Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #106094 in Books
• Published on: 2001-05
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 416 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
In 1957, the Russians launched Sputnik and the ensuing space race. Three years later, Gene Kranz left his aircraft testing job to join NASA and champion the American cause. What he found was an embryonic department run by whizz kids (such as himself), sharp engineers and technicians who had to create the Mercury mission rules and procedures from the ground up. As he says, "Since there were no books written on the actual methodology of space flight, we had to write them as we went along".

Kranz was part of the mission control team that, in January 1961, launched a chimpanzee into space and successfully retrieved him and made Alan Shepard the first American in space in May 1961. Just two months later they launched Gus Grissom for a space orbit, John Glenn orbited Earth three times in February 1962, and in May 1963 Gordon Cooper completed the final Project Mercury launch with 22 Earth orbits. And through them all, and the many Apollo missions that followed, Gene Kranz was one of the integral inside men--one of those who bore the responsibility for the Apollo 1 tragedy and the leader of the "tiger team" that saved the Apollo 13 astronauts.

Moviegoers know Gene Kranz through Ed Harris's Oscar-nominated portrayal of him in Apollo 13, but Kranz provides a more detailed insider's perspective in his book Failure Is Not an Option. You see NASA through his eyes, from its primitive days when he first joined up, through the 1993 shuttle mission to repair the Hubble Space Telescope, his last mission control project. His memoir, however, is not high literature. Kranz has many accomplishments and honours to his credit, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom, but this is his first book, and he's not a polished author. There are, perhaps, more behind-the-scenes details and more paragraphs devoted to what Cape Canaveral looked like than the general public demands. If, however, you have a long-standing fascination with aeronautics, if you watched Apollo 13 and wanted more, Failure Is Not an Option will fit the bill. --Stephanie Gold

Customer Reviews

Be Tough and Competent!
Gene Kranz does an amazing of showing what people can do if they have the right leadership, teamwork, commitment and passion.

The book allows us to see Kranz's perspective as flight controller, (and later flight director) during his tenure on the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo space programs and beyond.

From the tremendous successes, to the gut wrenching failures, to the heroism, to the practical jokes, this book has it all. Gene Kranz was a key player in helping to create a culture of Tough and Competent flight controllers who had discipline and morale. They knew the true meaning of teamwork.

One of the stories that impressed me most was after the devastating tragedy of the Apollo 1. A fire on the pad killed Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffe while they were training in the capsule. Afterwards Kranz got in front of his flight controllers and said:

"Spaceflight will never tolerate carelessness, incapacity, and neglect. Somewhere, somehow, we screwed up. It could have been the design, build, or test. Whatever it was we should have caught it."

Kranz and his people (as well as everyone else on the space program) took responsibility for their actions and went on to amazing successes. We crawled out the cradle of this home we call earth and explored another world. Twelve men in all walked on the moon. Also, three astronauts were brought back home safely from the brink of disaster in Apollo 13. We had truly gone where no man had gone before.

These were human beings, and they are the best of the best. Not an Astronaut was lost during any of the following Apollo missions. The tragedy on the pad drove the commitment of everyone on the space program to an entirely new level. As a matter of fact, not a man was lost once they left earth on the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo programs.

Gene Kranz sums up how he gained his skills to be a top flight director when he said:

"The flight director's ultimate training comes at the console, working real problems, facing the risks, making irrevocable decisions."


This book belongs on any bookshelf, but not to be looked at, but to be read and understood. We all have the makings of greatness, we just have to take responsibility for our actions and do the very best we know how. What other amazing things can we accomplish as a species if we have the right leadership, teamwork, commitment, and passion?

The Re-Discovery of Common Sense: A Guide To: The Lost Art of Critical Thinking

Absolutely Brilliant
Eugene Kranz is an unsung hero. Maybe most people are familiar with Ed Harris's portrayal of him in Apollo 13 but the man was around from the beginning of the space programme. We've already forgetten, all too easily, what an astonishing achievement NASA completed with the space programme in terms of technology. We forget also that the staff there literally invented the rules as they went along. But apart from all the engineering and science, there is the incredible way that they stood up to the pressure not just on the Apollo 13 mission but in other situations. In the thick of it all is Eugene Kranz. These days people in the UK are stupid enough to vote Queenie and Robbie Williams as the most important Britains ever. As an antidote read this and focus on someone who deserves our admiration.

Fascinating behind the scenes account
Gene Kranz was one of the original band of NASA flight directors, some readers may remember he was played by a white waistcoat-wearing Ed Harris in the film about Apollo 13. This book is for those of us that are slightly geeky with regards to the Space Race in as far as this is a technical and detailed account of what took place in the Mission Control Room while the mission was in progress. It is not a riveting read by any stretch of the imagination but it does offer the interested reader another take Mercury, Gemini and Apollo. Gene Kranz is unashamedly patriotic and God-fearing with a slight propensity to describe almost all of his colleagues as all American heroes. Nevertheless, afficionados of this era of space exploration will find a lot in this book.