Failure Is Not an Option: Mission Control from Mercury to Apollo 13 and Beyond
Written by Gene Kranz
Narrated by Danny Campbell
4.5/5
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About this audiobook
Kranz was flight director for both Apollo 11, the mission in which Neil Armstrong fulfilled President Kennedy's pledge, and Apollo 13. He headed the Tiger Team that had to figure out how to bring the three Apollo 13 astronauts safely back to Earth. (In the film Apollo 13, Kranz was played by the actor Ed Harris, who earned an Academy Award nomination for his performance.)
In Failure Is Not an Option, Gene Kranz recounts these thrilling historic events and offers new information about the famous flights. What appeared as nearly flawless missions to the moon were, in fact, a series of hair-raising near misses. When the space technology failed, as it sometimes did, the controllers' only recourse was to rely on their skills and those of their teammates. Kranz takes us inside Mission Control and introduces us to some of the whiz kids-still in their twenties, only a few years out of college-who had to figure it all out as they went along, creating a great and daring enterprise. He reveals behind-the-scenes details to demonstrate the leadership, discipline, trust, and teamwork that made the space program a success.
Finally, Kranz reflects on what has happened to the space program and offers his own bold suggestions about what we ought to be doing in space now.
This is a fascinating firsthand account written by a veteran mission controller of one of America's greatest achievements.
Gene Kranz
Eugene F. Kranz joined the NASA Space Task Group in 1960 and was Assistant Flight Director for Project Mercury (the original manned space missions). He continued as Flight Director for the Apollo 11 lunar landing. He is a co-recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his work leading the Apollo 13 teams. Failure Is Not an Option is his first book. He lives with his family near Houston, Texas.
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Reviews for Failure Is Not an Option
69 ratings13 reviews
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5A really good overview of what went on at Mission Control during the birth of America's manned space program. Kranz is somewhat clinical in his descriptions and you won't find any dirty secrets or revelations. He also gets preachy about what he perceives as a lack of willingness to continue manned space flight by leadership without giving any justification beyond planting flags. In spite of this, Failure Is Not an Option will provide anyone who didn't live through the time period a lens into what it was like and just how bare-bones the materials NASA was working with were. Although not as dramatic as the movies, it is thorough and well written. Definitely worth reading if you have any interest in space exploration.
2 people found this helpful
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This audio book explained more terms than I ever knew existed, but kept my attention the whole while. One anachronism that assaulted my ears several times was to hear the space program furthering the cause of mankind. How fast one's ear becomes attuned to more inclusive language.Throughout the memoir, Kranz stressed the value of hard work, integrity, and teamwork. Preparation and more prep was the entire game. Knowing everything was all one needed to know. Yes, as simple as that.Danny Campbell did an excellent job of narration.
2 people found this helpful
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Gene Kranz was a flight director at NASA, working in mission control in the pioneering days of the US space program, from the first Mercury flights all the way through the final Apollo mission. (If you've seen the movie Apollo 13, he's the guy who was played by Ed Harris. You might remember him wearing an eye-catching white vest, a detail that, like many of that movie's details, was commendably accurate.)Kranz talks in great detail about his time in mission control, about all the personal and technological requirements of the job, all the things that went right and the things that went wrong, the emotional moments and the times when everybody had to shove their emotions aside and concentrate on their jobs. It's interesting stuff, at least if, like me, you're the sort of person who can never get enough when it comes to this exciting (and, sadly, perhaps never to be repeated) era of humanity's exploration of space. And it's left me with a new and deeper appreciation of all these guys on the ground who made the whole thing work. Clearly they, too, had their own brand of the right stuff.I will say that I wouldn't exactly recommend this book as a first introduction to the subject of early manned spaceflight in the US. For that, I'd suggest Andrew Chaikin's A Man on the Moon, or perhaps Michael Collins' 1970s memoir Carrying the Fire. But if it's a topic you're interested in and already know a little bit about, and particularly if you're interested on a rather different perspective on it, it is very much worth a read.
2 people found this helpful
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Give this book to someone who wants to be a leader. Kranzs' book is the Right Stuff for the Geek crowd. This book is a good a history of the early space program. Its also a book about leading during crisis. I wish I had read it when I was young.
2 people found this helpful
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Flight Director Gene Kranz was involved with NASA's Mission Control since 1960 in the early days of the agency during the Mercury Program, and was "Flight" during the first Moon Landing and during Apollo 13--and became famous as a result of the film of that name. The title is taken from a line given Kranz in that film--not one he actually ever spoke, but one he thought conveyed the spirit of Mission Control.I have to admit I'm a space junkie, and you probably should keep that in mind in evaluating my rating and review. I was never bored--indeed I was fascinated, and I thought Kranz conveyed the technical aspects well. What I took away from it was the brilliance and just... well, sheer competence that was displayed by not just Kranz but the whole NASA team. Not something I usually find on display in government, but everyone involved then had a sense bringing a dream to life, a sense of taking part of history--and that may have made all the difference in drawing people of Kranz's quality and keeping up that level of achievement. I certainly was very much engaged by Kranz story of the pioneers of space exploration--or at least the American part.
1 person found this helpful
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5When it comes to the space program, most books focus on the astronauts, but the readers do themselves an incredible injustice by skipping the other 95% of the action. This book covers those heroes. I had always thought of Mission Control as similar to Air Traffic Controllers. If the tower isn't open, planes can still land on their own with a specific set of procedures. But Mission Control is just that - they are as integral to the mission as the astronauts and the rockets - every one of them.For every action of the astronauts - from docking, to EVAs, to even taking a poop, there was someone on the ground whose job it was to worry about that specific aspect of it and how it impacted every other part of the mission. These amazing specialist controllers worked and trained with the primary and the backup astronaut crews to develop the specific procedures for performing every action (potential and planned) the whole team might foreseeably encounter. When it came time to perform those actions, the makeup of the shift of controllers would be the specialists in those areas. So when the action changed from launch to docking rendezvous, the controller shift changed, too.The Apollo 14 mission is one great example. Paraphrasing a chapter, one of the controllers had detected a problem with the ABORT switch. After a quick conference with other specialists, they called a backroom of other experts who was there to specifically back him up. Behind that back room of specialists was a software team from MIT on the line waiting just in case. While the astronauts were preparing and proceeding with their lunar descent, the MIT team had written a software patch, the back room team had tested it with the backup astronaut crew in the SIM and then transmitted to the crew. Without their efforts, the landing would have been scrubbed.As another example, every time the launch was put on hold, there was a trajectory controller who performed the calculations for the new trajectory and upload it to the computers. You have to think, every minute means a new trajectory!The Apollo 13 movie only hints at the immense pressure these guys were under. No rocket was perfect and every mission required troubleshooting (and fixing) one set of problems after another. Live. Thanks to Gene for giving these guys their due.Another book that I think of as essential is Deke Slayton's book, "Deke!" This bridges the gap between astronauts and admin and how many of the decisions were made (such as who was first in space or on the moon).
1 person found this helpful
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Superb. Kranz is not only indelible within mankind's greatest ever achievement he also is a visionary and quite explicitly states that the USA is a nation with its feet firmly rooted in the Earth and has no stomach for risk, space exploration and leadership. We spend our time celebrating the past achievments without turning the talent of America towards a future of manned space exploration. Such a vision demands a visionary leader, like ... John F Kennedy. Where are such political leaders of today?
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5FAILURE IS NOT AN OPTIONGene KranzYou don’t get much more eyewitness-to-history than Gene Kranz. As a member (later leader) of the Mission Control team for America’s space program, Kranz participated in every Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo launch, from the humiliating failures of the early Mercury tests through the heart-pounding Apollo 13 journey, to the demoralizing end of our active participation in manned exploration of space.Kranz has a straight-up style, and the book’s only real flaw is that it may be overpacked with detail. In his attempt to ensure that every member of the ground and flight teams are acknowledged, and the technical details of the missions explained, there are a lot of names swimming around in the alphabet-soup of program acronyms.The reader who can get through those gets a front-row seat to the missions, including descriptions of mission- (and life-) threatening glitches and problems solved on the fly. Most of the American public, even those of us who followed the flights with great interest, had no idea of problems that didn’t rise to the Apollo-13 level of magnitude.As the Apollo program itself draws to an end, the emotional impact of the book strikes a deep and troubling chord. Kranz does a bit of soap-boxing at the end, acknowledging the short-sightedness of allowing apathy and changes in political support to fritter away the momentum we had at the height of the program. It remains one of the most devastating events in human history that we, as a country, turned away from space exploration and research just as we had battered the door open. The shuttle and space station missions are not within the purview of Kranz’ book and so are not addressed. While undoubtedly providing valuable information, neither has the impact of the moon landings, and it’s heartbreaking to recognize what we lost.Kranz’ viewpoint is a valuable part of the history of America’s man-in-space program, and an enthralling read as well.
- Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5This book is way to detailed. The minutia that are provided are no interest to me and I would think most people would agree. I did not finish the book because I felt it would be a waste of my time. I would not recommend this book unless you are interested in a detailed history of the space program from an insider.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I found this book to be more captivating than Chris Kraft's memoir, but I don't know exactly why. They are both excellent books, perhaps because Gene Kranz's memoir focused almost exclusively on his time with the space program. Either way, while they are both excellent books, I'd have to recommend Kranz's above Kraft's.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Excellent inside look at the manned space program.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I loved every bit of this book. It really humanizes the great early works of NASA. It seems like everyone thinks scientists are some kinds of robots; they are inaccessible and unfeeling, but seeing the stories through the eyes of Gene Kranz really bring them home.This book chronicles the history of Gene's life, as well as NASA missions with a first-person view of everything from the Mercury program to Apollo and a bit beyond. There are also some technical parts in this book, which I loved! He talks about not only the actions taken during missions, but the reasons and science behind them.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Wonderful history of NASA by one most suited to tell it in a personal way. All the details on why Failure Is Not An Option.