Review: Mission Control (2015)

For a long time, I could not find any book addressing the topic of mission control operations in a generic, conceptually satisfying and complete way. There is, of course, ample and excellent literature about the heroic days of the Mission Operations Control Rooms (MOCR) during Mercury, Gemini and Apollo. The best known examples are certainly Failure is not an option by E. F. Kranz, and Flight by C. C. Kraft.  Up until recently, however, I could not find any source that – for instance – compared human and robotic flight control operations, or how this important part of spaceflight was implemented over the years in the various spacefaring nations.

That’s why I got very curious when a few months ago I found out about Mission Control by M. P. Johnson. The objective of the book seemed to be spot on: describe and compare how flight control operations are performed at the Johnson Space Centre (JSC) in Houston, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena and – which I found very intriguing – the European Space Operations Centre (ESOC) in Darmstadt. In a heartbeat the book ended up in my shopping cart.

Well, I finally had the chance to read it through… and I have to admit I was disappointed. The basic idea is good and the author obviously went through considerable pains and research to uncover all the details presented. The overall analysis, however, turns out to be mostly superficial and, in more than one section, I found myself wondering why fairly uninteresting facts (like how the colour of the walls and carpets changed in the control rooms over time) got so much coverage – or, for that matter, any coverage at all. The narrative is also never really engaging and I felt more than once like reading a university essay or thesis.

In summary, I would give this book a 3/5. It is very clear that a lot of effort and passion went into its completion. It is unfortunately at least as clear that the author is no professional writer and, in some cases, lacks a deep understanding of the subject matter.