Apollo 12 launched and was struck by lightning twice

Rain was falling over Cape Kennedy on November 14, 1969, but Apollo 12 lifted off on schedule. Its own exhaust plume, trailing a column of ionized gas to the ground, acted like a giant lightning rod.

At 36.5 seconds after liftoff, a bolt struck the rising Saturn V; a second hit at about 52 seconds, knocking the three fuel cells offline and lighting the cabin with alarms. Telemetry to Mission Control dissolved into garbage data.

The fix came from a 24-year-old flight controller, John Aaron, who calmly radioed three now-legendary words: “SCE to Aux.”

Lunar Module pilot Alan Bean found the obscure switch, restored the data, and the mission pressed on. Days later, Conrad and Bean landed in the Ocean of Storms, a precise touchdown beside the Surveyor 3 probe. A near-disaster in the first minute became one of NASA’s finest displays of cool problem-solving.