Fire in the Spacecraft

Over forty years ago, those words crackled over the radio down in Florida.

It signaled a tragic halt to a breakneck pace program to reach the moon; three astronauts died on the launchpad during a simple test.

The Apollo program is long finished, many of the participants buried years ago, and even the launchpad itself is now just a stark empty monument to what once happened there.

Yet the lesson endures, for those of us willing to pause long enough to learn from it.

Too often, the dangers that will harm us are not the ones for which we plan and engineer for or for what we anticipate... It's that which is overlooked. Three astronauts died, not in deep space, or while stuck on the moon... But while on the ground, atop an unfueled rocket, surrounded by thousands. Yet, the could not be saved. For all that had been planned, a simple spark on the ground doomed them.

Our lesson is don't overlook the small stuff, the inconsequential, the minute - that's what brings down giants.

In memory of Gus, Ed, and Roger... Who made it safe(r) for those who followed.

And for NASA's week of tragedy (all of NASA's loss anniversaries are this week.)
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