Apollo 1

On January 27, 1967, Apollo 1 was in its launch pad in Cape Canaveral and the Mission Control was ready to guide the Apollo. The objective of the Apollo 1 was to test the CM (Command Module) and this operation would be the first manned Apollo Mission. The crew of the Apollo (Virgil I. Grissom, Edward H. White, and Roger Chaffee) was in the command module, making final preparations for the launch. After about five hours in the module, due to delays and problems, a fire broke out into the command capsule where the crewmembers were. The people guiding the launch were able to tell that there was a fire in the cockpit from the bio-telemetry sensors attached to the crewmembers and ordered the hatch to the module to be opened. However, it took five minutes to open the hatch because it was bolted shut. By the time the hatch was open, the crew died of asphyxiation. The cause of the fire was determined to be a spark from a bad wire in the command module, which contains a 100% oxygen environment inside. This was clearly a great disaster for the Apollo Missions that would greatly affect the next Apollo missions.

After the disaster of Apollo 1, NASA became a little more cautious about the materials of the ship, design, and the actual procedures for testing the Apollo's. In fact, Apollo missions two and three were never launched and Apollo missions four, five, and six became unmanned missions.