Apollo 1 Fire

In most books about the U.S. space program the end of 1966 is described as a time of optimism with 1967 promising to be an even better year with the new Apollo Program getting off the ground.

The spacecraft for the first manned Apollo (CSM 012) had been delivered to the Kennedy Space Centre on 26th August 1966 and following systems checks and altitude chamber tests, three men were ready to thunder into orbit atop their Saturn 1B rocket and man-rate the new moon craft.

The question often asked at this point is,

"What could possibly go wrong"?

The crew test their block 1 spacecraft in a vacuum chamber during October 1966. Note that whilst one crew member is entering the spacecraft, his two colleagues are waiting their turn.

At around 1pm on the 27th of January 1967, the crew of Apollo 1 eased themselves into their spacecraft high atop an unfuelled Saturn 1B rocket standing at pad 34.

They were going to conduct a countdown test down to the moment of ignition followed by a simulated emergency egress. The rocket would be drawing power from its own internal power source instead of from the launch pad and this was known as a plugs-out test, the rocket was not fuelled and the test was not considered dangerous.

The test was immediately stopped due to a strange odour in the breathing oxygen and the crew left the spacecraft. At 2.42pm the three men re-entered the command module and the inner hatch was locked into place followed by the ablative hatch and finally the Boost Protection Cover (BPC).
The block 1 Apollo spacecraft had a hatch that was little better than the hatch used on Grissom's first spaceflight.

Now he was locked inside the Command Module with a heavy hatch that required the Command Module Pilot (CMP) to insert a ratchet and crank open six different bolts before pulling it back into the spacecraft.

Once the hatch was in place the crew were secured inside and would not be able to exit the spacecraft for at least a minute and a half in an emergency, in hindsight it seems an antiquated hatch system for a multi-million dollar space program.

Led by Gus Grissom, the crew cross the access arm from the launch tower to the white room for the test.

With the hatch closed the internal pressure was pumped up to 16.7psi of pure oxygen to test the spacecraft's integrity under orbital conditions. The normal operating pressure in space for Apollo spacecraft was 5 psi and the atmospheric pressure at sea level is 14.8psi, hence the need for a higher than usual pressure. The downside of this was the fact that the inner hatch was immovable under such high pressure even White, probably the strongest of all the astronauts, would have been unable to budge the hatch with so much pressure bearing upon it. Also the pure oxygen at 16.7 psi turned the 700lbs of flammable material inside the spacecraft into a highly dangerous fire hazard.

Numerous delays plagued the countdown, including poor communications which prompted Grissom to say to Roosa, acting as Capcom: "I can't hear a thing your saying. Jesus Christ....I said, how are we going to get to the moon if we can't talk between two or three buildings?"

Now with the rocket bathed in searchlights and on its own internal power source, simulating the final minutes of a countdown, the test dragged on into the evening until at T-10 minutes a hold was called and the problems with the misbehaving communications were looked into. For a few minutes all was quiet with the crew waiting for the countdown test to resume, they would have been totally unaware of the deadly events unfolding behind a panel just below Grissom's feet.

Suddenly there was a report from the spacecraft,

"We've got a fire in the cockpit!"

It was 6.31pm and the TV monitor aimed at the CM's hatch window showed that the spacecraft was filled with bright flames. Chaffee cried out,

"We've got a bad fire........we're burning up!"

The monitor now showed White's arms stretched above his head in a frantic attempt to undo the inner hatches bolts, his arms were joined by Grissom's arms as he too reached over to help.

This is how the crew would have been lying on their couches during the test, side by side, with the instrument panel over their heads.

The fire started on Grissom's side of the spacecraft, furthest from the camera, and in a matter of seconds all three men would have been engulfed in flames as the fire quickly spread inside the confined interior of the
Command Module.

White, in the middle, desparately tried to open the hatch behind his head as fire flickered over his visor and
covered his arms and hands.

Meanwhile, Chaffee remained in his couch maintaining a comm's link to the conrol centre.

For the astronauts the terrifying experience of being
locked inside a spacecraft, surrounded by flames and
with a hatch that would not budge, even if the bolts had been removed, was nearly over.

Launch pad technicians using the ratchet that secures the six bolts locking the Block 1 CM inner hatch.

Apollo 1 The Fire

AS-204 was the Saturn IB for Apollo 1, after the fire this rocket was used to launch Apollo 5.

As the fire intensified Chaffee's voice was heard again in a cry to his two crew mates frantically trying to open the hatch,

"Lets get out!"

Seconds later a scream was heard from the spacecraft and then all communications ceased. Only 15 seconds after the first report of fire, the spacecraft's hull ruptured as the internal pressure and heat soared. Flames shot out of the rupture like a blow torch and the blast knocked one of the pad technicians backwards as smoke and flames spat out into the white room.

The pad team that fought to save the crew were Don Babbitt, Jim Gleaves, Jerry Hawkins, Steve Clemmons, L.D,Reece and later on Henry Rogers. These brave men risked their own lives in the struggle to rescue the trapped crew amidst secondary fires that had broken out and threatened the pyrotechnics situated throughout the rocket and Launch Escape System.

At first the heat and smoke forced them back and the gas masks, some of which didn't work, were designed for protection against toxic fumes, not suffocating smoke. Coughing and half blinded by the stinging smoke, the pad team spent brief periods tackling the fires with extinguishers before having to run out of the white room and onto the access arm for gulps of fresh air, then back in they ran knowing that they had to get that hatch off if the crew were to have any chance of surviving.

Hawkins managed to put out the fire in front of the hatch, then Gleaves removed the BPC hatch. Next came the ablative outer hatch leaving just the inner hatch which was still too hot to handle. Struggling through the dense smoke, with red sore eyes and close to being overcome, the pad team finally managed to open the inner hatch slightly but it had taken a full five minutes after the first report of fire from the crew.

As the hatch came open a new wave of heat and smoke rushed out into the faces of the rescuers and as they looked into the blackened interior nothing could be seen of the crew, even under the lights that still glowed by the headsets. When the smoke finally cleared enough to see inside, the transmission over the communications loop said it all,

"I'd better not describe what I see."

Inside the white room the hatchway can be seen through which the crew made their final entry to Apollo 1.

Note the rail above the hatch, this was used to aid the astronaut's ingress as they swung their legs inside the spacecraft over the hatch sill.

When Slayton and Roosa reached the gantry the smell of burnt plastics hung in the air and upon entering the white room they could see the spacecraft hatchway with the lifeless spacesuited arm of one of the crew hanging down from it. Inside the charred interior, under the instrument panel with its glowing warning lights, the bodies of the three men could be seen.

Chaffee was still strapped in his couch on the right hand side, White was lying underneath the hatch sill having given up in his attempt to remove the hatch and Grissom was under the centre couch, apparently seeking shelter from the fire. Near to the spacecraft they could see the hatch that had kept the crew in and the rescuers out and there, outlined in ash, was the handprint of Ed White.

Looking into the interior of the spacecraft, the main instrument panel can be seen at top with oxygen hoses hanging down onto White's couch. In the oxygen rich atmosphere even metal burnt but oddly enough a flight manual lies by White's headrest with only the edges of its pages singed.

Whilst the BPC hatch rests to the left, the inner hatch is on the right after being removed during the rescue attempt. Note the six bolts at the bottom of the hatch, actually at the top in this picture because its upside down, and the two handles used to assist in the positioning of the heavy hatch.

The spacecraft didn't give up its dead easily, the spacesuits were entangled in a mass of melted netting, electrical insulation and velcro and it wasn't until after 1am that the bodies were removed. They were taken to a makeshift morgue about one mile away from the launch pad where an autopsy was carried out
later that morning.

It was discovered that the crew had died of asphyxiation and not from their burns, which would have been survivable. The end would have come quickly, with their oxygen hoses burnt through, fumes would have forced their way into the crew's lungs and 15 to 30 seconds later they would have succumbed to unconsciousness.

The crew may even have been unconscious when the spacecraft ruptured because part of Grissom's spacesuit had been found on the floor of the white room five feet from where it had been blown out through the split in the spacecraft.

Command Module 012 bears the scars of the fire, flames and smoke jetted out of the ruptured side as internal temperatures and pressures breached the hull.

The three empty spacesuits of the Apollo 1 astronauts bear witness to the ferocity of the fire. Grissom's suit is on the left, White's is in the middle and Chaffee's is on the right,

White's Apollo 1 mission patch.

Just before the fire Grissom had said,

If we die, we want people to accept it. We're in a risky business and we hope if anything happens to us it will not delay the program. Our curiosity will force us to go there ourselves because in the final analysis only man can fully evaluate the moon in terms understandable to other men."

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The Apollo 1 spacecraft is joined to the Saturn 1B rocket.

The crew for Apollo 1 during a visit to the
North American Aviation Downey facility.

Artisitic view of Apollo spacecraft in orbit.

On to Investigation

The crew seen through the window during training.

The Launch Pad Plugs-Out Test