Spacelog Apollo 13

Okay. With the direct sunlight from the window, out of the TV camera field as it is now, we'd like you to open it up an f-stop or so and, if convenient, try to keep that bright spot out of the window.

Okay.

13, Houston. I guess we could stand one more twick down on the f-stop.

Okay, Joe. He's going to do it.

That is, we want you to open it up. Looks like a very interesting book you're reading.

Hey, that's pretty, Fred.

Okay. I hope you got more detail than I have on the monitor here.

No. We probably don't, but it's kind of a neat picture anyway.

Houston, we are now going to finish repressurizing the tunnel.

Houston; Roger.

… probably hear, Joe, we're just finishing pumping up Aquarius here.

Okay. About all we see on this picture, Fred, are the bright spots with the lights around the tunnel area. The hatch itself is pretty dark.

13, Houston. By the way, we'd like to know how the high gain antenna lockup worked. Our signal strength is a little bit lower than we thought it would be.

It looked just the way I expected it to, Joe. I had her sitting there in REACQ with the numbers cranked in and soon as we got pretty much through the rotation, I just threw it down to HIGH GAIN and it appeared to lock right up.

Okay. Good deal. See that flashlight beam wandering around in there.

13, Houston. Go ahead.

We'd kind of like to hold off on the—start the venting again until we get the things—pumped back up inside here. Wonder if you might give us a call to remind us when to initiate that.

Okay, 13; will do.

And we'll try to shift her up to look up into the tunnel here.

Okay. Real good.

Okay, 13; Houston. I think we could use an f-stop lower. What f-stop are you in now?

I'm about as low as you can go, Joe. I'm sitting on 4.4.

Okay.

What you're looking at, Joe, is the commander has removed the hatch and is proceeding to stow it.

Okay, 13. That's a pretty good picture there.

The CDR is verifying the docking latches now.

Roger.

Hey, Joe. Jim reports that there's a slight, you know, burn smell up in the tunnel area, as been reported on previous flights.

Okay. We copy that.

Okay. The commander reports all docking latches latched.

13, Houston. For your information, the S-IVB vent is proceeding on schedule.

Okay, Joe.

Yes, Joe. That's—That's concurring with all the thousands of particles that I see going by outside here.

Yes. I guess I didn't need to tell you.

13, it looks like Jim is connecting the umbilical at this time. Is that right?

I meant window 3, Joe.

Okay, 13; Houston. You're GO for LM SEP whenever you're ready.

Roger.

Okay, 13; Houston. Correction on that. You're GO for LM SEP at the nominal time and—or later. We don't want it early.

Okay, Joe. We'll do it at 04:01:00.

Okay. We're about ready to pull the LM out, Joe.

Okay, 13.

Here she comes.

Okay. Looks like we're clear, Joe.

Okay. Looks good. It's weird because we get the TV about 10 seconds after you call it.

Apollo 13, Houston.

Go ahead.

Okay. We'll be waiting for you to tell us that you feel you're safely clear of the booster, and give us the GO to command the booster in its yaw maneuver.

13, Houston. Did you copy my last about giving us a GO for the yaw?

Yes, we're maneuvering, Joe, and we hadn't picked her back up again yet.

Okay. Do you want to wait till you acquire it before we yaw it?

How much time do you have, Houston? Can you wait, or do you want to do it right now?

We can wait if you want us to, Jim.

Why don't you wait just a little bit.

Okay.

Joe, did they ever get an idea of what that—the TD and E fuel was?

Jack, they're not willing to pin it down to a specific number right now because they say the tanks will warm up later on and the apparent consumption will go down. But it was nominal.

Okay, Houston. We have the S-IVB in sight. You are GO to maneuver the S-IVB.

Houston, Roger that.

Try to give you a—Houston, we're going to try to give you a shot of the S-IVB with the TV out window number 3.

Okay. Real good, Jack. Our S-band signal strength has been fluctuating. Does it seem to be going all right up there in the AUTO TRACK mode?

Yes. Right now; yes, it's dropped off to about the 70-percent point, Joe, and it was before up about 85.

Okay.

And, Houston, do you have a TV picture?

Not at the moment, Jim. We had a garbled one there for a few seconds, and we don't have one at this moment.

Okay. I can see the S-IVB now out the hatch window and it's —

Okay, Jim. Suddenly we have a very good picture.

Okay.

And, Houston, I can see the gold shroud around the IU, and it looks that it's all intact.

Roger, Jim. We copy that. Incidentally, the APS evasive maneuver will be about 4 minutes late. It'll be at about 04 plus 18.