By Ben Mullin
On April 13, 1970 an oxygen tank on the Apollo 13 spacecraft exploded, ripping a hole in the thin aluminum skin of the fuel cell bay.
Houston, we”ve had a problem.
The most complicated vehicle ever constructed was crippled.
Food and water were scarce. The dreams of three moon-bound men were already dead, and mission control feared their bodies wouldn”t be far behind.
Over the next four days, the world watched something miraculous unfold.
The ingenuity of the engineers on earth and the fortitude of astronauts 200,000 miles away brought the Apollo spacecraft home safely. The unblinking creativity of humanity triumphed, in spite of finite resources, rising carbon dioxide levels and a damaged ship.
If this situation sounds familiar, then you either saw the movie Apollo 13, or you”ve been paying attention to the news. The last space shuttle blasted off from Cape Canaveral 12 days ago, leaving humanity stuck in the same position the astronauts of the Apollo mission were ? drifting through space with finite resources, rising carbon dioxide levels and no propulsion.
Theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking has already gone on the record and laid the situation out ? exponential growth in the human population has given us the ability and inclination to consume resources at an unsustainable pace. Our ship is in bad shape. If we can survive the next 200 years, Hawking predicts, technology will have advanced enough to let us colonize other planets, thereby relieving the pressure of dwindling resources. But with the shuttle program canceled, and no clear successor waiting in the wings, where will that technology come from?
I realize this discussion is all a bit apocalyptic for a Wednesday morning, but the idea of “dwindling resources” nags at me, and presumably you too, whenever we take our 30-minute showers, or suck down a debilitating quantity of Big Macs after a 60 mile drive down the highway.
You don”t do those things? Good on you, but enough of us do, so just keep reading.
Look, I think it”s misguided to assume we should just blast off into space and abandon our responsibility as stewards of this planet. Colonizing space without changing our attitude toward how we consume resources is just putting off the problem. But avoiding a devastating nuclear war or a genetically engineered plague is a lot easier from the far side of Alpha Centauri. And taking care of the planet we have doesn”t preclude expanding to new ones.
Technicians at NASA showed their resourcefulness and determination 41 years ago when they brought the Apollo crew 200,000 miles with a damaged ship. They performed molecular alchemy, turning carbon dioxide into oxygen using an incompatible filter, a length of hose and tape.
They ran the damaged space shuttle on just 12 amps of power, the same amount of energy required to run a vacuum cleaner. If anyone can take us to the stars on a limited budget, it”s NASA.
And with our future in jeopardy, failure is not an option.
Ben Mullin is a Lake County native and an English/journalism student attending California State University, Chico. He will spend his summer as a contributor to the Record-Bee.
