page_title: Skylab controversy
section_title: Effects
hierarchical_section_title: Skylab controversy / Effects
caption_attribution_description: English: Figure 3-2. Performance lapses for time in bed (TIB) over 14 days of sleep restriction.
context_page_description: A work slowdown, characterized by some writers as the Skylab strike, Skylab mutiny or the Skylab controversy, was instigated during some or all of December 28, 1973 by the crew of Skylab 4—the last of the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Skylab missions. According to Michael Hiltzik, the three astronauts, Gerald P. Carr, Edward G. Gibson, and William R. Pogue, turned off radio communications with NASA ground control and spent time relaxing and looking at the Earth before resuming communication with NASA, refusing communications from mission control during this period. Once communications resumed, there were discussions between the crew and NASA. The mission continued for several more weeks before the crew returned to Earth in 1974. The 84-day mission was Skylab's last crew, and the last time American astronauts set foot in a space station for two decades, until Shuttle–Mir in the 1990s.
  The event, which the involved astronauts have joked about, has been extensively studied as a case study in various fields of endeavor including space medicine, team management, and psychology.
context_section_description: At the time, only the crew of Skylab 3 had spent six weeks in space. It was unknown what had happened psychologically. NASA carefully worked with crew's requests, reducing their workload for the next six weeks. The incident took NASA into an unknown realm of concern in the selection of astronauts, still a question as humanity considers human missions to Mars or returning to the Moon.
  After the incident, there were many attempts to either determine the cause or downplay what happened. Nevertheless, lessons learned focused on balancing workload with crew psychology and stress level. One factor that affects disaster planning is the process of lessons learned from past incidents. Two contrasting pressures are the desire to hide a problem to avoid issues such as reprimands versus the honest evaluation of the issue to prevent future occurrences.
  Among the complicating factors was the interplay between management and subordinates (see also Apollo 1 fire and Challenger disaster). On Skylab 4, one problem was that the crew was pushed even harder as they fell behind on their workload, creating an increasing level of stress. Even though none of the astronauts returned to space, there was only one more NASA spaceflight in the decade and Skylab was the first and last American space station. NASA was planning larger space stations but its budget shrank considerably after the Moon landings, and the Skylab orbital workshop was the only major execution of Apollo Applications projects.
  Though the final Skylab mission became known for the incident, it was also known for the large amount of work that was accomplished in the long mission. Skylab orbited for six more years before its orbit decayed in 1979 due to higher-than-anticipated solar activity. The next U.S. spaceflight was the Apollo–Soyuz Test Project conducted in July 1975, and after a human spaceflight gap, the first Space Shuttle orbital flight STS-1.
  The described events were considered a significant example of "us" versus "them" syndrome in space medicine. Crew psychology has been a point of study for Mars analog missions such as Mars-500, with a particular focus on crew behavior triggering a mission failure or other issues. One of the impacts of the incident is the requirement that at least one member of the International Space Station crew be a space veteran (not be on a first flight).
  The 84-day stay of the Skylab 4 mission was a human spaceflight record that was not exceeded for over two decades by a NASA astronaut. The 96-day Soviet Salyut 6 EO-1 mission broke Skylab 4's record in 1978.
caption: Figure 3-2. Performance lapses for time in bed (TIB) over 14 days of sleep restriction.[17]
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