Tom’s body was still slumped in place, held by the Nomex shoulder belts. His fire-retardant flight suit was only charred, and his blackened helmet was still on his head. The crew chief moved closer. What he saw inside the helmet made him quickly turn away.
The Harris County fire crew rolled up just as the Ellington medic was checking Tom’s body for vital signs. She looked up and shook her head at both crews. With no one to rescue, the urgent pace slowed and the two fire chiefs refocused their attention on maintaining the crash site for the accident investigators and awaiting the county coroner.
After calling the fire crews, the tower controller had next called NASA Ops, and the ops chief had scrambled a pickup truck with airframe techs to head to the scene. Luke had quickly landed the LLTV and come to stand, stunned, beside Kaz, each of them hoping for the best and fearing the worst. Kaz flagged down the NASA pickup on the way past, and he and Luke clambered into the back.
Luke looked ahead at the diminishing black plume, and then at Kaz. Holding on as the truck bounced over the uneven ground, Kaz yelled over the noise, “What did you see?”
“Only the smoke.”
Kaz nodded. They were both test pilots. Fatal crashes were a frequent part of the profession, which made understanding why one happened all-important. It also gave them something to focus on, which helped them deal with the personal tragedy and grief. “No use speculating until we know more,” Kaz said. “Hopefully Tom’s there to tell us.”
“Shit, Kaz, we’re only a month from launch.”
Kaz somberly held up crossed fingers.
The lack of action at the crash site told them the story before they’d even parked. The Ellington fire chief walked over to their truck, his face grave.
“The pilot was killed, I’m sorry to say. Because we’re off the base and on county land, I need you to stay clear until the police get here.” They heard a siren in the far distance. “That’ll be them now.”
Kaz, as senior rank present, turned to the NASA ops chief. “We need to get word right away to the Astronaut Office Chief, Center Director, Air Force Liaison Office, NASA HQ.” He glanced at Luke and briefly held his gaze. “And Tom’s family. Can I use your radio?”
They gathered in the Astronaut Office conference room, on the third floor of Building 4 at the Spacecraft Center. Every available astronaut was there, whether NASA or MOL, along with Gene Kranz and Dr. McKinley. Since Kaz had been at the crash site, Al Shepard asked him to speak first.
He took a deep breath. “As you’ve all heard, Tom Hoffman was killed this morning in a solo helo crash just east of Ellington. Luke and I were at the crash site twenty minutes after it happened, and could see no obvious cause.
“Luke is Tom’s designated Casualty Assistance Calls Officer, so he’s gone to the Hoffman house to stay with Margaret. I asked Doc McKinley to be here to speak to us, as he’s just been out to the site and talked with the county coroner.” Kaz nodded at JW.
“The coroner’s report will take a day or two, but there’s no doubt it was the impact that killed him. His back and neck were both broken, and it happened quick.” JW looked around, making eye contact. “There was a subsequent fire, but Tom was already gone.”
Several heads nodded. Death was new to no one in the room, and they all preferred to hear that it happened fast. They feared fire. When the Apollo 1 crew had burned to death in a plugs-out simulation six years previously, it had shaken everyone to the core.
Gene Kranz spoke up. “Gentlemen, this is a horrible day. We need to figure out why one of our training helicopters killed Tom, but we also have a launch scheduled for April 16. It’s a miserable thing, and I hate it, but the brutal truth is that this is why we have backup crews.”
He looked around the room for Al Shepard. “Management is extra-complex for Apollo 18, but we need a decision ASAP as to how the crews are going to be changed. As soon as that happens, we need to be ready to sprint.”
Shepard nodded, and Kranz drove his point home. “We need to get the new crew assigned, and then this whole center needs to work day and night to turn them into the team that will leave Earth for the Moon in thirty-one days.”
As the meeting broke up, Al Shepard gathered six of the astronauts in his office. After he closed the door, he said, “Guys, we have a lot to do, but let’s have thirty seconds of silence to honor Tom Hoffman.”
Some bowed their heads in prayer, and others stared into the distance. Kaz found himself painfully thinking about telling Tom that his face would be on a magazine cover. Not now, it wouldn’t.