Apollo 13 Problem

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32265, 7 April 1970, Page 15

Apollo 13 Problem

(N.Z. Press Assn.—Copyright) CAPE KENNEDY, April 6.

While the three Apollo 13 astronauts underwent medical examinations to-day, space engineers watched the pressure in a helium tank in their spacecraft to see if it will be safe enough for the voyage to the moon on Sunday.

Captain James Lovell, Lieu-tenant-Commander Thomas Mattingly and Mr Fred Haise were expected to pass their tests without difficulty, and project officials were hopeful that the helium tank would pass its tests, too.

Sunday is the only day this month that Apollo 13 can be launched towards its highpriority landing site in a moon valley called Fra Mauro —after a sixteenth century

Franciscan monk. The next launch opportunity will be on May 9. If the launching has to be postponed, the remainder of April will be unsuitable for a Fra Mauro landing, either because the moon will be in the wrong position for the flight from earth, or because sunlight will not be falling at the right angle to throw the landing area into sharp re lief.

The- launch director (Mr Walter Kapryan) ordered the count-down to be started at 3 p.m. New Zealand time to day despite the problem tank, which will be monitored for another 12 hours.

It is the descent stage of the lunar-landing craft, Aquarius. It carries frigid helium in a mixture of gas and liquid, and is used to pressurise the propellants for Aquarius’s huge engine. The helium was observed to heat slightly faster than normal in the double-walled

tank, resulting in a build-up of pressure. A spokesman said that the abnormal rise could have been caused by nitrogen contamination in the vacuum jacket that serves as the tank’s insulation. A leak was found in the vacuum lining of a hydrogen tank in the Apollo 12 service module last November, and 11 was replaced a day before launch.

Geologists believe that the Fra Mauro formation in the foothills of the moon’s high lands, consists of debris blasted out of the lunar surface by the collision of a giant meteoroid or comet millions of years ago. The remaining scar is now the large circulat basin that is called the Sea of Rains. If that interpretation Is correct, scientists believe that the astronauts may return with samples of rocks from great depths beneath the lunar surface. These rocks may be more than 5000 million years old. ' .