January 27, 1967. Tragedy struck on the launch pad during a preflight test
for Apollo 204 (AS-204),
which was scheduled to be the first Apollo manned mission, and would have
been launched on February 21, 1967. Astronauts Virgil
Grissom, Edward White, and Roger Chaffee lost their lives when a fire
swept through the Command Module (CM).
The exhaustive investigation of the fire and extensive reworking of the
CMs postponed any manned launch until NASA officials cleared the CM for
manned flight. Saturn 1B schedules were suspended for nearly a year, and the
launch vehicle that finally bore the designation AS-204
carried a Lunar Module (LM) as the payload, not the Apollo CM. The missions
of AS-201
and AS-202
with Apollo spacecraft aboard had been unofficially known as Apollo
1 and Apollo 2 missions (AS-203
carried only the aerodynamic nose cone). In the spring of 1967, NASA's
Associate Administrator for Manned Space Flight, Dr. George E. Mueller,
announced that the mission originally scheduled for Grissom, White and
Chaffee would be known as Apollo
1, and said that the first Saturn V launch, scheduled for November 1967,
would be known as Apollo
4. The eventual launch of AS-204
became known as the Apollo 5 mission (no missions or flights were ever
designated Apollo 2 and 3).
The second launch of a Saturn V took place on schedule in the early
morning of April 4, 1968. Known as AS-502,
or Apollo
6, the flight was a success, though two first stage engines shut down
prematurely, and the third stage engine failed to re-ignite after reaching
orbit.
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Forgotten Founders vs. U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson
Samuel
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First President of the
United States of America
in Congress Assembled
March 1, 1781 to July 6, 1781
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