Customer Rating: 
Summary: Living History and Inspiration for Our Times
Comment: Failure is not an Option: Mission Control from Mercury to Apollo 13 and Beyond
This book came highly reccommended by other teachers at Advanced Space Academy for Educators. It is a great companion to A Man on the Moon.
Gene Kranz is an inspiration for us all. In today's world we need his message. He makes one feel that if we can go to the moon then we can accomplish anything that we set out as a nation to do.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Be Tough and Competent!
Comment: Gene Kranz does an amazing job of showing what people can do if they have the right leadership, teamwork, commitment and passion.
The book allows us to see Kranz's perspective as flight controller, (and later flight director) during his tenure on the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo space programs and beyond.
From the tremendous successes, to the gut wrenching failures, to the heroism, to the practical jokes, this book has it all. Gene Kranz was a key player in helping to create a culture of Tough and Competent flight controllers who had discipline and morale. They knew the true meaning of teamwork.
One of the stories that impressed me most was after the devastating tragedy of the Apollo 1. A fire on the pad killed Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffe while they were training in the capsule. Afterwards Kranz got in front of his flight controllers and said:
"Spaceflight will never tolerate carelessness, incapacity, and neglect. Somewhere, somehow, we screwed up. It could have been the design, build, or test. Whatever it was we should have caught it."
Kranz and his people (as well as everyone else on the space program) took responsibility for their actions and went on to amazing successes. We crawled out the cradle of this home we call earth and explored another world. Twelve men in all walked on the moon. Also, three astronauts were brought back home safely from the brink of disaster in Apollo 13. We had truly gone where no man had gone before.
These were human beings, and they are the best of the best. Not an Astronaut was lost during any of the following Apollo missions. The tragedy on the pad drove the commitment of everyone on the space program to an entirely new level. As a matter of fact, not a man was lost once they left earth on the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo programs.
Gene Kranz sums up how he gained his skills to be a top flight director when he said:
"The flight director's ultimate training comes at the console, working real problems, facing the risks, making irrevocable decisions."
This book belongs on any bookshelf, but not to be looked at, but to be read and understood. We all have the makings of greatness, we just have to take responsibility for our actions and do the very best we know how. What other amazing things can we accomplish as a species if we have the right leadership, teamwork, commitment, and passion?
The Re-Discovery of Common Sense: A Guide to: The Lost Art of Critical Thinking
Customer Rating:
Summary: Be Tough and Competent!
Comment: Gene Kranz does an amazing job of showing what people can do if they have the right leadership, teamwork, commitment and passion.
The book allows us to see Kranz's perspective as flight controller, (and later flight director) during his tenure on the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo space programs and beyond.
From the tremendous successes, to the gut wrenching failures, to the heroism, to the practical jokes, this book has it all. Gene Kranz was a key player in helping to create a culture of Tough and Competent flight controllers who had discipline and morale. They knew the true meaning of teamwork.
One of the stories that impressed me most was after the devastating tragedy of the Apollo 1. A fire on the pad killed Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffe while they were training in the capsule. Afterwards Kranz got in front of his flight controllers and said:
"Spaceflight will never tolerate carelessness, incapacity, and neglect. Somewhere, somehow, we screwed up. It could have been the design, build, or test. Whatever it was we should have caught it."
Kranz and his people (as well as everyone else on the space program) took responsibility for their actions and went on to amazing successes. We crawled out the cradle of this home we call earth and explored another world. Twelve men in all walked on the moon. Also, three astronauts were brought back home safely from the brink of disaster in Apollo 13. We had truly gone where no man had gone before.
These were human beings, and they are the best of the best. Not an Astronaut was lost during any of the following Apollo missions. The tragedy on the pad drove the commitment of everyone on the space program to an entirely new level. As a matter of fact, not a man was lost once they left earth on the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo programs.
Gene Kranz sums up how he gained his skills to be a top flight director when he said:
"The flight director's ultimate training comes at the console, working real problems, facing the risks, making irrevocable decisions."
This book belongs on any bookshelf, but not to be looked at, but to be read and understood. We all have the makings of greatness, we just have to take responsibility for our actions and do the very best we know how. What other amazing things can we accomplish as a species if we have the right leadership, teamwork, commitment, and passion?
The Re-Discovery of Common Sense: A Guide to: The Lost Art of Critical Thinking
Customer Rating:
Summary: Space, did we lose our way?
Comment: Gene's memories from the first halting attempts to launch rockets into space through the successfull Apollo moon program paint vivid pictures of what happened inside the space agency on a non-technical level in building the space program. Good review of challenging and motivating people to envision the what-if and do it step by step. Small references to lack of vision in senior leadership of space program after the Kennedy moon goal was achieved.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Interesting Read
Comment: This is a really interesting read, and a must have if you have any interest in the space race at all. This is a book with a lot of detail about each mission that Gene Kranz was involved in, and is interspersed with some neat personal information about his family. Buy it and enjoy it!!
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