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Four astronauts in flight suits, one waving, are greeted by a naval officer on the deck of an aircraft carrier, celebrated by onlookers for their achievements in space exploration.

Virtual Astro Live: Virtual Conversation with Apollo 13 Astronaut Fred Haise

Event Information
Date & Time Tickets Price Location
Sunday, June 23 | 3:00 PM - 4:30 PM EDT Available Free Virtual
About This Event

"Houston, we've had a problem..."
The words that no astronaut wants to hear, but were infamously uttered during NASA's ill-fated Apollo 13 mission and later immortalized in the 1995 film.

Astronaut Fred Haise served as lunar module pilot for the mission, which was originally scheduled to be a ten-day trip to the Fra Mauro region of the moon. Approximately 55 hours into the flight, the service module’s cryogenic oxygen system ruptured, causing the flight plan to change dramatically. Haise and fellow crewmen James A. Lovell and John L. Swigert worked closely with Houston ground controllers to convert their lunar module "Aquarius" into an emergency lifeboat, conserving both the electrical power and water needed to ensure their survival and safe return trip back to Earth.

Hear from legendary astronaut Fred Haise, in conversation with former NASA Astronaut Mike Massimino, as he reflects on his experiences as Apollo 13’s lunar module pilot.

Participants:

Fred Haise served as a backup Lunar Module Pilot for Apollo 8 and Apollo 11 before serving as the Lunar Module Pilot for the Apollo 13 mission. He worked with NASA for nine years after Apollo 13, serving on the backup crew for Apollo 16, commanding free flight test missions for the Space Shuttle program, and was scheduled to command Apollo 19 before its cancellation. He left NASA in 1979 to work as an executive for Grumman Aerospace Corp.

Mike Massimino is a New York Times bestselling author who served as a NASA Astronaut from 1996 to 2014. He is a four-time spacewalker who completed two missions to the Hubble Space Telescope, including the final Hubble servicing mission which has been called the most dangerous and complex mission in space shuttle history. Mike set a team record with his crewmates for the most cumulative spacewalking time in a single space shuttle mission, and he was also the first person to tweet from space. Mike received his BS from Columbia University and his PhD from MIT. He currently lives in New York City where he is a professor at Columbia, Senior Space Advisor at the Intrepid Museum, an expert television commentator, and an in-demand keynote speaker. He also had a recurring role as himself on The Big Bang Theory television series.

Registration info: Free with advance registration. Register here.

All programs are live-streamed via the Intrepid Museum’s Facebook, YouTube, and X and NSF’s YouTube channel.

American Sign Language (ASL) interpretation will be provided during this program.