Categories: Uncategorized

Apollo 12 Cuff Checklists

One thing that impressed me in the movie Apollo 13 was their use of checklists: in a mission where little differences are actually big differences, there’s nothing like a checklist to take care of the things that our brains are bad at (accurately tracking long lists of procedures and data) and free our brains to do what they do best (evaluating, analyzing and reacting to changing situations). I should probably get in the habit of making more checklists.

The Apollo 12 Lunar Journal site has two PDFs showing two different mission checklists that were mounted on the cuffs of the astronaut’s suits: one for the command module [700K PDF — some poorly-photocopied nudity], and one for the lunar module [900K PDF — some poorly-photocopied nudity]. Not only do the checklists feature the standard tech stuff, they’ve also got some cartoons and photos of Playboy playmates. That sort of stuff wouldn’t fly today, but this was engineering culture in the ’60’s.

Joey deVilla

Recent Posts

“You had me at ‘grenade’” / “Show me the MAC-10!”

Clearly, I missed out by not watching the director’s cut of Jerry Maguire! But seriously —…

6 hours ago

Same energy

19 hours ago

MLK Day

Amidst all the noise of an incoming government that stands against everything he stood for,…

1 day ago

Florida Governor DeSantis’ latest attempt to enshittify higher education, starring Scott Yenor

One of the guys — and I do mean guys — who’s bound and determined…

2 days ago

Sunday picdump for January 19, 2024

It’s Sunday, which means it’s time for another “picdump!” Here are 118 memes, pictures, and…

3 days ago