By April 1970, man had already landed on the moon, and the public's interest in the space program began to wane.
The Apollo 13 mission was slated to be the third lunar landing. But many news organizations initially overlooked it.
When Jim Lovell took command of Apollo 13, with astronauts Fred Haise and Jack Swigert, he was about to realize his dream to land on the moon.
But the dream faded two days into the mission. An explosion crippled the spacecraft soon after the crew wrapped up a lengthy live television broadcast.
With the world watching, flight controllers at NASA and the astronauts frantically worked to find a way to get them safely back to Earth.
For five days, through one crisis after another, the Apollo 13 crew and mission specialists on the ground worked through each difficulty. The astronauts survived by rationing water and food while using the lunar as a lifeboat before returning to the command module for re-entry to Earth.
Their efforts ended with splashdown in the Pacific Ocean. All three astronauts survived, and Apollo 13 became known as a "successful failure."
wane: gradually lose power or importance; become smaller or weaker or less impressive衰败; 衰落; 变小; 变弱; 变差
ration: fixed quantity, esp an official allowance of food, etc in times of shortage 定量; （尤指食物等短缺时的）配给限额
发表于 2010-4-5 00:10
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