered down the command module, by riding in the attached lunar module, which was undamaged and service as a kind of life boat.
The Apollo 13 astronauts were forced to transfer the data from the guidance computer of the command module to that of the lunar module by hand. The Apollo guidance computers in that era had less power than modern pocket calculators and data had to be entered by hand. Lovell's notes, written in the margins of the check list, consisted of the data that had to be entered into the lunar module computer.
The prospect of the crew of Apollo 13 dying in space was very real and their successful return to Earth, celebrated in a Ron Howard film starring Tom Hanks as Lovell, provided the Apollo program some unexpected drama for a world that had become jaded with moon landings less than a year after Apollo 11.
Why is the check list so valuable if it never went to the moon?
Besides having been on board an iconic and, because of the accident, unique Apollo mission, the check list has hand written notes from an actual Apollo astronaut, recently signed and authenticated. Among space related collectables,. Apollo artifacts are considered the most valuable.
Why is Lovell letting go of the check list after so long?
Lovell has donated quite a few artifacts to museums and for auction. He is, as are all of the Apollo era astronauts, in the winter of his life, being past 80 years of age. It is time to pass the checklist, an undoubted historical artifact, to a new custodian.
Mark R. Whittington is the author of Children of Apollo and The Last Moonwalker. He has written on space subjects for a variety of periodicals, including The Houston Chronicle, The Washington Post, USA Today, the L.A. Times and The Weekly Standard.
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