NOVA; To the Moon; Interview with John Leland "Lee" Atwood, engineer, aerospace executive, and overseer of the Apollo program, part 1 of 2

And early in the program, 1962, Mr. Kittleberger, who was chairman, died at that time, we lost him. And I became chief executive as well. So I served as both chairman of the board and president of the company after 1962. Now, when North American got the contract, were you confident that you were the best company for the job? I was involved in the, very deeply in the competition. We made our presentations. We offered our organization, personnel, and experience. And we were not privy to the selection criteria, but I think we were judged the most capable to do the job overall. I have a copy of a

memorandum, which I received many years later, which indicated that the selection board thought we were probably the most capable overall in the competition and most well-adjusted, adapted to what they wanted, at least we were given the votes of the three principal decision writers. Well, let me ask you, sir. Did you feel that there was a, as the astronauts referred to it, an atmosphere of go fever was North American being pushed and hurried along by NASA at the time prior to the fire? We were pushing and hurrying ourselves. I don't believe you could say that NASA was going in any one. They had their orders, really, from President Kennedy, and he said it wouldn't be easy to be hard, and he was right. It was hard. But we took it on with enthusiasm

and every expectation of success. Where were you at the time of the fire? How did you hear about it? I was in Washington at the time of the fire. I was attending a meeting. As a matter of fact, we were sitting at dinner. The entire group of people involved in the Apollo program. It was sort of a meeting that the administrator, Mr. Webb, had called and we read in dinner. He called me to the telephone and Harrison Storms, who was our head of our space program, had me on the telephone. He told me about the tragedy. He knew about it before Mr. Webb, before Dr. Miller, before General Phillips, and before the NASA people from Houston. I

was absolutely, of course, astounded, shocked, and almost unbelieving, but he told me, and he also talked to General Phillips and three four others at the time. What do you think caused the fire? Undoubtedly, electrical overheat of some kind. Undoubtedly, two wires were rubbed together. Something was disturbed or in complete wiring system that didn't left. Unconnected. I did not know which one and nor does anyone else. It was a undoubtedly electrical origin. It really had to be because there was absolutely nothing that could possibly

have fired up a thing like that, independent of electrical current. The endowment in the Space Capsule was exceedingly dangerous. It consisted of nothing but pure oxygen, which was injected through pipes and tubes. And it was at a pressure of 16.7 pounds per square inch. This is two pounds per square inch above the normal atmospheric pressure that we're sitting in right here. That was too much oxygen because the spacecraft had been designed with a specification requiring only five pounds

per square inch of oxygen to keep the astronauts in good condition in space. But if we used only five pounds per square on the ground, the outside pressure being more would have tended to crush the spacecraft inward. So as a practical matter, you had two choices. One was inflated with air on the ground and leave the air out as you went to altitude, making up the difference with oxygen at five pounds per square inch. Or you could put pure oxygen in the spacecraft on the ground. Well, the proper answer was the first. Use air until you got to altitude

and didn't have that pressure from the outside. The NASA shortcut was to use 16 pounds pressure on the pad on the ground, saving some time perhaps and a few pounds of oxygen. It was exceedingly dangerous because no tests had been made for flammability at that pressure of oxygen. Now, did you know that it was dangerous? Did NASA know that it was dangerous before the fire? The company people did not know they were going to inflate to the oxygen. They thought it would be inflated with air. NASA had, however, on previous tests, gotten away with using oxygen on the ground and they continued that practice on

from the mercury to the Gemini to the Apollo. It was a big mistake. Was there a recommendation to put more nitrogen into the environment that was ignored? North American people had tried to make this what we call our two gas system. The same as they have in the shuttle today. Two gases meaning part nitrogen, part oxygen, the way the normal air is. NASA didn't want to fool with a nitrogen. They were afraid that somehow it might give the crew enough oxygen in their blood to give them the bins, which is a condition you get when there's too much nitrogen pressure on a body and then the nitrogen pressures relieved and bubbles form in the blood. So, this was a shortcut and it was successful

in the Gemini and Mercury because they did not have a short circuit or electrical metal function all in the ground. Cut. I don't know whether you did or not. I don't know whether a gas gruesome had anything to do with the Apollo hatch. I should make the point though that the hatch was a secondary problem. If the fire had started just after liftoff, it wouldn't have mattered whether they had a quick opening hatch or not. And the point of it is the fire was much more likely to happen after liftoff because the spacecraft

went into an accelerated state and the effective gravity was increased from one, which is normal, to approximately four at the end of the burn. And during that entire period, the fire would have escalated much faster. And so, the escape aspect of it was not important. The final analysis, it was more about the condition of the atmosphere in which most anything would burn if it heated up a little bit. Okay. Let's change things. Well, I were certainly expressing unhappiness. The only thing that I heard personally was

that the communication system was not working. It was intermittent. And this is very annoying of course to the crew. And I don't know what the intermittency of the communication system, how it could possibly have been connected with the whatever caused the fire, but it's possible. An intermittency, as everybody knows, is very discouraging to electrical people. I have to do a lot of troubleshooting to find out what caused it. And it's usually some small item that was damaged or otherwise defective. And this was the main thing that I knew about. So of course the spacecraft at the time were very much dominated by the weight problem.

And there were things that could have been done now. One of the executives complained afterward that the spacecraft didn't have nicely finished interior. It's true there were later they shielded a lot of the panels and wire bundles with some shielding more like an automobile to cover up. Whereas before they'd been operating pretty much with the minimum of that sort of minimum of what you might say furniture.

Right. Well now at the time of the fire was the spacecraft just filled with things that were flammable. Was that a mistake? The spacecraft was not filled with anything flammable at five pounds per square inch pressure. The Velcro on the walls, the suits themselves, the houses, the upholstery and the seats and beds. And the insulation of the wires had all been tested for flammability at five pounds per square inch. Now at 16 pounds per square inch, they were flammable. And the way that was tested, they took a nickel chrome wire

and laid it across the cockpit and put a high current through it that became incandescent. Now with 16 pounds per square inch of oxygen, they could not try to prove that it's capsule at all. With five pounds per square inch of oxygen, nothing would burn. What was the effect of the fire on the program? The effect was less than it might have been effected because of the general resolution and courage of the crews and the NASA and the operated people. And it could have been more, of course, the house, what you might call the drive for perfection after the fire was put on with a vigor that's hard to

describe. And of course every detail was looked at as a microscope, you might say. Everything was a flaw until it was absolutely safe. They tried to make it safe for 16 pounds per square inch. But they couldn't do it. I mean, they never tried really to burn it, but it probably would have burned because the insulation of the wire itself is a kind of a, it's got to be flexible. It can't be metal. And so the chances are that they would have still could have had a fire 16 pounds pressure without going to something like asbestos insulation and all the wiring, which would have been earlier than possible.

Now, so went over a tremendous review process. But what about the NASA review board? How did North American come out in terms of that? Did North American feel like they were being the scapegoat? Did you feel like you became the scapegoat for this fire? At the time, I was, of course, very anxious to do everything possible to avoid anything like that in the future. Of course, there was an overkill in many respects because of a, you know, the natural reaction. They changed all kinds of fabrics. I don't have to cut on the Velcro. It would have been there. A lot of it is unnecessary just from a fire point of view. But from a reassurance part of you, I'm sure it is all to the good. And I was

all for that. I was all for every improvement we could possibly make. I was strongly in supporting of the program to get it done. I felt this is keenly as anyone that this was the national period of trial. Anything that would help should be done. And we spared nothing. I realized that storms has been unfairly punished. They forced me to remove him. I didn't fire him. He had too many excellent qualities. He had done so much for the program. Did you feel that, and did you take on the responsibility more so than you really deserved? Did North American step up and say? Yes, of course. I think we took more than we deserved.

The same thing could have happened to Grumman if they had that kind of oxygen thing to face what they didn't. It could have happened to any company, including your McDonald's. Because Germany ate, had a short circuit in space. But the pressure was only five pounds. The short circuit is recorded in the book on the shoulders of Titans, which NASA published. So the possibility of a short circuit can never be completely eliminated. Never. But tell me, I need you to tell me clearly that you felt that NASA, you didn't feel NASA could take the blame for this. NASA was not in a position to take the blame.

Well, I felt that the government had to look fairly good under this situation. And I realized after 40 years of doing this kind of work, the part of the compensation the contractor gets is for unknown contingencies. So yes, I only want the record straightened out. I don't care about the money or what's going on in the past. But people like Starm's, his family are living with a burden they don't deserve. Of course, he lost his job later after I retired. But that wasn't because anything he did. And what should the record read, sir?

It should read that the unfortunate lack of information led to a mistake in the inflation of the oxygen and that nobody in the circuit realized the danger. And those should have made the tests were never given the opportunity to do so. The congressional hearings were quite interesting, of course. I felt they were not oppressive. Mr. Tegg from Texas, Tiger Tegg is running the committee and he seems to understand pretty well what had happened. And it was not at all abusive or didn't stay any great show of indignation. He ran it very fairly. I thought it was a tough time.

I don't know how to guess. You see what they did. The lightest way to do it. And they were fighting weight every step of the way. It's a double wall vessel. And outside wall and then an inside wall. The easiest way to do it was to seal the inside wall and then just latch the outside or whatever you want to do with it. And so it was a little more trouble to get in and out, but they were not concerned about that. And it was strictly

a matter of choice there. And very few people knew that this was being inflated this way. I think even the mass of the upper, I was sure they didn't really know what they were doing. Here we go. Micah? Okay. Chris him in the crew, the record seems to indicate that they were unhappy at the time of the contractor review. Let me ask you that question. They were unhappy with the state of the capsule at the time of the contractor review. They even so much they have a picture of them on a lemon on the thing. I need you to tell me what was your sense? Did you sense the crew was happy with the condition of the capsule at the time of the contractor

review? What were they unhappy with? All right, ready to go. We have speed. This is roll number 94 Lee Atwood. Take one.