Name: Failure is not an option
ISBN: 9781439148815

Failure is not an option

"Kranz was flight director for both Apollo 11, the mission in which Neil Armstrong fulfilled President Kennedy's pledge, and Apollo 13. He headed the Tiger Team that had to figure out how to bring the three Apollo 13 astronauts safely back to Earth. (In the film Apollo 13, Kranz was played by the actor Ed Harris, who earned an Academy Award nomination for his performance.)". "In Failure Is Not an Option, Gene Kranz recounts these historic events and offers new information about the famous flights. What appeared as nearly flawless missions to the Moon were, in fact, a series of hair-raising near misses. When the space technology failed, as it sometimes did, the controllers' only recourse was to rely on their skills and those of their teammates. Kranz takes us inside Mission Control and introduces us to some of the whiz kids - still in their twenties, only a few years out of college - who had to figure it all out as they went along, creating a great and daring enterprise. He reveals behind-the-scenes details to demonstrate the leadership, discipline, trust, and teamwork that made the space program a success."--BOOK JACKET.

What Hacker News says

TwelveEyesAug 2026

Decided to check this book out because of this and it is actually extremely interesting. Thank you for mentioning it. Have you ever read “Failure is not an option” by Gene Kranz? It’s about turning NASA into a fully functioning organisation, and your book reminded me of it.

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donatjMay 2025

About ten years ago I became fascinated with the Venusian landings. I've read a fair number of books about the US space program, including the great "Failure Is Not an Option", and I was kind of surprised to not find many English language books detailing the Soviet programs, and particularly the Venus missions.

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somenameformeFeb 2025

You're doing some improv here based on your intuition when history has a way of surprising us. So what was the "actual" failure analysis and risk percent? It didn't exist. "Mathematical risk analysis was used in Apollo, but it gave unacceptably pessimistic results and was discontinued." [1]

Of course there were working assessments internally and they generally put the figure at about 50%. That figure is from Gene Krantz's excellent book "Failure Is Not an Option." The reason you go is because you cannot find any other practical way to significantly reduce the risk, and are willing to accept the risk you end up with.

Also I feel you're somewhat denigrating the astronauts with your comment by saying their estimations weren't "real". These weren't just adrenaline junkies looking for a wild ride - they were extreme intellectual outliers with higher degrees in aerospace engineering and extensive backgrounds in the development and application/flight of all sorts of aerospace systems. Like that paper also mentions, "The only possible explanation for the astonishing success [of the Apollo Program] – no losses in space and on time – was that every participant at every level in every area far exceeded the norm of human capabilities."

[1] - https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/20190002249/downloads/20...

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tuetnsuppeJan 2025

Failure is not an Option by Gene Kranz, Flight Director of Apollo 11 and Apollo 13 among other missions give a lot of insight into the preparation and focus of safety critical operations.

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stonlybJan 2025

81. Failure is Not an Option by Gene Kranz

82. Mrs. P’s Journey by Phyllis Pearsall

83. River of Doubt by Candice Millard

84. Longitude by Dava Sobel

85. Dreaming in Code by Scott Rosenberg

86. The Last Viking - A biography of Roald Amundsen

87. The Wager by David Grann

88. Simply Fly by Captain G. R. Gopinath

89. Engines That Move Markets by Alasdair G. M. Nairn

90. The Education of Cyrus by Xenophon

91. Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War by Robert Coram

92. Madhouse at the End of the Earth by Julian Sancton

93. How to Make a Spaceship by Julian Guthrie

94. West with the Night by Beryl Markham

95. The Age of Uncertainty by Tobias Hürter

96. American Steel by Richard Preston

97. Showstopper by G. Pascal Zachary

98. Eccentric Orbits by John Bloom

99. The Great Bridge by David McCullough

100. Loonshots by Safi Bahcall

101. The Art of Doing Science and Engineering by Richard Hamming

102. Where Wizards Stay Up Late by Katie Hafner

103. The Evening Star by Henry S. F. Cooper

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fluxflexerDec 2024

Depending how deep you want to dive into this rabbit-hole:

-How Apollo flew to the Moon: https://amzn.eu/d/1QtsN1D Covers in my opinion all aspects of the Apollo/Saturn programme, including design, technology, procedures and a lot of history as well. A must read if you are interested in such things

-Moon Lander https://amzn.eu/d/bI3wpt7 Memoire of Thomas Kelly the chief engineer for the Lunar Lander. Gives great insights of the technical and management challenges while desiging the first "true" spaceship. Highly recommendet!

-Digital Apollo: https://amzn.eu/d/0KigTU9 Focuses on software development (actually an afterthought to hardware development) for the Command Module and the Moon Lander and on the important aspect how much controll should be given to the astronauts against automatic systems. Includes a very detailed analysis of the software alarms that almost compromised the first moon landing.

-Failure Is Not An Option: https://amzn.eu/d/ix6CWnq The memoir of the Gene Kranz, the tough, no bullshit flight controller pictured in the Apollo 13 movie. Kranz was a key player in the manned space program for decades. Here we learn that almost each moon mission had critical moments and had to be saved by the teams at mission controll and the astronauts.

Other interesting books: -Moon Launch: https://amzn.eu/d/1Z6U5f6 on Saturn Apollo Launch Operations -Sunburst and Apollo: https://amzn.eu/d/2ms3IW8 a personal memoire of one of the software designers for the LM computer

Hope there is something interesting for you in the list.

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