Apollo 13 Apollo 13 Apollo 13 was the seventh manned mission in the Apollo space program and the third intended to land on the Moon. The craft was launched on April 11, 1970 from the Kennedy Space Center, Florida, but the lunar landing was aborted after an oxygen tank exploded two days later, crippling the service module (SM) upon which the command module (CM) had depended. Despite great hardship caused by limited power, loss of cabin heat, shortage of potable water, and the critical need to make makeshift repairs to the carbon dioxide removal system, the crew returned safely to Earth on
Apollo Applications Program of the Outer Solar System, and the original "Voyager program" of Mars Lander probes. The Apollo lunar base proposal saw an unmanned Saturn V used to land a shelter based on the Apollo Command/Service Module (CSM) on the Moon. A second Saturn V would carry a three-man crew and a modified CSM and Apollo Lunar Module (LM) to the Moon. The two-man excursion team would have a surface stay time of nearly 200 days and use of an advanced lunar rover and a lunar flier as well as logistics vehicles to construct a larger shelter. The isolation of the CSM