My test pilot experience proved useful, because it gave me the right mental attitude to do the job. We were in new territory, flying a vehicle that no one had ever piloted before. However, my engineering background was even more important, because it allowed me to understand the spacecraft’s fiendishly complicated systems.
Unlike the cramped Mercury and Gemini spacecraft, the Apollo command module was a spacious Cadillac. Yet it was still pretty small for three people. If you want to get a general idea of what it was like to be inside, climb into a Volkswagen Beetle with two of your buddies, lock the doors, and don’t come out for two weeks.
The command module was just one of three spacecraft sections making up the entire Apollo assembly that would fly to the moon. Behind the command module was the service module, also manufactured by North American, which carried all of the electricity, water, oxygen, propulsion and communication equipment for the flight. It was a little like hauling a big trailer behind your car, with all the supplies you need for a long trip but don’t wish to bring back home. It also had all of the little thrusters for small maneuvers, and a big engine on the back for large maneuvers such as heading back to Earth from lunar orbit.
Then there was the lunar module, designed specifically to operate on and around the moon. It was built using the most lightweight materials possible. If you imagine a helicopter without rotor blades or a tail, balanced on a jet engine that pointed down, it will give you a general idea of this odd flying machine. The lunar module was something I would like to have flown—it would have been a kick—but it was built by a different company, Grumman, way over on the East Coast, so I didn’t have much to do with it. I never worked directly on the Block I command module either, only Block II. Before the first generation of Apollo spacecraft had even flown, I was working on the next generation.
To get to Downey and other places around the country, we flew ourselves in Northrop T-38 Talon jets. They were, in effect, our personal vehicles. Not only did they get us around much faster than commercial travel, they also kept our piloting skills sharp. We had about the same number of T-38s as astronauts; I could almost have put my name on one of them. It was the greatest transportation in the world. The agency placed a lot of trust in us. There was an urgency to what we did, so it didn’t seem unusual that we flew ourselves around the country like this. Everyone at NASA wanted us to be in the right place at the right time so that the program could keep moving. One phone call got me an airplane in an hour, ready to go. I’d drive out to the airfield, put my bag between the two seats, and head skyward.
We were a competitive group, of course, so a lot of these cross-country flights turned into races. I recall leaving Houston at the same time as the Continental nonstop flight to Los Angeles. Just for kicks I hot-rodded it to El Paso, Texas, refueled, headed back up to the best altitude as fast as I could, and beat that LA flight. To save time I had to hot-refuel: that is, pump gas with the engines still running. We weren’t supposed to do this with our airplanes, but every astronaut did it, and it saved a few precious seconds.
It was wonderful flying performed by a bunch of elite aviators. Yes, some of the astronauts made piloting mistakes here and there. But overall my colleagues were all extremely skilled, knew exactly what they were doing, what risks to take, and what not to do. Every now and then we may have pushed it a little—such as pressing on to Houston even if the weather was bad there—but we knew how to handle those conditions and were comfortable in the air.
Unless, of course, we had partied too much the night before.
Very early in my tenure at NASA, I was working at the Cape on the same night as a big Gemini postflight party. One of the Gemini astronauts had a little too much to drink, decided he could fly without a spacecraft—and prepared to jump from the third-floor balcony of the Holiday Inn. His colleagues locked him in a closet for the rest of the night so he couldn’t hurt himself. Guess who had to fly with him to Downey the next morning?
We set off in two separate aircraft; I piloted a T-38, while he flew my wing in a T-33 Shooting Star jet. At least, he tried. We began in close formation, but soon he wandered off about a mile before drifting back to my side. He kept this up all the way to Houston, where we landed and left the T-33. He headed home to change his clothes while I stayed at the airport with the T-38. When he reappeared I told him, “Get in the back seat. I’m not letting you fly today. You had
Up at high altitude on the way to California, I grew a little concerned: I hadn’t heard from him for about an hour, “Hey,” I asked on the radio, “are you okay back there?” No response. I looked in the mirror on the canopy rail above the windshield. His head was bowed. Wonderful—it looked like my copilot fell asleep. I concentrated on my flying once more.
Then I felt a sharp jolt on my control stick, and the jet shuddered. What the hell? Had we hit something? No, we were flying fine. After working through any possible problems with the aircraft, I could only conclude that my sleeping copilot had bumped his control stick.
We flew on to a smooth landing in Los Angeles and climbed out of the jet. I was ready to ask him about the stick, but as soon as I saw his face I didn’t need to. One of his eyes was bright red, no white visible. He’d fallen asleep so soundly that his head had forcefully slumped right onto his control stick. I was surprised he hadn’t dislodged his eye. The guy walked around for weeks afterward with a gruesome red eye, while his bosses pretended not to notice.
Fortunately, dumb behavior like this was pretty rare. I flew to Los Angeles for my work at Downey so often, the fifteen-hundred-mile journey became like a bus ride for me. I’d leave Houston, stop in El Paso to refuel, and head on to California. At El Paso, I’d open the canopy and the Mexican flight line chief would hand me an enchilada to munch on while I waited.
I soon had a new work routine: I would leave Ellington Field at dusk on Sunday and land at Los Angeles airport. I’d park the airplane at the North American Aviation ramp on the south side of the field; a rental car would be waiting for me. Some astronauts, not content just to race airplanes, also raced their rental cars from the airport over to Downey. I would throw my gear in the back, drive east down the highway to Downey, and arrive at a hotel around nine o’clock, local time. That left me enough time to get some sleep and go to work early the next morning.
On Friday night, I’d head back to the airport and fly home. If I were very careful how I flew, and if the winds were right, I could sometimes make it all the way back from LA to Houston without refueling. When attempting that nonstop flight, I couldn’t perform a normal takeoff using my afterburner. I had to begin my journey without it and use a lot more runway, then get high enough to catch the wind.
A couple of times, I got pretty low on fuel. It was a surreal feeling: my world contracted to that tiny fuel gauge needle, as I calculated and recalculated how much time I had left, and if it was enough to get me to Ellington. The worst thing I could have done would be to eject from an airplane because I hadn’t figured my fuel right. I would lose an expensive government airplane for no good reason, possibly ruin my career—and feel like a dumb shit for the rest of my life.
The hairiest moments were when the weather was bad at Ellington, but I would have no choice when I was low on fuel—it was the closest airfield. It didn’t matter how strong the wind was blowing, it was my only hope. Locking on to Ellington’s radio guidance beacon, I flew through thick clouds, unable to see a thing. Right next to the runway, somewhere in the murk, was a huge water tower, and if my approach were off by a fraction I could plow right into it. If my instruments weren’t calibrated correctly, I might make a direct hit. Each T-38, in theory identical, had its own little quirks, and we flew so many that we never had time to get a feel for them all. Today might be the day I found this one had a defect.
Scared as shit, I would hope like hell my engines didn’t flame out, focus on my instruments, and finally break out of the bottom of the cloud only seventy-five feet above the ground. I would be level with the water tower and only three seconds from landing when I’d finally catch my first, blessed glimpse of the welcoming lights of the runway. I’d be ready to veer over if necessary, but luckily the lights would be right below me. My instruments were fine. I would taxi down the runway, open the canopy, and take my first deep breath in a long time. I am alive, I
