Minute 119: Time to Bail Out

Neil Armstrong asks Blanch Lovell if Jim ever made Eagle Scout. “Yes, he did,” says Blanch. “He did?” says Neil. In the Lovell living room, Marilyn sits with family and friends and her pastor. “If the heatshield is even slightly cracked,” says a news anchor on TV, “the extreme cold could split it wide open. Worst of all, if the pyrotechnics for controlling the parachutes have been damaged, the chutes may not open at all causing the spacecraft to hit the water not at a gentle twenty miles per hour but at a suicidal three hundred.” Walter Cronkite narrates stock footage on telvision, saying, “Perhaps never in human history has the entire world been united by such a global drama. In New York city, thousands of people have gathered to watch updates to the mission in Times Square.” NBC’s Chet Huntley continued with the news, saying, “Many countries offered help. And the State Department said it would ask for it, if it were needed. The House and Senate passed resolutions calling on the American people to pray tonight for the astronauts.” “In Rome, Pope Paul led fifty thousand people in prayers for the safe return of the astronauts,” continued Cronkite. “In Jerusalem, prayers at the Wailing Wall – ” Back in Aquarius, Lovell talks to a shivering Fred Haise. “It’s about time to bail out of this ship, Freddo,” says Lovell. IN THIS MINUTE: Jean Speegle Howard as Blanch Lovell Mark Wheeler as Neil Armstrong Larry Williams as Buzz Aldrin Rance Howard as Priest Kathleen Quinlan as Marilyn Lovell Max Elliott Slade as Jay Lovell Chet Huntley as Himself Walter Cronkite as Himself Tom Hanks as Jim Lovell Bill Paxton as Fred Haise Bruce Wright as Anchor Ivan Allen as Anchor