Incredible flown Bus Bar Batt B cable carried into lunar orbit during the Apollo 13 mission as part of the Command Module Odyssey’s Electrical Power System (EPS), which consists of the equipment and reactants required to supply the electrical energy sources, power generation and controls, power conversion and conditioning, and power distribution to the electrical buses. As such, this cable played a key role in the dramatic rescue of Apollo 13. After the explosion of the Service Module’s oxygen tank No. 2, the only power the spacecraft was able to maintain was through its batteries. Just prior to earth re-entry, the CM was powered up again using only its onboard batteries interconnected with this and several similar cables. The cable, 5.5″ in length, is stamped on the body with part number “V36-452265,” and ends with two metal terminals. Includes its original “Space Division, North American Rockwell” temporary parts removal tag, listing the matching part number and identifying the spacecraft as 109 for PFT (Post Flight Testing). In fine condition. Accompanied by a signed letter of authenticity from Max Ary, the former director of the Kansas Cosmosphere and Space Center, who attests that the cable was flown on the CM Odyssey, later removed by North American Rockwell engineers, and derives from his personal collection, and by an illustrated information sheet detailing the Odyssey incident, which is signed in black ink by two Apollo 13 astronauts: “‘Houston, we’ve had a problem,’ ‘We’ve had a Main B Bus undervolt,’ James Lovell, Apollo 13 CDR” and “‘We got a Main Bus A undervolt now, too showing…it’s reading about 25 ½, Main Bus B is reading zip right now!’ Fred Haise, Apollo 13 LMP.”
Provenance: Gaston & Sheehan U.S. Marshal's Service Ary Auction, April 1, 2014.
On the 13th minute of the 13th hour, the 13th Apollo mission was launched. A million things could have gone wrong, and on April 13th, one did. More than 200,000 miles away from Earth, the Command Module Odyssey was dying. At 55 hours and 54 minutes, Oxygen tank No. 2 blew up, causing the No. 1 tank to also fail. The Odyssey's normal supply of electricity, light, and water was lost, and the crew of James Lovell, Fred Haise, and Jack Swigert were 200,000 miles from Earth and heading further away. Warning lights indicated the loss of two of Apollo 13's three fuel cells, the spacecraft's prime source of electricity, and revealed that one oxygen tank was completely empty and that the oxygen in the second tank was rapidly depleting. CDR Lovell voiced his concerns to mission control: ‘Houston, we've had a problem…we had a Main B Bus undervolt.’
As a result of the explosion, the rupture of oxygen tank no. 2 in the service module closed valves in the oxygen supply lines to fuel cells 1 and 3. These fuel cells ceased to provide power in about three minutes. Fuel cell 2 continued to power AC bus 1 through DC main bus A, but the failure of cell 3 left DC main bus B and AC bus 2 underpowered. The three re-entry batteries aboard the CM were all that remained to power the CM as it streaked through the atmosphere during re-entry, splashdown, and postlanding operations.
The failure damaged the number one oxygen tank. Its contents slowly leaked out over the next several hours, leaving the SM completely without oxygen. Because the fuel cells in the service module needed oxygen to generate electricity, the loss of all SM oxygen left only the command module's own batteries, needed for re-entry after the SM jettison. These would only last about 10 hours. The crew survived by completely shutting down Odyssey and using the Lunar Module Aquarius, still attached to the CSM, as a ‘lifeboat.’ The LM, which was built and equipped for a crew of two for 50 hours, now had to house all three crew members for three days. The Apollo 13 crew endured temperatures at or below freezing for the bulk of the return flight, as well as many other hardships, including water rationed at six ounces per astronaut per day.
Considerable ingenuity under extreme pressure was required of the crew, flight controllers, and support personnel for the safe return. To the cheers and tears of an anxious world, Apollo 13 splashed down within sight of the recovery team in the Pacific Ocean. The consolidated efforts of all truly defined NASA's 'finest hour.’
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