copyright 1994 (first edition mfg. code 10-1); Houghton Mifflin Company publishers, Boston; hardbound; very good condition with unmarked pages; dust jacket very good.
Description -
Written with all the color and drama of the best fiction, Lost Moon is the true story of a thrilling adventure and an astonishing triumph over nearly impossible odds. Apollo 13 was the seventh manned mission in the Apollo space program and the third intended to land on the Moon.
The craft was launched on April 11, 1970 from the Kennedy Space Center, Florida, but the lunar landing was aborted after an oxygen tank exploded two days later, crippling the service module (SM) upon which the command module (CM) had depended. Despite great hardship caused by limited power, loss of cabin heat, shortage of potable water, and the critical need to make makeshift repairs to the carbon dioxide removal system, the crew returned safely to Earth on April 17, 1970, six days after launch. The flight passed the far side of the Moon at an altitude of 254 kilometers (137 nautical miles) above the lunar surface, and 400,171 km (248,655 mi) from Earth, a spaceflight record marking the farthest humans have ever traveled from Earth. The mission was commanded by James A. Lovell with John L. "Jack" Swigert as Command Module Pilot and Fred W. Haise as Lunar Module Pilot. Swigert was a late replacement for the original CM pilot Ken Mattingly, who was Grounded by the flight surgeon after exposure to German measles. The story of the Apollo 13 mission has been dramatized multiple times, most notably in the 1995 film Apollo 13.