RIP.
I think he got short shrift in the Apollo 13 movie (as did Milt Windler). Very smart guy, and he was arguably more responsible for getting them back than Kranz.
2 thoughts on “Glynn Lunney”
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RIP.
I think he got short shrift in the Apollo 13 movie (as did Milt Windler). Very smart guy, and he was arguably more responsible for getting them back than Kranz.
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I met him at a Texas Space Authority get-together back in the 90’s, and we had drinks together one evening. The movie Apollo 13 was in theaters at the time, so it naturally came up. He told me about moving the astronauts to the LM that first night, but with great modesty. He did say “I think that was the best work I ever did.”
A very nice gentleman, and, as you note, really smart. RIP.
As an aside, the guy who got the worst treatment in Apollo 13 was T.K. Mattingly. His portrayal bordered on character assassination. In real life, the entire crew found out about their possible exposure to measles during the flight surgeon’s part of a morning briefing. It was Mattingly who said, “I have to take myself off the prime crew, then, because I never had the measles.” He was in mission control in Houston for the launch, and films of him show him beaming and talking with excitement with other flight controllers.
In the film, Lovell informed him he had been bumped during a meeting of the prime crew only, and said that it was his call, not Deke Slayton’s. Mattingly acted almost like a petulant child. On launch day he was shown parking his Corvette on the beach, completely alone, forlornly watching the Saturn V fly away.
T.K. spent 3 days at Kelly Space back in the 90s, evaluating us in response to a job offer I had made him. He was the epitome of “an officer and a gentleman,” a consummate professional, smart as could be, and wicked funny. Gary Sinise got the professional part right, but nothing else. (T.K. opted to go to Universal Spacelines, partly because of Pete Conrad. But he gave us a fair shot.)