Happy Birthday to John Young!

[RonDVouz]

Everyone wish a happy 84th birthday to John Young, the bravest man to ever fly three NASA designed vehicles, two for the first time, and one of only three men to have visited the moon twice.

And his heart beat never went above 90 bpm during any launch.

Nerves of steel!

 

[Kyle]

IMO, John Young's greatest mission will always be STS-1. Happy Birthday to him!

 

[SolarLiner]

I guess we can say ...
*puts on sunglasses*
He is a grown man now.

All jokes aside, Happy Birthday, STS-1 pilot!

 

[Andy44]

IMO, John Young's greatest mission will always be STS-1. Happy Birthday to him!

In terms of achievement, I'd disagree.

But in terms of test pilot craziness, oh yeah. Especially the heart rate thing. I believe the term is "steely-eyed missile man".

---------- Post added at 01:45 PM ---------- Previous post was at 01:43 PM ----------

I'd put him right up there with Chuck Yeager on my list of "Old Guys One Does Not Mess With, Especially in Aerial Combat".

 

[RonDVouz]

"...anybody who thinks they can statistically predict when something with 2 million moving parts is gonna fail is sort of smoking something they shouldn't probably."

~John Young on STS-1 risk assessment

 

[llarian]

"...anybody who thinks they can statistically predict when something with 2 million moving parts is gonna fail is sort of smoking something they shouldn't probably."

~John Young on STS-1 risk assessment

Never did agree with him on this. Part of a career I once had (Field Engineer for NCR Canada) was doing exactly that ... statistical assessment for component failure, then try to argue for quality improvement based on those assessments. Young's views were similar to the bean counters. They didn't want to spend the money for the needed improvement.

But then I guess it depends on which end of the fire cracker you sit on. Young was on the pointy end. Blind faith is often all they have to go by.

I'll say this for similar speculative viewpoints such as Young's and those of bean counters, managers, et al ... ignoring the statistical assessment often leads to incidents such as Challenger and Columbia.

For what it's worth..

 

[RonDVouz]

Except what he meant by this statement was STS-1 had to be flown manually, there was no unmanned tests on this. He was listening to "experts" explain why it "statistically" wasn't going to blow up (or how you could pound the thermal tiles with a baseball bat and they wouldn't come off) and this was him calling BS to that.

 

[richfororbit]

I never remember this Astronaut's mission to the moon, never.

Commander Young yes, but that is it for me.:huh:

 

[RonDVouz]

John Young was first to fly the Gemini capsule with the late Gus Grissom, also it was the first time humans were placed on the Atlas booster, which prior testing showed that 1 in 3 blew up on the pad. Then he flew as CMP on Apollo 10, Commander of Apollo 16 (having flown the CSM and the LM) and commander of the first flight of the mighty Columbia.

He's basically flown nearly everything NASA's ever built.

 

[boogabooga]

Gemini went up on Titan II.

 

[Codz]

He's certainly one of the greatest astronauts NASA's aver sent up.

 

[GLS]

... ever fly three NASA designed vehicles...

Sorry the nitpicking but actually it was 4. :thumbup:

There are some interesting quotes from this great person, but there's a little-known one I like a lot, that he said in some old documentary that I managed to find: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6j0nb_sSzA#t=2776
(ignore the channel's name and most other videos)

 

[Linguofreak]

In terms of achievement, I'd disagree.

Likewise.

In terms of the "You came in that thing? You're braver than I thought!" factor, however, it probably was his greatest mission, for many of the same reasons that it lacked in achievement.

 

[Andy44]

Gemini didn't fly on Atlas, it flew on Titan II. And, yeah, I guess it's 4 vehicles if you count the CSM and LM separately.

There is documentary footage of Young sitting in on a briefing during the Apollo 13 crisis and he is smoking a pipe, calm as can be. For some reason that image sticks in my mind. I've never been a tobacco user of any kind, but a pipe in the modern day almost seems a professorial anachronism. And it's not like you could ever get away with calling Young a hipster, either. More like the Gandalf of Coolheaded Pilots.

 

[RonDVouz]

Ahh, you're right. I stand corrected. It was a Titan missile.

And I suppose you could could the LM separate from the CSM, I don't though.

 

[ex-orbinaut]

Many happy returns!

 

[Aeadar]

Happy Birthday John Young!

it was the first time humans were placed on the Atlas booster

The first to ride an Atlas booster.


Why not count the CSM and the LM separately? They were, in fact separate vehicles.

 

[Ravenous]

"...anybody who thinks they can statistically predict when something with 2 million moving parts is gonna fail is sort of smoking something they shouldn't probably."

~John Young on STS-1 risk assessment

He's also said to have stated about STS-1, where someone suggested doing the flight as an abort test (RTLS) - "Let's not play Russian Roulette" or something similar!:lol:

Apparently, that is. I have searched for a record of this quote many times, but haven't been able to find one...

 

[RonDVouz]

He had one about NASA telling him it was possible to hit the thermal tiles with a baseball bat and it wouldn't damage them, then they sent Enterprise up on another approach and landing test and hundreds of tiles just flew off. He really did play Russian Roulette on that launch.

Heart rate was 94 bpm at launch, Bob Crippen's was 140.