Houston, we have a podcast. Welcome to the official podcast of the NASA Johnson Space Center,

episode 139 Apollo 13. I'm Gary Jordan. I'll be your host today. On this podcast,

we bring in the experts, scientists, engineers, astronauts,

all to let you know what's going on in the world of human spaceflight.

On April 13th, 1970, roughly 200,000 miles away from Earth, John or Jack Swigert, Fred Hayes, and James or Jim Lovell,

the crew members of Apollo 13 had just wrapped up a TV broadcast before turning it in for the night.

Nine minutes later, after Swigert flipped one switch for a routine churn of the liquid oxygen tanks,

oxygen tank number two exploded, which led to a chain reaction that left the

crew in a dire situation. Houston we've had a problem rings over the

audio loops.

Say again, please.

Here's can we've had Apollo?

To set the stage, here's what Houston and the crew were up against.

On the Apollo spacecraft, there were three main areas that ended up playing much different roles after the blast.

The service module, the command module, and the lunar module.

The service module was stocked with the oxygen, water, and power needed for the mission.

However, it also housed the main propulsion and maneuvering systems for the spacecraft.

When the oxygen tank exploded, the crew lost these consumables and the service module was rendered non-functional.

The command module was the control center and served as the crew compartment, accommodating all three astronauts.

This module was also designed for reentry and was equipped with enough power and consumables

only for the crew's descent back into Earth's atmosphere.

However, the command module had to be powered down

...