Dave Williams - Leadership Moments from NASA: Achieving the Impossible

Houston, Tranquility Base, the Eagle has landed. July 20, 1969 a day that will stand forever in history. With the advent of television, more people were watching the NASA lunar landing than any other event in history. It had been eight years since President John F. Kennedy proclaimed that NASA would send humans to the Moon and return them safely to Earth before the end of the decade. Not because it is easy, but because it is hard. With that proclamation began one of the most incredible stories of leadership, teamwork and risk management in history. It takes courage and a relentless commitment to excellence to achieve the impossible. Even with todays space exploration capabilities, many wonder how NASA was able to accomplish this seemingly impossible feat, successfully achieving Kennedys goal within the decade. It wasnt easy.

Many who dreamed of exploring space believed that it would be impossible. The televised Mercury, Gemini and Apollo missions and the many articles in LIFEand National Geographicmagazines captured the imaginations of the young and old. It was clear that there were risks associated with space exploration; to push the boundaries of the unknown was not something to be taken lightly. In January 1967, the crew of Apollo 1 perished. Not in space but on the launchpad, in a fire lasting 90 seconds. The crew trapped inside the Apollo capsule had no chance for survival and NASA suffered the first loss of a spaceflight crew. When asked about risk in December 1966, Commander Gus Grissom responded, You sort of have to put that out of your mind. Theres always a possibility that you can have a catastrophic failure, of course; this can happen on any flight; it can happen on the last one as well as the first one. So, you just plan as best you can to take care of all these eventualities, and you get a well-trained crew and you go fly. A month later he, Roger Chaffee and Ed White would perish in the tragic fire.