Watch: 1967 CBS News special report on Apollo 1 tragedy
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- Опубліковано 25 січ 2017
- Friday marks 50 years since the Apollo 1 tragedy, where three astronauts were killed in a fire on the launch pad. Watch the full 1967 CBS News special report here.
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I was 11 years old when this happened. There was a snowstorm in Chicago so our whole family was home digging out from 23 inches of snow. We watched the news that day and the following. few days all day long since we were snowed in. Still remember the sadness we all felt as we silently watched. The sixties were filled with tragic events.
There is also footage here on UA-cam of a Chicago TV station covering the Blizzard of 1967 where they broke in about the Apollo 1 tragedy. They also featured amateur radio operators calling into a ham radio station at the station giving the condition of the roads and snow around the area.
The Great Chicago Blizzard of 67. Ivluved in the western 'burbs. It crippled the entire Greater Chicagoland area. But it still wasn't as bad as the ice storm a few years earlier.
I love old style news you actually want to listen to them
Also they said the word "speculation" out loud.They don't just do it.
Straight news...no doubt. Now they just say opinion geared to influence the listener.
The script writing was so much more personalized back then, likely due to being less removed from the days of radio when there was more creativity that went into explaining what you could not see. As we have moved farther away from that time the news has become impersonal & script writing has become more generic & bland.
Great reporting, and this was all off the cuff, and totally unscripted.
Amazing coverage.
Turns out there was indeed communication from the astronauts, and it was horrible. My father was on the investigation team and heard the uncensored tape which he described as absolutely heartrending. He knew those men personally and had wished he didn't have to listen to it, but that it was his responsibility. And so he listened, in order to try and prevent such a tragedy from ever happing again. He said that he would carry the screams of his friends in his mind for the rest of his life. That complete recording, with all of the astronauts' voice transmissions, has never been released to the public. But back at this time in our country, our society was more dignified and civilized. Even the media was mostly honorable and interested in the fundamental principles of ethical journalism and fair, impartial reporting. Out of respect to the families and for the greater good of the space program and our country, the media cooperated with the story that the astronauts had died "silently, and swiftly." Had this tragedy occurred now, it would be a much different story. Our present day media, motivated by power, greed, and furthering a political agenda, would race to see who could be the first outlet to get that awful tape onto the air, caring not what suffering or damage they would be causing in the process, and at the end of the airing, would blame the whole thing on a President who hasn't been in office for the better part of a year.
Well said centerice. Well said.
The tape is on UA-cam now. For those who do wish to hear it, I warn you: Do so only at your own risk. It is not pleasant.
Yeah a fire would have to be like a bomb for them to not have time to scream. Anyone being burned even for 5 secs would scream sounds terrible
Actually by Sunday morning following the fire, the media was reporting transcripts to include "Fire in the spacecraft!" and "a scream of pain", not exactly all of the comms and not verbatim but no, the original "they died silently" inaccuracy was quickly rebutted.
Ya
Hearing the audio and Chaffee's last scream, this wasn't them going peacefully into the night.
🤣🤣🤣💯
My grandpa was 27 and he worked for NASA. He actually was there when it happened, and made friends with some of the pilots before launch. Apollo stopped their missions for a while and my grandpa got bored, quit, and moved back to Mississippi where he met my grandmother.
I'd never seen these interviews and reports in full length.
Thanks CBS
Gus Grisson had a very pleasant voice. I could really seem him as having become an expert commentator for CBS or one of the other networks with that voice after he was done flying in space if he had lived
Hard to believe 19 years and one day later, another major space accident. The Challenger Disaster.
Poor Gus... I can't imagine making it out of the capsule in 61 with the risk of drowning but dying after this tragedy only 6 years later...
I was 9 yrs old when this happened. Brave men were adored and plentiful in 1967. As was their courage.
Those three men were heros, not because they died but because they pursued the ultimate goal in man's history, space exploration. They will never be forgotten, Virgil I. Gus Grissom, Roger Chaffee, and Ed White.
I was only 6 years old when this occurred, but I remember the pure horror of it. We lost 3 outstanding astronauts and it set us back for quite some time.
I was 6 myself, and it became the birth of my interest in space exploration.
I was six also, and it was horrifying, but it did not diminish my keen interest in space exploration, either.
In a sense it sort of had to happen in hindsight. Turned out that the capsule was a mess of poorly done wiring, etc., obviously also terminating the pure oxygen way which seems incredibly dangerous in hindsight, not sure why they thought that was a good idea.
"Setting us back" in short term scheduling but likely preventing a similar disaster later.
This news report is so elegant and honorable. What has gone wrong with news special reporting today....
That was fake news too you idiot just like moon landing
@@malcolmwindmon8399 You dishonor the memories of men who died with your lies. You think you're special and edgy, but the fact is history has already forgotten you. Enjoy your menial existence.
@@malcolmwindmon8399 Your comment is fake because you're getting paid by flat earther and conspiracy organizations.
@@malcolmwindmon8399 found a flat earther
@@malcolmwindmon8399 you are a disgraceful individual.
That's some pretty damn good quality for 1967. Even for CBS.
A little off topic, but (regardless whether or not it was digitally remastered,) the audio and video quality for 1967 is pretty good.
Part of the reason is probabaly that we are used to pretty poor video quality from the Apollo era from the actual missions. Let's face it, the TV cameras and footage from Apollo 8 to 14 were really bad. They used low weight tv cameras during those. And obviously recodings of footage on youtube was often done from tv, using vcr from the 70's, 80's and 90's. BAck then we didn't realise how bad even VHS was :)
Actual TV footage from a proper tv camera, recorded by the studio itself, wasn't nearly as bad, even in the 60's.
Also from i think 15 onwards, Nasa used a MUCH better tv camera, which was mounted on the rover and controlled from earth, so the astronauts didn't have to carry and point this thing. So the TV footage from these later missions is (for the time) really good. Almost fulltime all 3 evas of 6-7hrs in great quality is available.
I was 12 years old at the time, I can remember this so well when it came on CBS, I was watching TV and when this special bulletin interrupt TV programming, came on I can remember even as a kid the sorrow that I felt when I heard this,
I was also 12. I don't remember watching the TV but do recall learning of this and being horrified. (So many memories from the 60's of "learning of this and being horrified"....)
This was a profoundly painful night. I was 8. My sister was 10. She cried and ran into our Mom's room to tell her. I was stunned. I remember being hushed and disbelieving of this.
Two disasters shown here.
1) Apollo 1
2) the death of real broadcasting. Today’s news is an embarrassment.
RIP and never to be forgotten.
We were immured in our farmhouse, buried in ice. The power was out for ten days or so and we just had AM radio. And that's where I heard the bulletin and the subsequent reports. Normally we would have CBS TV but not that week. So I never saw this! Thank you!
This event is out of the memory of many of us, but I remember this tragedy being discussed by my parents years after it happened. Getting to the moon in the decade of the 1960's was our national goal. These men paved the way for others to get to space; their deaths were a national tragedy.
I can only wonder why we do not have similar national unity and goals today. In the 1960's , we certainly had problems: poverty, racism, war. Yet according to my parents, the space race was a unifying activity.
Can we ever return to a time of national cooperation? Today we seem to be devolving into an era of political bitterness, squabbling and vengeance. When I reflect on the Apollo1 tragedy, I am sad not only for that horrible loss of life, but also for seeing how far our political and national integrity have fallen.
Today 1/30/2021 is the anniversary of their funerals.
Heroes: rest in peace.
NEVER FORGOTTEN.
I was one year old when this happened
In a sense it sort of had to happen in hindsight. Turned out that the capsule was a mess of poorly done wiring, etc., obviously also terminating the pure oxygen way which seems incredibly dangerous in hindsight, not sure why they thought that was a good idea.
It was not a good time in America, arguably worse than today, 1960's and '70's.
Rest In Peace Virgil Gus Grissom, Roger Bruce Chaffee, and Edward White. January 27, 1967
It came out later that one of the astronauts had notified the command center of a fire in the cabin. And they also heard them screaming in pain, apparently they decided to keep that from the public at the time.
Imagine you’re preparing to go to space for the first time you are training and you die one of the most horrible deaths imagined
27 January 1967; the day we lost three American heroes...
...and the day I cried for their loss.
Unfortunately, they did not die "instantly" and clearly suffered before it was all over :-(
I remember this ... still so sad.
Thank you for posting this video. Gus had a bad feeling about that spacecraft. They should have trusted Gus' instincts. RIP, Gus, Ed, and Roger
I remember this news being broadcast all over the television airwaves--where there were three networks.
I was 7 years old. I saw this in the newspaper. It gave me nightmares.
Friday, January 27, 1967 was my 6th birthday. I still remember my teacher talking about this in school the following Monday.
I was only in fourth grade then. However, I didn't learn about this until two years later, when I was in special education school, and we had the names of the astronauts as spelling words.
I was only 9 when this terrible tragedy happened.
White's comments during his interview are timeless, wise, and relevant. My heroes.
Rest in Peace Hero's.
Poor guys :( ....God bless their soul....
Color interviews of Apollo 1!! My first time seeing this report tonight!!
Came here right after we lost communication with chandrayaan 2 robot. Space is tough, appreciation for all those toil for the success in this field. 🙏
Ironic how they say they died silently when they obviously burnt to death screaming
Their comments are chilling. I remember this like it was yesterday. It hasn't gotten any less horrifying.
1:31 "There was no communication..." Wow, what they didn't know at the time.
bt10ant I think they knew but they wanted it to seem like they didn't see it coming, didn't know what hit them kinda thing. It's worse to think that the were in there, knowing there was a fire, can't get out and saying things like "we're burning up in here".
If you look up death caught on audio on youtube, the apollo 1 audio is one of the first ones listed. They didnt didnt die quitely, they died screaming in pain and agony😞😞
My mother graduated from high school when this occurred.
"Aviation progress is a series of black smoking holes in the ground."
General Chuck Yeager
Amazing the video quality of such an "old" news reel.
Walter was a great predicter of the future, but so were Frank Reynolds and Jules Bergman, as they were there during the Apollo flights as well!
May God bless their souls...
May They All Rest In Peace.
May they rest in Peace !
I was watching a kid watching TV when I found out. I'd been following the Gemini missions. Every man who was a boy in that era almost invariably still put "Astronaut" on their list of "what I want to be when I grow up", even afterward.
The best of the best! Brave men. R.I.P.
We can’t be afraid to go to space and take the risk.
This brings to my mind the final scene of "The Bridges at Toko-Ri": "Where do we get such men?"
That is an excellent statement. Very very true
The soft-pedal a fix was already in. The Grissom, White and Chaffee did NOT die silently. They died while choking to death as their suits began to burn, and their capsule became an oven.
Rest In Peace Walter Cronkite.
The Launch Escape System wouldn't have helped anyway - the spacecraft would have took off with the fire still raging inside.
Launch escape system work was to pull the failing first stage booster away to safety.
@@FeverDev64 Not true - it was to pull the SPACECRAFT away from the failing first stage booster.
@@FeverDev64 The escape systems for Mercury and Apollo involved an "escape tower" rocket at the nose end of the capsule yanking it off so that the capsule (which doesn't have fuel) would safely parachute back to the ground. Only Gemini had ejection seats. In any case, the big danger was from a booster blowing up or shutting down just after liftoff.
If the capsule itself is somehow on fire, the escape tower rocket system would be useless.
@@wardenphil oops my bad
Unlike JFK's assassination and countless other national tragedies in American history, the deaths of Apollo 1 astronauts and those who died in the Challenger explosion have not been talked about a great deal anymore. Nevertheless, Apollo and Challenger astronauts did not lose their lives in vain.
What is particularly tragic, is that immediately following the Apollo 1 accident, NASA called a meeting in which a new document was read, instituting the mission philosophy that they would NEVER AGAIN rush a project that was not ready, to the launch platform. The specific cause of the Apollo 1 accident were inexcusable engineering design flaws in the command module by North American Aviation negligence. However, the big picture was that the whole project had been "rushed" forward in order to remain compliant with an arbitrary schedule, a push which had placed safety, lower on the priority list. Unfortunately, it took only 19 years for the tenet of that document to be forgotten when in 1986, the Challenger project was rushed to the gantry with KNOWN residual engineering problems, and the obsession with adherence to the planned launch schedule proved fatal for yet another group of astronauts. Incidentally, the 737 Max debacle was also of precisely the same origin; rushing a project out the door to meet some deadline (in this case not to be docked money on contracted dates of delivery) before it was properly completed and deemed safe.
Yes, but we did twice land men on the moon twice in 1969.Apollo 11 in July and Apollo 12 in November. The Russians three months after Apollo 1, they had their own tragedy with the Soyuz 1 flight they knew wasn't ready by orders of Leonid Brezhnev who was in a hurry to have a space first. Cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov was having trouble with the spacecraft tumbling around. He fired the retro rockets to return to Earth and the burn was successful, but the parachutes were all twisted around, and he crashed. There was nothing much left but fiery ashes. The Apollo 11 crew left a plaque with the names of the three Apollo astronauts Grissom, White, Chaffe and the Soyuz 1 cosmonaut, Komarov on the surface of the moon. It is still there.
@@GGE47 Of course it's still there. A totally and truly unneeded and practically redundant comment. Where else would it be? Ugh.
why - where has it got us?
It is ironic that oxygen was the fault in both fires.
When real news was reported without bias. I miss this type of honest reporting. Such a sad day for everyone when this happened. I was 8 yrs old but I remember seeing this on the news.
Back when the news simply reported what they knew. No hype, no political correctness, just professionalism.
I agree LastCommodore. At the very end, 50 years later, the female reporter asking the gentlemen how "embarrassing" this was to the USA. Give me a break. How embarrassing the news is nowadays.
Condolences to the Family.
Wasn't quite instantaneous was it!
Every step of the way since early days we have had the bravest men an woman who unselfishly pushed forward to bring us to today technically challenged world . I was 11 when this happened .
I was 12 years old in Chicago , the big blizzard just went through town one day earlier when this happened
Occ
A sad event. This broadcast really highlights how back then television news was higher quality, more news-like, while today we get a lot of hype, noise and footage, empty banter that is the opposite of information dense...there is usually very little real information. It is clear that some research, thought, preparation, work went into this old broadcast. One rarely gets that feeling with today's hasty, watery, error filled, loud reports that have very little actual information.
Another thing that got me was when they started inserting the constantly moving backgrounds, because apparently we dumb dumbs out here can't pay attention to what they're saying unless there's constant motion like we were 6 months old.
Fake news you idiot
So tragic, and sad
NASA never seemed to learn. The rush to launch was the problem here and it was still the problem 19 years later when Challenger launched. And they got careless with the foam issue and lost Columbia
At 12:20, Ed White hit it right on the head. His pronouncement has sadly come to pass....
These three men proved the Human Spirit if not The American Spirit. The mission was what drove these men and all of NASA. We have all benefitted from their sacrifices just like every war veteran. I was six years old and never knew all the space deaths that happened. I saw the moon landing in school on a tv july 1969, all classes gathered around to watch it. I went on to be enlisted at 18, three months after graduating. I endured the Reagan Years of the Cold War and the 1991 Gulf War. These men died doing what they aspired to do, and they made a difference, they were living their lives, at any cost. They are our brothers...
There was record warmth here in Philadelphia on that day.
28:13 best journalist that was around back in that time wish we had them back today tell the news!
Brave, brave, men. The Best of the Best.
Pushing the idea so hard that they died instantly. Of course when the tapes came out it became clear just how nasty their deaths really must have been.
PassiveSmoking where do I find these tapes
@@kjswensen63 ua-cam.com/video/274lQSbpkRg/v-deo.html
@@kjswensen63 ua-cam.com/video/274lQSbpkRg/v-deo.html
@@sethflix aint a damn thing there.
I did not know this! I’m sorry 😢
White and Grissom sounded almost exactly alike
Who knew that 21 years later, almost to the day (actually one day later), the Space program would encounter a more intense tragedy--the explosion of the Space Shuttle Challenger, which claimed the lives of seven astronauts, including civilian Sharon Christa Corrigan McAuliffe.
67 & 86,19 yrs later..
@@richardmorris7063 Ahh, my bad. Sorry, I'm not perfect.
I never understood why 100 % oxygen was needed inside the spacecraft. But im sure NASA had a good reason. Three brave souls, now they are among the stars. God bless
The nitrogen in their blood if they were to breathe air wood embolize them
To save a lot of weight. Pure O2 at 5 psi means a lot less storage capacity and piping needed than having O2/N2 at 14-15 psi...and keeping weight down was critical for these vehicles to get up into orbit, much less go to the Moon and back.
The big no-no was having a cabin pressure check by pumping that O2 to sea-level normal-plus in order to check for leaks. Yes, it saved time, but made the interior of the capsule a bomb ready to go off.
They used 100% oxygen in the Mercury and Gemini missions also.
@@baraxor Pure oxygen above sea level pressure made this so deadly. Almost every documentary I've heard or watched goes over this fact. I think they could have made it if they had reduced the pressure to ⅓ as on later flights.
Three great men.
How sad!
Does anyone know what time this went on air (the original special report)?
iVenge feb 4th 1967 I think
zarrzy delightful :-P.... i meant the *time*.... as in the hour and moment. :-)))
I believe this program was broadcast from 9 to 9:34 P.M. Eastern time on January 27th, 1967. Walter Cronkite (who anchored CBS space coverage from the Mercury 7 days until the early space shuttle era) is only seen during the latter part of the special; I once read that he was out having dinner when news of this tragedy broke on the wires around 8:30 P.M. Eastern time, and rushed to the studio in-time to be interviewed towards the end of this special.
I was in the 9th grade in 1967. I had already gone to bed around 8:20 PM as I had just finished a grueling week of mid term exam
Part 2. I was not asleep when CBS broke on with the news. Best I can remember the news break happened shortly after 8:32 p.m EST
Reena Ninan?! What are you doing on CBS?!
Walter Cronkite, the one news caster that everyone trusted with the news and he never pulled any punches.
He told the news and didn't try to give extra comment . His sign off at the end was always "And that is the way it is ! " for what ever day it was. More Trusted than some of the Yahoo's who give the news these days.....
Wrongly trusted. Planted listening devices at the 57 RNC. Pos
Their deaths were anything but swift and silent.
We all know they did not die silently. It went something like "Hey! We got a fire! Arrrrgh!" Sickening.
Interesting how NASA spun the initial reports - the description apparently given by the blockhouse technicians is totally at odds with what was revealed later.
Oh God, I hope to God in Heaven that when it happened, it was super quick! God bless those astronauts!
I miss when news did these kind of in depth reports and where they expected the viewers to have some intelligence.
How very sad. 😞
All these incidents nasa was cold and callous afterwards. It’s amazing how wanting to rush a deadline they ignored all of the issues before hand.
Eerie circumstances apollo1 challenger and Columbia one on launch test pad second 63 seconds into flight the third returning from space
It's a good thing I know this happened due to history books, because if It happened now I wouldn't believe the media to tell me night is dark and day is light.
I did a paper on The Apollo Fire in college.
I was 8 years old when this happened. I awful, I had nightmares about it.
This should be science and technology not news and POLITICS
But it is the news?
@@drobnoxius9483 “POLITICS”
The newsmen never tried to exaggerate this tragedy
Problem was obviously not just the Oxygen. Problem was the extremely high pressure. They simulated the pressure difference from inside vs outside.
In space the outside pressure is obviously zero. So inside pressure is rather moderate. But to simulate the difference under the high air pressure on earth you have to have the internal one very very high.
With all unpredictability and the known risk in space flight... This should never ever have been allowed to happen. Oxygen under that high pressure was absolute madness. Which they realised. Too late. And the hatch construction was madness too. It opened inwards. Which means with the pressures involved it doesn't open. AND was boltet shut.
However, as astronauts and mission control people said, without the lessons from Apollo 1 (and the 2 year delay in the program to fix it) the moon landing would probabaly not have happened. Not sure about that but HAD there been another accident, spacecraft and procedures after the elssons from Apollo1 would have given them a MUCH better chance of survival.
Same accident with the final version of the Apollo CM would not have killed the Astronauts.
The delay was only 18 months. The cause wasn't only pure O2 tanked up to 17psi, but the wear on two wires with Teflon insulation that had been abraided by the constant opening and closing of a small service hatch. The electricity arced and set the cloth netting below Gus' feet ablaze. The pure O2 made the fire spread swiftly and raised the air pressure to 29psi. No way Ed could open the inward-opening hatch.
Most of the design flaws in the Block I CSM were already dealt with in the Block IIs. Mostly, the delay was to re-evaluate the culture within NASA. Look up The Kranz Dictum, written by Gene Kranz the Monday following the fire.
NASA should have known better. 100% Oxygen? That's as flammable as you can get. All it takes is one, just one, tiny little spark or short circuit to ignite 100% Oxygen.
Who was the genius that thought 100% oxygen was a good idea? 😂😂🤷🏻♂️
Do you find it odd that on January 27, 1967, the same day these guys died, that the US, Washington,UK, London,and Soviet Union, Moscow signed the OUTER SPACE TREATY, also known as he Treaty of Princples Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, including the Moon and other Celestial Bodies, that is supposed to only be used in peaceful purposes, and to refrain from placing any objects carrying nuclear weapons or weapons of mass destruction in space and on any celestial bodies???
And they DID state that the exploration and use of outer space should be carried on for the benefit of ALL people's irrespective of the degree of their ECOMOMIC or Scientific Development.
2:27 those teenagers will never see their father again
Man, Gus was grey!! He looked old for a 41 year old.
All the inner stress and tension of his high octane worklife
It could have ONLY been, an electrical short in a pure oxygen, pressurized, environment!
RIP my fellow Boilermakers (Grissom & Chaffee)
Walter knew the truth!
55 Years Ago. The Legendary Mike Wallace at his Best. RIP SIR