Originally posted by dansamy Looking up his illness during Apollo 13. He developed a kidney infection due to the dehydration & rosining they had to do. That man is a walking, breathing, living miracle. Both of luck & amazing scientific ingenuity. Those men shouldn't have made it back. Any one of a number of tiny changes would have spelled death for them. I am, and have been for 20+ years, completely awe struck by that mission.
Yes, that's one amazing true story (and film). Something similar would be Shackleton's Imperial trans-antarctic expedition 1914-1917. With their ship being crushed by the ice, Shackleton and his men were stranded on the pack ice. Low on food they hauled their massive lifeboats along for many miles, then made a perilous journey in the open boats across the rough Antarctic ocean to reach Elephant Island, little more than a barren rock. Picking five of his best men and leaving the rest to stay in a little make-shift shelter, he ventured out into the ocean and in one of the greatest feats of navigation in the history of seafaring, managed to steer his little lifeboat 1,300 km through occasionally hurricane force winds to South Georgia. There they landed on the Southern coast but in order to reach the whaling stations on the north coast, had to make another 36 hour journey, travelling 32 miles through the rough interior of the island, crossing glaciers and crevasses, climbing down through a waterfall etc. - a feat that to this day has not been repeated.
Afterwards they went back with help and rescued the others - every single expedition member survived. It's very much like the Apollo 13 mission - none of them should've survived this ordeal, but they all did.
There is a saying about explorers:
"For scientific discovery give me Scott;
for speed and efficiency of travel give me Amundsen;
but when disaster strikes and all hope is gone, get down on your knees and pray for Shackleton."
There is a well written and
highly interesting series of articles about this expedition on
Cool Antarctica.
Last edited by FantasticMrFox; 11-30-2015 at 06:33 PM.