Marooned (film)

Marooned is a 1969 Eastmancolor American film directed by John Sturges and starring Gregory Peck, Richard Crenna, David Janssen, James Franciscus, and Gene Hackman. It was based on the 1964 novel Marooned by Martin Caidin. While the original novel was based on the singlepilot Mercury program, the film depicted an Apollo CommandService Module with three astronauts and a space station resembling Skylab. Caidin acted as technical adviser and updated the novel, incorporating appropriate material from the original version.

Three American astronauts commander Jim Pruett Richard Crenna, Buzz Lloyd Gene Hackman, and Clayton Stoney Stone James Franciscus are the first crew of an experimental space station on an extended duration mission. While returning to Earth, the main engine on the Apollo spacecraft Ironman One fails. Mission Control determines that Ironman does not have enough backup thruster capability to initiate atmospheric reentry, or to redock with the station and wait for rescue. The crew is marooned in orbit.NASA debates whether a rescue flight can reach the crew before their oxygen runs out in approximately two days. There are no backup launch vehicles or rescue systems available at Kennedy Space Center and NASA director Charles Keith Peck opposes using an experimental Air Force XRV lifting body that would be launched on a Titan IIIC booster neither the spacecraft nor the booster is manrated, and there is insufficient time to put a new manned NASA mission together. Even though a booster is already on the way to nearby Cape Canaveral Air Force Station for an alreadyscheduled Air Force launch, many hundreds of hours of preparation, assembly, and testing would be necessary. ........

Source: Wikipedia