On this day in 1970, the crew of Apollo 13 splashed down in the south Pacific Ocean after one of the most intense events in the history of space exploration.

Known as the “successful failure,” an explosion on board forced NASA to circle the damaged spacecraft around moon without landing.

I still think about how lucky I was to have met astronaut Fred Haise when I was a kid. His voice, with a Mississippi accent, is still etched in my mind. His taking the time to chat with a young man interested in Space spoke volumes of his character.

Hearing him talk about the experience of becoming the humans who traveled the farthest from Earth became even more special to me when the Artemis II astronauts broke that record last week.

The perseverance of the Apollo 13 crew and NASA personnel on the ground 56 years ago is something that should still inspire us all today!

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