{"id":16269,"date":"2015-06-11T19:32:57","date_gmt":"2015-06-11T11:32:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/jack-king-voice-of-nasa-dies-at-84\/"},"modified":"2015-06-11T19:32:57","modified_gmt":"2015-06-11T11:32:57","slug":"jack-king-voice-of-nasa-dies-at-84","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/jack-king-voice-of-nasa-dies-at-84\/","title":{"rendered":"Jack King, \u2018Voice of NASA,\u2019 dies at 84"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>STORY WRITTEN FOR&nbsp;CBS NEWS&nbsp;&amp; USED WITH PERMISSION<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_6884\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-6884\" style=\"width: 623px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-6884\" src=\"http:\/\/spaceflightnow.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/as12-0255-jack-king-369c-147b.jpg\" alt=\"Jack King provided launch countdown commentary for every U.S. human spaceflight mission from Gemini 4 through Apollo 15, with one exception. He is seen here inside the firing room at the Kennedy Space Center's Launch Control Center during the countdown for Apollo 12. Credit: NASA\" width=\"623\" height=\"502\" srcset=\"https:\/\/spaceflightnow.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/as12-0255-jack-king-369c-147b.jpg 1399w, https:\/\/spaceflightnow.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/as12-0255-jack-king-369c-147b-300x242.jpg 300w, https:\/\/spaceflightnow.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/as12-0255-jack-king-369c-147b-768x619.jpg 768w, https:\/\/spaceflightnow.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/as12-0255-jack-king-369c-147b-1024x826.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 623px) 100vw, 623px\"><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-6884\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jack King provided launch countdown commentary for every U.S. human spaceflight mission from Gemini 4 through Apollo 15, with one exception. He is seen here inside the firing room at the Kennedy Space Center\u2019s Launch Control Center during the countdown for Apollo 12. Credit: NASA<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>John W. \u201cJack\u201d King, the calm, reassuring \u201cVoice of NASA\u201d who held the world riveted as he counted down&nbsp;the final seconds of the Apollo 11 launch to the moon, died Thursday after a long illness. He was 84.<\/p>\n<p>The cause was congestive heart failure, according to his family.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt was a very peaceful passing for him,\u201d said daughter Beth King Post. \u201cHe was really an amazing person, not only professionally, but personally.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>A veteran Associated Press reporter, King was chief of the public information office at the time of the Apollo 11 launch in July 1969 and as such had the responsibility for countdown commentary through liftoff, describing critical events for journalists and the public alike.<\/p>\n<p>As the countdown ticked into its final tense moments, King calmly noted the rush of events leading up to ignition of the mighty Saturn 5 booster\u2019s five first stage engines.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cT-minus 60 seconds and counting. We have passed T-minus 60. Fifty-five seconds and counting. Neil Armstrong just reported back: \u2018It\u2019s been a real smooth countdown.\u2019 We\u2019ve passed the 50-second mark. Power transfer is complete, we\u2019re on internal power with the launch vehicle at this time. Forty seconds away from the Apollo 11 lift-off.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Finally, the moment of truth arrived.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTwenty seconds and counting,\u201d King said from the firing room. \u201cT-minus 15 seconds, guidance is internal. Twelve, 11, 10, 9, ignition sequence start, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, zero, all engines running, liftoff! We have a lift-off, 32 minutes past the hour. Lift off on Apollo 11.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"678\" height=\"509\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/zGNryrsT7OI?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>By some estimates, more than a billion people heard his commentary during live broadcasts and subsequent replays.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think he did a great job,\u201d said Hugh Harris, one of King\u2019s successors and a familiar voice during space shuttle launchings. Despite King\u2019s seemingly calm demeanor, Harris said he could hear a catch in his voice just before launch, a \u201crecognition that this was something special in the history of spaceflight.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cRight before when he says \u2018all engines running,\u2019 there was sort of a catch there, and you had a feeling he was thinking \u2018this is really going to go!\u2019 Harris said. \u201cHe did a great job.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>King managed press operations at NASA\u2019s Florida spaceport for 12 years, serving as the voice of launch control for \u201cvirtually every human mission from Gemini 4 to Apollo 15,\u201d NASA said on the Kennedy Space Center web page.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe biggest PR job I had to do was with our own people in order to get information that I could pass out to the news media,\u201d King said in a NASA oral history. \u201cThese were the early days when things were just starting out.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Born in Boston, King graduated from Boston College and moved to Florida in 1958 to serve as Cape Canaveral bureau chief for The Associated Press. He later went to work for NASA during the pioneering Mercury program.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"678\" height=\"509\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/vU3k04j_mYs?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>King later moved to Houston to direct public affairs at what became the Johnson Space Center and helped negotiate arrangements for the first live television broadcast of a Russian launch as part of the Apollo-Soyuz Test Program.<\/p>\n<p>In 1975, King left NASA to serve as director of public affairs for the U.S. Energy Research and Development Administration and in 1977 went to work for Armand Hammer and Occidental International Corporation. After Hammer\u2019s death in 1990, King held a variety of top-level public affairs positions before attempting to retire.<\/p>\n<p>But in 1996, King decided to keep working and joined United Space Alliance, a partnership between Lockheed Martin and Boeing that was responsible for processing space shuttles for launch. He retired for good in 2010 but continued to serve as a public affairs volunteer during major launch events.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe was one of the pioneers as far as public affairs was concerned,\u201d Harris said. \u201cHe developed many of the ways (NASA works) with the media (today and) he was very close to many of the reporters. He was one of a kind.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>King\u2019s wife of 39 years, Evelyn, died in 2005. He is survived by his daughter, Beth King Post, his son Chip King and five grandchildren.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>STORY WRITTEN FOR&nbsp;CBS NEWS&nbsp;&amp; USED WITH PERMISSION Jack King provided launch countdown commentary for every U.S. human spaceflight mission from Gemini 4 through Apollo 15, with one exception. He is seen here inside the firing room at the Kennedy Space Center\u2019s Launch Control Center during the countdown for Apollo 12. Credit: NASA John W. \u201cJack\u201d [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1758,4028,190,4029],"class_list":["post-16269","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-apollo-11","tag-jack-king","tag-nasa","tag-space-history"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16269"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16269"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16269\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16269"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16269"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16269"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}