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Day 1 April 11, 1970
launch announcer The ignition sequence has started. Six, five, four, three, two, one, zero. Take off!
commander jim lovell The clock is working.
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astronaut jack swigert Clear the tower.
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lovell 2,000 feet
swigert OK, you’re right, Jim. You are right on the path.
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astronaut fred haise Look at the horizon out there.
swigert Yes, here it comes.
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swigert Houston, how do you read 13?
Mission control, Houston 13 from Houston. Loud and clear.
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swigert I am trying to find out what country we are from.
lovell I have to keep telling Jack that the blue things down there are water.
houston I’ll give you a clue. You are in the western hemisphere.
swigert OK Joe. It looks like we’ve crossed the Gulf of Mexico here, and I have a peninsula or an island that’s down there. I don’t know if you can see it.
houston Roger, Jack. We see that. Of course, there is a lot of cloud cover and you see it more clearly than we do, but it looks like Earth, not the moon.
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swigert That’s an explosion, Joe. We have separated [from the S-IVB rocket], and we have launched around 60 degrees now.
houston Roger, Jack.
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lovell As you know, Joe, I have the center seat again and I can’t see anything.
houston Too.
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haise I’m looking out of window five at what I think the S-IVB is, and I see what appears to be a double plume …
swigert Hey, Joe, what it looks like, more or less, is if you stop behind a guy who’s pulling a trail and walk into his trail, like he’s running away from you.
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haise It is a very beautiful sight.
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lovell Houston, Apollo 13.
houston Rog. Go ahead Jim.
lovell Roger We are in that stage now where we are going to take some pictures of the Earth’s climate. If you’re waiting, I have the camera pointed at Earth right now, and I’ll give you a mark when I take the first photo.
houston Roger Copiamos, Jim. We will be waiting for the brand.
lovell OK Houston. Three, two, one, mark.
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houston Is the Earth starting to look pretty small now?
swigert Well, looking at it here, Vance, it’s hard to be convinced that it’s even Earth. All we see is water and clouds.
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lovell Vance, according to our calculations, we have taken about 10 photographs of Earth’s window. … I was thinking of going to bed at night very soon.
houston OK, that sounds good, Jim. FAO [flight activities officer] Here, if you don’t mind, request one more photo before bed.
lovell OK. We will come with one more photo.
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haise Three, two, one, mark.
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Day 2 · April 12
houston Good morning, 13. This is Houston. How are you?
lovell I read aloud and clearly. We slept quite well.
houston OK, fine … The only important thing about the spacecraft is that it has been moving away.
lovell OK. Well that’s to be expected I guess.
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lovell Hello Hello; 13)
houston 13 from Houston. Ahead.
lovell God, we had forgotten, but we would like to know what the news is.
houston OK. Not much of that. … The Beatles have announced they will no longer act as a group. The quartet is reported to have earned more than half a billion dollars during its short musical career. However, the rumors that they will use this money to start their own space program are false.
lovell Maybe we could borrow some.
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houston Today’s favorite hobby in the entire … oh, guys, have you completed your income tax?
lovell How do I request an extension?
houston (Laughter.)
swigert Yeah Joe. I have to … hey, listen, it’s not too funny. Things happened very quickly there, and I need an extension.
houston (Laughter.)
swigert I didn’t get mine filed. I’m serious, could you …
houston We’ll see.
swigert I may be spending time in another quarantine in addition to the one they are planning for me.
houston We’ll see what we can do, Jack.
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lovell Just a passing comment, Joe. We are having lunch right now, and I just made myself a hot dog sandwich with tomato sauce. Very tasty and almost unknown in the old days.
houston That’s right, 13. Remembering the flight plan, you’re supposed to put mustard on hot dogs and not ketchup, but I guess we’ll overlook it.
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Day 3 · April 13
lovell Houston, Houston, Apollo 13. More.
houston Good morning 13.
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lovell We are awake and we obtain the shape of the spaceship.
houston Roger The spaceship is in great shape as far as we’re concerned, Jim. We are bored to tears down here.
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houston OK Jim. It has been a very good television program. We think we should conclude it from here now. What you think?
lovell Roger, it sounds good. And this is the Apollo 13 crew wishing everyone a pleasant night, and we are ready to close our inspection of Aquarius and return for a pleasant night in Odyssey. Good evening.
houston Thank you 13.
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houston 13, We have one more item for you, when you have a chance. We would like you to shake your cryogenic tanks. Also, I have an axle and stump to look at Comet Bennett, if you need it.
swigert OK wait.
swigert OK Houston …
lovell … Houston …
swigert I think we have had a problem here.
houston This is Houston. Say it again please.
lovell Oh, Houston, we’ve had a problem. We had an undervoltage on the Main B bus.
houston Roger Principal B undervoltage.
houston OK, wait, 13. We’re looking at it.
haise OK. Right now, Houston, the voltage is … looks good. And we had a pretty big bang associated with caution and warning [system] there. And as I recall, Main B was the one that had had an amp spike once before.
houston Roger, Fred.
haise Meanwhile here, we start to go ahead and buckle the tunnel again [between the command module and the unoccupied lunar module].
houston Roger
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swigert OK Houston. Are you still reading 13?
houston That is affirmative. We are reading you. We are trying to find some good ideas here for you.
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haise Fuel cell 1: Nitrogen indicates zero.
houston Roger Zero.
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lovell And, Jack, our O2 [oxygen] quantity Tank number 2 is reading zero. Did you get it
houston Amount of O2 The number 2 is zero.
lovell … and it seems to me, looking through the hatch, that we are ventilating something. We are ventilating something in space.
houston Roger We copy your ventilation.
lovell It is a gas of some kind.
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houston We are starting to think about the LM [lunar module] lifeboat.
swigert Yes. We are thinking about that too.
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houston We think we have about 15 minutes of power remaining in the command module, so we want it to start to beat the LM and get some power on that. And are you ready to copy your procedure?
haise OK.
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houston 13 from Houston. We would like you to start reaching LM now.
swigert Fred and Jim are on the LM.
houston OK Jack. Thank you.
haise And, Jack, I have LM on.
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lovell Houston, Aquarius.
houston Go ahead, Aquarius.
lovell OK. Odyssey is completely turned off, according to the procedure you read to Jack.
houston Roger, we copied. That’s where we want to be, Jim.
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houston Aquarium, Houston. Can you see a star through the LM window?
haise We’ll have to clean them up, Jack. They are covered with water at this time.
lovell Can you give me a towel?
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lovell OK. I’m looking out of Fred’s window. I see a lot of particles out there, but a lot of those things are still moving away from us, so a lot of them flicker in the local vicinity, and I don’t recognize any constellations right now, in this particular attitude.
houston OK Jim. If that state changes, please let us know.
lovell Roger We continue to drift.
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houston How do you like this sim[ulation]?
haise It is a beauty
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houston We recommend that you do not dump your urine if you can avoid it as it will make the debris problem worse than it is now. And we have some items that you might want to transfer to the LM: some towels, some flashlights, stool bags, UTS [urine transfer system]. And do you have any more articles that we can help you with right now?
haise OK. Wait on your last list there, Jack. I understand that there are no urine dumps. I guess we will work through the UCD [urine collection device] and all the bags we have.
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houston And, Aquarius, Houston. We are starting to think about the CO2 buildup in the command module there, so we have a recommendation. And what we recommend is that you take the commander’s hoses in the LM … and then find a way to hold those hoses to explode in the CSM [command and service module] extending them through the tunnel as far as possible.
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lovell Houston, we’re trying to extend that commander’s hose by using the vacuum hose.
houston Sounds like a good plan if you can figure it out, Jim.
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lovell Well I’m afraid this will be the last lunar mission in a long time.
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haise How do you read it?
houston We read you satisfactorily, Fred.
haise OK.
haise Jim and Jack are upstairs now taking a nap.
houston I didn’t know it was upstairs.
haise We have the first space station.
houston (Laughter.)
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Day 4 April 14
lovell Boy, we must be very close to the moon.
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lovell We may need a spare flashlight. You have one? OK. OK. The sun has gone down.
lovell Man, look at those stars. Houston
houston Go ahead, Aquarius.
lovell Roger We are in the shadow of the moon now. The sun is almost hidden as far as I can see and all the stars are rising.
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lovell What is that cloud that I see there?
haise I do not know. It looks like a Milky Way.
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lovell I know what it is. Those could be the debris that was dumped there.
haise On the cloud?
lovell Everything is dark now. From the explosion.
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haise Jack, why don’t you get the other one …?
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lovell All good. Let’s go up to Mare Smythii now.
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lovell Oh yeah, yeah, we’re no longer 139 miles [from the surface]. Let’s go
haise Yes, look at that curvature.
lovell that may be [Mare] Crisium over there, Fred.
haise Oh yeah. Far away on the horizon, yes, yes.
lovell Hello, if you want to use the 250[mm]? There is a beautiful photo of Tsiolkovskiy that we rarely have.
lovell Let’s square the cameras; let’s set everything to burn We have a chance now.
swigert OK.
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houston By the way, Aquarius, we see the results now of [Apollo] Seismometer 12. Looks like you [S-IVB] reinforcement alone hit the moon, and it’s shaking it up a bit. Finished.
lovell Well, at least something worked on this flight.
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haise I’m sure we didn’t have an LM impact too.
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haise Houston, do you call Aquarius?
houston Roger, Fred. I would like to confirm that you are drawing drinking water from the command module water.
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haise Yes. Jack worked through the procedure and filled as many drinks as he could, making 10 bags of about 8 ounces per bag.
houston OK. We copy that.
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haise Yes, we are also taking around a thousand photos between steps.
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lovell I can even see Mount Marilyn [named after Marilyn Lovell, his wife] from here.
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houston Aquarium, Houston. Finished.
lovell Go ahead, Houston.
houston Jim, you’re going for the burn. Go for the burn.
lovell Roger I understand. Go for the burn.
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lovell We are burning, 40 percent.
houston Copies of Houston.
lovell 100 percent.
houston Roger
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lovell To turn off.
houston Roger Shut Down.
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houston Good burn, Aquarius.
lovell Ahead.
houston I say it was a good burn.
lovell Roger And now we want to turn it off as soon as possible.
houston Roger Understand.
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lovell We are now in follow-up hands.
haise Yes. It looks different than before.
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haise You can almost see …
lovell See Ptolemy, Alfonso, there is Herschel [near Fra Mauro, their planned landing site].
haise Yes, you can barely see it in the corner.
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houston We are developing a procedure for you to use the LiOH command module [lithium hydroxide] containers to connect to your hoses: the outlet hoses on the LM. So that as time passes in the mission you can continue cleaning the atmosphere of LM.
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houston We wish we could send you a kit and it would be like putting together an airplane model or something. As a result, this gadget will look like a mailbox when you get it all together.
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haise Jack and I will go to work trying to build that thing. Suppose we will use the space age packaging cable or the gray ribbon?
houston That is to affirm. … You will need gray tape to tie everything together, and you will need something like a sock to put on the bottom so that the outlet side is covered.
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haise From the sounds of all the work that is going on and is still going on, this flight is probably a much bigger test for the ground system than here.
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houston Well everyone down below is 100% optimistic. It seems that we are on the positive side of all this now.
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haise Jack, I can definitely say that we are moving away from the moon now. I have everything in the monocular at the same time.
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lovell Fred is relieved now. He rested a little again. Here is Lovell who has the duty.
houston Caramba. You woke up early, didn’t you?
lovell It’s cold back there in the command module.
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houston Jim, you will be splashing about 560 miles southeast of Samoa at 0800 local time.
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lovell Roger would you tell the LRL people [Lunar Receiving Laboratory, a three-week quarantine facility] to turn it off?
houston Oh no. We are going to do everything.
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houston I would suggest we go ahead and tear up these lithium hydroxide canisters and make a couple of them. Jack could work on it. It will take four pairs of hands, I think.
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lovell I’ll give Jack the headphones for a little while and he’ll copy your instructions.
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houston OK Jack. Has anyone ever told you that you received a 60-day extension on your income tax? Finished.
swigert Yes. I think, I think someone said that when you’re out of your country, you get a 60-day extension.
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swigert OK Houston; Aquarium.
houston Aquarium, Houston. Ahead.
swigert OK. Our do-it-yourself lithium hydroxide container change is complete.
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houston Set up the second canister of the command module the same way you just did the first one, using the commander’s hose, and you’re done.
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houston Is it a little cold up there?
haise Yes. We made the mistake of placing the blinds, which we will not do again, and with this mode turned off we are not generating much internally, and it really got cold.
houston Yes. I guess you will have to generate your own heat there for a while.
houston Deke says undo the Exer-Genie [in-flight exerciser].
haise OK.
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haise I was just going to say that we haven’t had a sewage dump overboard since we cleared the other side of the moon. By this time, we are running out of the suitcases we have on board here.
houston OK. I’m … I’m stupid this morning, Fred. I’m not quite sure what you mean.
haise OK Joe. We need a place to put the urine.
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Day 5 · April 15
houston And Jack, Houston. For your information, FIDO [flight dynamics officer] it tells me that we are in the sphere of influence of the Earth and that we are beginning to accelerate.
swigert I thought it was time for us to cross. Thank you.
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haise With all these other procedures you’ve been working on there, I thought I was going to have a new one for you. How to separate four cubes of gingerbread? I think they were glued with epoxy.
houston Is this in the food bag?
haise Yes.
houston That’s taking a lot of launch and momentum.
haise Roger Tool B did the trick.
houston Hi Fred John says you can use the levees [diagonal cutters] to separate them.
haise Yes, that probably wouldn’t have crushed them that much. I generally don’t use the subtle approach. You can tell that we felt pretty good, Vance, when we started complaining about the food.
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swigert Right now, we are getting two sets of CWG [cotton underwear] in.
swigert It’s not uncomfortable at all in Aquarius, but it’s definitely cold in Odyssey.
houston Roger
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houston Our readings below say that your LM cabin is almost as cold as the command module cabin. It’s okay?
lovell Well we really don’t know. Usually there are two people in the LM’s cockpit, and it’s a lot – it appears to be much more compact, so we don’t notice the chill here like we do in the command module.
houston OK.
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Day 6 · April 16
haise Houston, Aquarius.
houston Go ahead, Aquarius.
haise How far are we now, Jack?
houston Okay, Aquarius. You have 150,000 miles and you come at 4,500 feet per second. That’s from Earth.
haise OK.
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lovell Joe, you could pass on to our friends in crew systems that moon boots are great foot warmers.
houston I guess you need them up there too. Is anyone sleeping on the command module now, Jim?
lovell Negative, Joe. It is too cold there.
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lovell Another note of interest to people in crew systems: tell them they don’t have to bother putting the refrigerator on board. I just got some hot dogs out, and they’re pretty much frozen.
houston (Laughs) OK. We copied that, Jim.
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haise How do you read, Vance?
houston Hello, loud and clear, Fred. Understand that you’ve been doing a little house cleaning in the spring, moving stowage over there.
haise Boy, wouldn’t you believe this LM right now. It’s just floor-to-ceiling bags.
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haise And there was a piece of flight data that we needed that we didn’t bring this time.
houston What was that?
haise It is a great book with many old and simple blank pages.
houston Yes, when it leaves the nominal, why? You only need scrap paper, right?
haise Yes.
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swigert Okay, back to the fridge.
houston Hey, I thought it was the room.
swigert Well, now it has a new name, because it’s about 30 degrees cooler.
houston Roger Going back to deep freeze.
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lovell Houston, Aquarius.
houston Go ahead Jim.
lovell OK. We don’t have any more water in the drinking water tank. We tried to get something else out a few minutes ago, and there is none.
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houston We understood that he had put some water from that tank in bags, and I wondered if any of the bags would be left.
swigert Negative.
houston OK.
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swigert At this time, all the windows of the command module are heavily covered with water. So I don’t know what kind of images we will take from them, but I’m going to try to clean them up and do my best with the 250mm lens on the Hasselblad.
houston Roger
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Day 7 · April 17
houston I know none of you are sleeping, it’s worth it because it’s so cold, and you might want to dig up the medicine cabinet there … and get out a couple of Dexedrines. [stimulants] one piece …
lovell Well, I hadn’t mentioned that. We could, we could consider it.
houston OK. I wish we could find a way to bring you a cup of hot coffee. It probably tastes pretty good now, right?
lovell Yes, I sure do. You don’t realize how cold this thing gets.
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houston Hang there. It won’t be long now.
lovell Yes. So is. In fact, this alignment on Earth this time will be like landing with a foggy windshield.
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houston Aquarium, Houston.
lovell Go ahead, Houston.
houston All right, boss. We find a way to keep you warm. We decided to start energizing you now.
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lovell Sounds good and are you sure we have a lot of electrical power to do this?
houston That is affirmative.
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lovell It will be interesting today, Jack. The earth is much bigger; the crescent is much more pronounced than yesterday.
houston Well, you’re going in the right direction.
lovell So is.
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lovell And, now it’s getting a little warmer here. Thank you.
houston Blinds are always warmer, Jim, when birds fly.
lovell Right.
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lovell The sun feels wonderful. It’s glowing in the appointment window.
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houston Keeping warm?
swigert Hey, it’s hot in here now. It is almost comfortable.
lovell Now I’m looking out the window, Jack, and that Earth is whistling like a high-speed freight train.
houston We are registering it at 48,000 miles and reaching approximately 9,000 [feet per second].
lovell I don’t think there are many LM who have seen it like this. I am still looking for Fra Mauro and Cone Crater.
houston You’re going the wrong way, son.
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houston Aquarium, Houston. We have 10 seconds to nine minutes for the burn. Three, two, one … mark. Nine minutes.
lovell Very well.
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haise We are burning
houston Copy that, Fred.
houston Good show, Aquarius.
lovell We’re adjusting now, Joe.
houston Roger Aquarius, Houston. You are fine right where you are.
lovell OK. That’s.
haise OK. If you are satisfied, can we maneuver to service the sep module?[aration] attitude now?
houston That is affirmative, Aquarius.
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houston Hey Jim, did you get into the medicine cabinet on my recommendation a few hours ago?
lovell Yes. Everything is settled, Deke.
houston It’s okay. You can hit it again in about two hours.
lovell OK.
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lovell SM sep.
houston It is understood.
lovell Do you see it, Jack?
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lovell OK, I have it, Houston.
houston Beautiful beautiful. … Finished.
lovell And one side of that spaceship is missing.
houston It’s okay?
lovell Right next to … Look out there, will you? Right next to the high-gain antenna, the entire panel shuts down, almost from the base to the engine.
houston It is understood.
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houston OK Jim. We would like you to take some photos, but we want you to keep RCS [thrusters]. Don’t do unnecessary maneuvers.
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lovell All good. Now he is adrift in front of our windows, Houston.
houston OK.
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haise Man, that’s amazing!
lovell And, Joe, it looks like a lot of debris hanging off the side near the S-band antenna.
houston Roger, Jim.
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lovell Jack went back down the tunnel and said the computer is fine.
houston OK. How good to hear it.
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lovell Well, I can’t say that this week was not full of emotion.
houston Well, James, if you can’t take better care of a spaceship than that, we may not give you another one.
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houston Okay, Aquarius; Houston With the current amount of power you have in the LM, … we think you have almost 12 hours of power left.
lovell 12 hours, huh? We could go back in with him.
houston That is to affirm. That’s enough for two taps and a full stop, Jim.
lovell That’s right, Joe. If you could dig a crater like Cone Crater, it could hit it.
houston (Laughs) OK.
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houston OK, you’re going to start turning on the command module.
lovell Right-o. We are starting now.
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houston We have the AOS command module [acquisition of signal]. Request Omni Charlie at the CM. Finished.
lovell Omni Charlie. OK. Be placed. Going up.
houston OK.
lovell That was sent through a new on-board communication system known as screaming through the tunnel.
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lovell I have Fred up there with Jack now helping to turn on the CM, and I’m staying in the old Aquarium.
houston Understand, Jim.
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houston Just to inform you. We have data from – Odyssey, and it looks good.
lovell Hi great
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houston Okay, Odyssey, Houston.
swigert Ahead.
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houston You look good on the ground, Odyssey.
haise OK.
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lovell OK Houston; Aquarium. I am in the attitude of LM Sep and I am planning to rescue myself.
houston OK. I can’t think of a better idea, Jim.
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swigert OK. We are ready to proceed with the first shading.
houston OK. Jim released the Aquarius movie?
swigert Yes. We, you mean the movie we took this morning?
houston That is to affirm.
swigert Yes, we have transferred it.
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houston Odyssey, Houston. We just had a formal Go for LM jett[ison] at your convenience. Finished.
swigert OK. Thanks Joe.
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swigert 10 seconds.
lovell Five. LM jettison.
houston OK, copy that. Goodbye Aquarius, and we appreciate it.
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houston OK Jim. Your cabin looks great. We recommend that you turn off the suit compressor now. Finished.
lovell Going out Chico, it’s nice and quiet here.
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swigert Joe, how far do you show us now?
houston Oh, on our board here, we can barely see how far you are.
swigert OK.
swigert I know that all of us here want to thank all of you for the excellent work you did.
lovell That’s saying, Joe.
houston I’ll tell you we all had a good time doing it.
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houston You look good. We are very happy with the trajectory, and a minute ago we lost contact with your friend Aquarius.
swigert OK. Where was he?
houston Oh I don’t know. She’s up there somewhere.
swigert She surely was a good ship.
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swigert You sure wish you could go to the FIDO party tonight.
houston (Laughter.) Yes, it will be wild.
houston Someone said, “We will cover you guys, and if Jack has phone numbers wants us to call, why, pass them on. “
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houston Odyssey, Houston. Finished.
swigert Ahead.
houston OK LOS [loss of signal during re-entry] It’s about a minute or a minute and a half … and welcome home. Finished.
swigert Thank you.
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houston Odyssey, Houston. We show you on the net, it really looks great. I got you on TV, honey.
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Recovery helicopters Apollo 13, Apollo 13, this is Recovery. Finished. Apollo 13.
swigert Ahead. I see you tall and clear going through 5,000 [feet].
Recovery helicopters Roger, Apollo 13. This is Recovery and your shots look good.
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Recovery helicopters Splashdown right now. The three ramps are displaced. They are in the water
This project combines condensed mission transcripts with selected photographs taken by Apollo 13 astronauts: James A. Lovell Jr., Fred W. Haise Jr., and John L. Swigert Jr.
Sources: NASA; Apollo Flight Journal; NASA Scientific Visualization Study; Center for Astrogeology Sciences of the United States Geological Survey; Paul White. Photos from NASA Johnson Space Center, the Apollo Project Archive and Photograph of Earth at the Astronaut’s Gate. Highlights of Astronomy modified seismometer chart, International Astronomical Union.
