After the first stage was finished, the S-II second stage began to have its own problems. Engine number two (of five) had problems 225 seconds after liftoff. It got worse at 319 seconds, and then at 412 seconds the engine shut down. Two seconds later Engine Number Three shut down as well. The onboard computer was able to make changes and the other engines burned for 58 seconds longer than normal. The S-IVB third stage also had to burn for 29 seconds longer than usual. The S-IVB also did not work properly.
The S-IC first stage crashed back to Earth in the Atlantic Ocean east of Florida (), while the S-II second stage crashed south of the Azores ().
Because of the launch problems, the rocket did not reach the planned height. After two orbits, the third stage, S-IVB would not restart. It was decided to use the Apollo Service Module engines to get the spacecraft into a higher orbit, as had been done in Apollo 4. It burned for 442 seconds (longer than it would ever fire on a lunar mission) to get to the planned height. There was not enough fuel to speed up the atmospheric reentry. The spacecraft only entered the atmosphere at a speed of instead of the planned of a lunar return. However, this had been demonstrated on Apollo 4.
Ten hours after launch, it landed from the planned touchdown point in the North Pacific Ocean north of Hawaii, and was lifted on board the USS "Okinawa".
The S-IVB's orbit slowed three weeks later, and it re-entered the atmosphere on April 25, 1968.
Although Apollo 6 did not reach the speeds in either direction, it was considered successful enough to fly astronauts on the next Saturn V. This would orbit the Moon instead of the planned Earth orbit for Apollo 8. Instead, the next flight, Apollo 7, which did not use a Saturn V, tested a manned Apollo module in Earth orbit.
The cause of the vibrations during the first stage of the flight was well known. However, it had been thought that the rocket had been 'detuned'. The solution was to add helium gas to the pipes and pumps to act as a shock absorber. This did not completely fix the vibration problem, and it caused the engines to shut down on the Apollo 13 flight.
A fuel pipe carrying liquid hydrogen had broken because of the vibration, caused the two engines in the second stage to stop working. The engines were burning just liquid oxygen which caused them to overheat. This led to the engines shutting down. The liquid oxygen supply was turned off which then meant engine three was shut down as well. The problem was fixed by replacing a flexible section of pipe with a loop of stainless steel pipe.
The join between the Saturn V and the Apollo modules had a honeycomb like cell structure. The cells expanded because of trapped water and air as the rocket got faster. The solution was to drill small holes in the surface to allow for the expansion.
Documentary movies often show a Saturn V launch, and one of the most used pieces shows the interstage between the first and second stages falling away. This is usually said to be from the Apollo 11 mission, but it was actually filmed on the flights of Apollo 4 and Apollo 6.
The high speed cameras were dropped from the rocket soon after the first stage separation. They re-entered the atmosphere and were parachuted to the ocean, where they floated. Only one of the two S-II cameras on Apollo 6 was found.
Another launch shot often said to be Apollo 11 was shot on this day. It shows the rocket lifting up, positioned relatively close up and dead center. The shot can be identified as Apollo 6 as it had a white Apollo module; all the others were silver.
There was little press coverage of the Apollo 6 mission. On the same day as the launch, Martin Luther King, Jr. was shot and killed in Memphis, Tennessee, and President Johnson had announced he would not seek re-election only four days before.
The Apollo 6 Command Module is on display at the Fernbank Science Center, in Atlanta, Georgia.
Hurricane Ernesto (2012)
Hurricane Ernesto is an Atlantic tropical cyclone that went across Jamaica and then cut through the Mexican Yucatán Peninsula as a hurricane. The storm later made landfall in southeastern Mexico and caused several deaths over the area. The storm was born August 1, 2012 and died August 10 over south central Mexico.
Édouard Herriot
Édouard Herriot (July 5, 1872 – March 26, 1929) was a French politician of the Third Republic.
Bonar Bain
Bonar Stewart Bain (born February 4, 1923 – February 18, 2005) was a Canadian actor. He was the identical twin brother of actor Conrad Bain, who starred in Diff'rent Strokes as Phillip Drummond. He once played a fictional “evil” twin to Conrad (“Hank Bain”) in an episode of "SCTV". He also portrayed Arthur's (Conrad Bain) twin brother Arnold on "Maude".
Bain was born on February 4, 1923 in Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada to Jean Agnes Young and to Stafford Harrison Bain. He was married to Vella Bain until his death in 2005. Bain died on February 18, 2005 in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, from cancer, aged 82.
Charles Durning
Charles Edward Durning (February 28, 1923 - December 24, 2012) was an American actor.
Durning was born in Highland Falls, New York on February 28, 1923, the ninth of ten children. His three brothers James (Roger) (1915–2000), Clifford (1916–1994),and Gerald Durning (born 1926), and his sister Frances (born 1919) survived to adulthood, but five sisters lost their lives to scarlet fever and smallpox as children. His mother, Louise (née Leonard; 1894–1982), was a laundress at West Point, and his father, James Durning (1883 – c. 1939), was an Irish immigrant. His mother was also born in Ireland.
Durning was raised Catholic. He fought during World War II. He was married to Carole Doughty from 1959 until they divorced in 1972. He was legally separated from his second wife, Mary Ann (Amelio) Durning, in 2010. He is survived by his three children from his first marriage.
Referred to as "the King of Character Actors", Durning began his career in 1951. While working as an usher in a burlesque joint, he was hired to replace a drunken actor onstage. Subsequently, he performed in some 50 stock company productions and in various off-Broadway plays. He attracted the attention of Joseph Papp. Beginning in 1961, he appeared in 35 plays as part of the New York Shakespeare Festival. "That time in my life was my best time," Durning told Pittsburgh's Post Gazette in 2001. "I had no money at all, and he (Joseph Papp) didn't pay much. You were getting a salary for performance plus a rehearsal salary. We would do three plays in Central Park for the summer. And then you'd do three to six plays every year down on Lafayette Street -- new plays by new writers: Sam Shepard, David Mamet, David Rabe, John Ford Noonan, Jason Miller".
In slack periods between acting jobs, Durning taught ballroom dancing at the Fred Astaire Dance Studio in New York City.
A bit later, Durning moved into television and movies. He made his film debut in 1965, playing in "Harvey Middleman, Fireman". He appeared in John Frankenheimer's "I Walk the Line" (1970) starring Gregory Peck, two Brian De Palma movies, "Hi, Mom!" (1970), credited as Charles Durnham, with Robert De Niro and "Sisters" (1973). He also appeared in "Dealing: Or the Berkeley-to-Boston Forty-Brick Lost-Bag Blues" (1972) with Barbara Hershey and John Lithgow.