My father Armand worked at Cape Kennedy (now Kennedy Space Center) during the Apollo program. He was the Pad Fire Chief whose fire and safety responsibility was launch pad operations — and that included astronaut safety except for when they were in the rocket itself. Once they were strapped in, the Launch Escape System (a rocket on top of the rocket) was the primary safety system, but anywhere else, that was Dad’s team.
Apollo 7 lifts off from Cape Kennedy on October 11, 1968.
When it came time to launch Apollo 7, everyone at Kennedy Space Center was tense — it was the first human-crewed flight of Apollo, and it was the first time men humans would be going to space after the AS-204 (Apollo 1) tragedy that had claimed three astronauts in the first design of the Apollo capsule. America had started falling behind schedule in its schedule to get to the moon before 1970, and on this flight, everything had to go right…or perhaps the program would be canceled.
If there’s one thing about NASA, is that’s they pay attention to the smallest details. That’s because major incidents always start small…and mushroom from there. On this particular mission, due to the previous tragedy in the capsule, extra attention was given to FOD — foreign object debris — that might be loose in the capsule. The fear was another fire, and no one was taking any chances. None.
With that, word came down from on high in the NASA hierarchy: once they were in their flight suits, no one was to touch the astronauts, under penalty of instant dismissal from their position. The mission managers made it clear that they meant business and that meant anyone.
Part of Dad’s job was to ride up in the elevator on the rocket gantry to the White Room — the place where crew would help each astronaut into the capsule. This elevator was essentially a hardened industrial elevator, big enough to move a lot of people and gear, but not so big one could stand on the other side of a room. There wasn’t room enough for that.
Wally Schirra waiting to go to the launch pad to start the Apollo 7 mission on October 11, 1968.
The mission command was Walter “Wally” Schirra, a crack former Navy test pilot and an inveterate smart-ass. He and my father knew each other well from launches and rehearsals for the Apollo 7 launch. They’d spent a lot of time testing emergency evacuation systems, refining them afterwards in meetings, and probably hoisting a couple of drinks after work back in Cocoa Beach. That meant Wally had also experienced by Dad’s wicked sense of humor, and anyone that ever knew him said the same thing: he was a masterful raconteur who loved to laugh and loved to tell a joke even more. He and Schirra were two peas in a pod.
So the astronauts get out of their van, walk up to the elevator on the launch pad and they start riding up towards their seats, and Dad was with them in their procession.
Dad told me that they ended up in the back, side by side, riding up to the top when Schirra starts laughing, gives my Dad “a shit-eating grin” and then “started rubbing shoulder all over me, laughing.”
What did you think about that?
“I was scared shitless that one of the Germans would turn around and I’d have to come home and explain to your mother why I’d gotten fired.”
But you didn’t, right?
“Nope, the Germans turned around, looked at Schirra and said in their perfect* English ‘stop it Schirra. Armand has kids at home.'”
Did you worry about getting any FOD on Wally?
“No, we were in jumpers and they were the cleanest clothes I ever wore. Wally knew it too.”
Dad told me that the rest of the way was silent, and when they got to the top, and then he looked at my Schirra and said, “give me a hug goodbye, Wally!”
Yup, the world watching and two smart-asses are cutting up behind the scenes. That was my Dad.
- most of zee Germans had accents.
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