The tragedy of the Apollo 1 fire is the biggest counterpoint to one the United States’ most awesome achievements, the Apollo program. This program’s roots extend back into the 1800’s but truly became possible with the beginning of the Space Race. After the race for the Moon began with President Kennedy’s historic speech, America began heading for both victory and tragedy in the rush to be first to the Moon. In the sprint of the Apollo program, NASA overlooked the technical risks of the command module which resulted in the Apollo 1 fire and subsequent death of three astronauts. The buildup to and ultimate rush of making the Apollo program successful created the conditions for NASA’s first fatal accident of spaceflight, the Apollo 1 fire.
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Leading up to these events, the United States was attempting to halt the expansion of communist governments all over the world. Between the Korean and Vietnam Wars, the addition of nuclear weapons to the Soviet Union’s arsenal, the insurmountable Soviet lead in space and now the Bay of Pigs disaster, President Kennedy now needed something for the United States to win at. After consulting with the Vice President, Defense Department, and NASA (to include Wernher von Braun), it was determined the best chances for beating the Soviet Union in space accomplishments was to attempt a Moon landing as fast as feasibleEvaluation of Space. This consultation, combined with the political climate that immediately followed the launching of the first human into space, set the stage for President Kennedy to make the decision for the United States to set off on the mission to land men on the Moon by the end of the …show more content…
This was immediately followed a few weeks later by the announcement of a manned Moon mission by the United States. This announcement finally brought the idea of the Apollo program to the public stage. Despite having a program already in place, the United States was nowhere close to launching a human Moon landing mission. With the still fresh beginning of the Mercury missions, NASA had to change the stance of the slow but proceeding Moon landing program into a crash program, this mean a massive increase in funding and
The …show more content…
Leading up to these events, the United States was attempting to halt the expansion of communist governments all over the world. Between the Korean and Vietnam Wars, the addition of nuclear weapons to the Soviet Union’s arsenal, the insurmountable Soviet lead in space and now the Bay of Pigs disaster, President Kennedy now needed something for the United States to win at. After consulting with the Vice President, Defense Department, and NASA (to include Wernher von Braun), it was determined the best chances for beating the Soviet Union in space accomplishments was to attempt a Moon landing as fast as feasibleEvaluation of Space. This consultation, combined with the political climate that immediately followed the launching of the first human into space, set the stage for President Kennedy to make the decision for the United States to set off on the mission to land men on the Moon by the end of the …show more content…
This was immediately followed a few weeks later by the announcement of a manned Moon mission by the United States. This announcement finally brought the idea of the Apollo program to the public stage. Despite having a program already in place, the United States was nowhere close to launching a human Moon landing mission. With the still fresh beginning of the Mercury missions, NASA had to change the stance of the slow but proceeding Moon landing program into a crash program, this mean a massive increase in funding and