Milojko 

Dino

How does the engineer credited with saving the Apollo 13 crew handle the crisis with his mother-in-law?

Milojko Vucelic, a native of Garešnica and the leading engineer of the most expensive Apollo space program, sat in his control office in Houston, as during every mission. He had just received a call from Wally Schirra, the crew commander of the two-stage Saturn 1B rocket that was currently orbiting the Earth.

Schirra told him in a panic that there was a fault in the electrical panel and that he needed an urgent solution. But Vucelic was unlucky that day. An hour later he received another urgent call. And from his wife Inga. Namely, the drama unfolded in the Vulić family house at the same time.

The mother-in-law came to visit. She brought a pair of house slippers as a cute souvenir from Munich. But these were not just any slippers. These were in the shape of a rabbit, and they had cute puffy tails on the heels.

Vucelic's boxer Gogi could not resist the sight and, in accordance with his hunting instinct, rushed after his mother-in-law, trying to catch the rabbits on her legs. Terrified, the mother-in-law started running and finally found shelter in the bathroom. She boldly announced that either she or the dog was leaving the house. NASA manager Vucelic had to choose between solving problems on a dangerous space mission or the danger that his mother-in-law might pose when he returns home. The decision was clear.

The electrical failure was not "that" problematic, as he later claimed, and the Apollo 7 crew could wait a little longer. He told Schirri to be patient with the problem, because he had to contact his wife first. The entire team in Houston listened as Mike persuaded a neighbor to take the dog for a few days.

For years afterward, he heard jokes about himself, the best of which was that he must have deliberately trained the dog to attack his mother-in-law. After solving the domestic crisis, as every time before that, NASA's "problem manager" successfully solved the malfunction on the spacecraft, and Apollo 7 completed its mission successfully. Schirra, of course, did not find out about Milojko's "difficult" decision immediately upon his return, but only fifty years later, which is why they remained longtime friends.

Problems s puniticom

How Milojko convinced the Americans that they could go to the moon.

However, Vucelic, believing that the aircraft was technologically developed enough, persistently convinced the program managers that he could continue. He believed that a huge amount of money and other available resources should not be spent on another mission that did not achieve the goal of the American Space Agency. Namely, the space race was tight at that time. It was said that the Russians were already planning to send cosmonauts on a flight around the moon. If their most advanced spacecraft had not exploded, they would have been the first to reach Earth's closest celestial body.

The Americans had an advantage because they had Vucelic in their agency, cautious when needed, but also full of initiative when he sees an opportunity with a likely positive outcome. Vucelic managed to convince the management that the team is fully prepared to maintain the mother ship in case of malfunctions and that all systems are ready to operate. This was proven to him by the continuous monitoring of the eleven-day mission of Apollo 7. He considered that Apollo 8 was ready to leave Earth's orbit.

Despite the fact that the moon flies at a speed of 60 miles per second at which the spacecraft must intercept it, despite the fact that in such an endeavor every second can be fatal and despite the fact that on that second depends not only incredibly expensive and unique equipment, but also life crew of three - on Christmas 1968, the whole world watched their blue-green home in front of their screens. During that mission, the spaceship circled the moon as many as ten times in twenty-four hours, and the crew celebrated their success by reading from the Book of Genesis. The broadcast of the mission was the most watched television broadcast up to that time, and the happy return of the astronauts home, modestly and without media attention from the Houston Tower, was ensured by Vucelic.

Apollo 8

What actually happened to Apollo 13 and how did the Croatian engineer save the entire crew?

On that ominous April 13, the first man of the Apollo project responsible for crew safety - Milojko Vucelic, was working in the control center in Houston. The Apollo 13 flight was already routine. Man has already visited the moon many times, and during the twelfth mission a game of golf was played on it. Media attention to the US space agency has waned. Although every flight carries great risk, the control center was convinced of the success of the mission.

At the time, no one knew that during the preparation for takeoff, due to the use of the new tank heating system, all the insulation on the electrical cables in the liquid oxygen tank had burned. No one was aware of the fact that the rocket, which had just broken through the stratosphere, was sent into space with bare electrical wires. The explosion was inevitable.

Almost two and a half days after takeoff, Vucelic asked the crew to turn on the heaters in the mentioned tanks so that the astronauts could sleep without the low pressure alarm being activated. Jack Swigart pressed the button to turn on the electric heater. Immediately afterwards, the crew heard an explosion. The oxygen tank was destroyed. At that moment, the supply of air, water and electricity to the aircraft was cut off. The three-member crew was 321,869 kilometers from Earth. Astronaut James Lowell watched the vital gas escape into the atmosphere.

The crew was in a panic. Lowel called the switchboard and shouted the now iconic sentence: - Houston, we have a problem! - The invitation was received by Vucelic. He had only four hours to figure out how to save the crew. Ground control was supposed to devise a way for the crew, using items found in the spacecraft – just some nylon, tape, and cardboard – to create a filter that would help reduce carbon dioxide levels in the cabin. A group of engineers on Earth managed to construct a blueprint of the device in just a few hours, according to which the crew made the filter. Fifty years later, Vucelic recalled how the level of carbon dioxide was already at the upper limit. If the invention didn't work, the entire crew would suffocate in space. The year 1970 would be tragic for America, but also for the whole world. Who knows how this would affect further space exploration and public opinion on the danger and utility of research missions.

For his endeavor, Vucelic was awarded the highest award the USA gives to its citizens - the Medal of Freedom, which was presented to him by then President Nixon. Modest Vucelic, who for his endeavor was never publicly celebrated as much as he should have been, repeated in his lectures the lesson he learned saving Apollo 13. He said: - You should always be prepared for surprises and react coolly and without panic. We must never lose hope because hopeless situations do not exist. –

 – Houston, we have a problem! –

The pen that brought the Apollo 13 crew home alive.

The Apollo 11 mission accomplished the impossible. Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin became the first men on the moon by landing in the so-called Sea of ​​Silence. Armstrong, being the first to step onto the surface of the Moon, uttered one of the most memorable statements in history: - This is a small step for man, but a giant step for mankind. - Although the story surrounding the first moon landing is presented as a perfectly executed mission, the Croatian engineering genius responsible for crew safety, Milojko "Mike" Vucelic, knew how small technical errors destroy systems worth billions of dollars. He knew this because he had experienced countless of them in his career. And he solved so many of them. Because of this, he was called the "problem manager" at NASI. During his many lectures that he gave in the old days in Zagreb, he warned young engineers that they should always keep a cool head when encountering unpleasant surprises. And how you should always be resourceful.

He would often say that even the most famous mission of the American space agency was not without crisis situations. Vucelic used to explain how the computers with which America sent people to the moon in 1970 were worse than the average laptop and how they often broke down. Thus, just before landing, warning 202 appeared on the Lunar computer.

Buzz Aldrin did not follow the flight program and turned on the radar on his own initiative. The system automatically overloaded. During those first missions, the computers were programmed to perform operations critical only to that particular phase of flight. The inclusion of an additional system led to a blockage. Sensing the danger, Collins, who was in the command module, was ready to descend and retrieve the lunar module. Yet on that momentous day, Apollo was destined to bring men to the moon. Vucelic and Gene Kranz in flight control quickly unloaded the blocked computer. The eagle has landed. But as it always happens, another crisis situation arose during Buzz Aldrin's exit from the grounded module.

The doors on the spacecraft were small, and astronauts Neil and Buzz wore massive spacesuits and equipment. Because of this, Buzz inadvertently caught the switch of the electrical line with the oxygen bottle and broke it. That switch was an extremely important part of the spacecraft because it turned on the lift motor. The astronauts realized what had happened only after they returned to the module. According to protocol it was time to take off and the lift engine could not be engaged. The flight control, which included Vucelic himself, informed Buzz that he should urgently try to turn on the switch in any way possible. Aldrin had no tools with him. But he had a pen. He used an ordinary pen to move the inaccessible switch and it lifted the Eagle off the moon. Aldrin kept the life-saving pen as a memento, and proudly showed it to Vucelic, years later, at a regular gathering of the Apollo team jokingly called the Bald Eagles (they were Bold Eagles in his youth).

O penkali

Why do kids who jump off roofs become America's most famous engineers?

Milojko Vucelic, a famous NASA engineer, was born back in 1930 in Garešnica. His father worked as a railroad supervisor, which meant that the family moved often.

As a five-year-old boy, he watched the trains arrive at the Mišulinovac railway station near Veliko Trojstvo. Every day he would go with his father to inspect the railway, and he was most surprised to see the bulky kilns from the nearby brick factory.

That's how Milojko became fascinated by technology, and at that time he couldn't even dream that one day, he would be the one, from the control headquarters in Houston, solving malfunctions on the spacecraft that would land the first man on the moon.

But he had no problem dreaming about people going into space. His imagination was first stirred by Jules Verne's story, A Trip to the Moon, in which men cannonball their way to Earth's nearest space body.

Through stories, little Milojko became obsessed with the concept of flying. For a long time he thought about how he too could experience at least a fraction of that wonderful experience he heard about on the radio.

Namely, those years were very difficult for the population of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. They had the lowest per capita income in all of Europe, and most of the arable land and factories were owned by foreigners. The Vucelić family was not extremely wealthy either, but Milojko's incredible ability to improvise (which, so many years later, enabled the astronauts to always return home successfully) existed from an early age.

The boy's eye was caught by his father's large black umbrella. His child's mind saw in that object a very good potential for an aircraft. Well, as the characters from Verne's stories can fly, so can he!

He gathered his courage, crept out of the house and silently climbed the iron stairs that led to the attic of the family's one-story house. The height of the narrow terrace was not great, but it was enough for the little pilot to realize his long-dreamed-of dream.

However, the coordinates were not correctly estimated, so instead of rising into the air, his craft landed straight on the floor! And Milojko together with her. Fortunately, the little pilot remained unharmed, and the short-lived happiness due to the short flight turned into tears and moans. His mother took him crying and bleeding to the hospital, and the scar on his chin reminded him of his first launch for the rest of his life.

It seems that Vucelic has never lost his courage, creativity and perseverance. Sitting forty-four years later with Gene Kranz, the director of the Apollo mission, in the control room in Houston, he watched the landing of the module on the lunar surface. Kranz told him in delirium: - Impossible, we are there on the moon! –

Smiling, Vucelic calmly answered him: - Impossible, that's our goal! –

All his life he reminisced about his childhood, and he reminded anyone who would listen about how as a boy he had to fall painfully to the ground so that one day he could send someone to the moon.

The first aircraft

How did Vucelic answer Tito from the Yugoslav space program?

After commander Frank Borman and his crew flew around the moon for the first time, NASA astronauts became world stars. This is why the leader of Yugoslavia wanted to meet the American space travelers. Even then, just like today, there were no well-known people from Earth who made sure that everything went well. Even Josip Broz Tito did not know that one of the most important people in Houston at that time was Milojko "Mike" Vucelic from Garesnica.

Frank Borman went on a world tour, and one of the host countries was, of course, Yugoslavia. When Tito received Borman, the first thing he asked him was: - Well, weren't you afraid of flying around the moon? –

Borman replied that he was not afraid at all. He quickly explained: - Your Vucelic was in charge and took care of me from Earth. I had nothing to fear. – Hearing about this successful domestic engineer, Tito, who was fascinated by space and who dreamed of starting a Yugoslav space project, immediately wanted to meet him.

Not long after, he invited Vucelic and his wife to have dinner with him and Jovanka. Like Nixon and Brezhnev, Tito also wanted to try his hand at the space race. He offered Vucelic to return to Yugoslavia. He wanted to come create and lead the space program. Vucelic answered him: - Comrade Tito, do you want Yugoslavia to go bankrupt? - He explained to him that space flights are so expensive that not even America can afford them. This turned Josip Broz away from that idea and the Yugoslav space program was never implemented.

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– Houston, we have a problem! –

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The first aircraft

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