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About Jonathan H. Ward
Jonathan brings a unique perspective to his writing that marries a systems view of the topic, fascination with the technology, passion for space exploration, and deep respect for the people who make it all happen. He holds an MS in Systems Management from the University of Denver and a BS in Psychology from Virginia Commonwealth University. He is professionally certified as an executive coach by the International Coach Federation and serves on the adjunct faculty at the Center for Creative Leadership. His professional experience includes extensive work with leadership teams and several years with Boeing on the Space Station Freedom program.
Jonathan and his wife Jane now reside in Greensboro, North Carolina. He is fiercely proud of his two grown children and their families, and he wishes they lived closer to him. He maintains web sites at www.apollo-saturn.com and www.apollolaunchcontrol.com to document his research on the Apollo era at Kennedy Space Center. He collects and restores artifacts from the Apollo era, including several control panels from the Firing Rooms. Jonathan also notes that he might possibly be the only current author about Apollo who has appeared on two GRAMMY-winning albums, which were recorded during his years as a Bass II section leader, soloist, and eventually president of The Washington Chorus.
Jonathan's current book is "Bringing Columbia Home: The Final Mission of a Lost Space Shuttle and Her Crew," co-authored with former Space Shuttle Launch Director Mike Leinbach. The book will be published by Skyhorse Publishing in January 2018.
Jonathan's previous two books, "Rocket Ranch: The Nuts and Bolts of the Apollo Moon Program at Kennedy Space Center," and "Countdown to a Moon Launch: Preparing Apollo for Its Historic Journey" were published by Springer-Praxis in 2015. The books have been widely acclaimed in the space history community for their unique perspective--frequently in the everyday workers' own words--on the heroic behind-the-scenes efforts needed to send Apollo to the Moon.
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Author Updates
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Blog postMike Leinbach, the final Launch Director of the Space Shuttle Program, and the last man to give the “go for launch” for a crewed US mission from Kennedy Space Center, returned to his old stamping grounds on May 25. He was invited by SpaceX management to meet with the SpaceX launch team and answer any questions they might have about what it’s like to launch humans into orbit.
The testing and launch countdowns for the final decade of Space Shuttle launches were run from Firing Room 4 in9 months ago Read more -
Blog postOur February/March 2020 cruise on the Viking Star was a fantastic trip. In addition to meeting some great people and enjoying the stunning scenery, we also achieved our primary goal, which was to experience the Northern Lights.
Of course, we returned to a world changed by the COVID-19 lockdown, but I didn’t let that prevent me from sharing our experiences with the Greensboro Astronomy Club via Zoom on Friday, April 20. I recorded the presentation and am happy to provide the link to th10 months ago Read more -
Blog postOur final port of call for this trip was Bergen, one of Norway’s oldest cities. On our first day in town, we took a tour which started in Bryggen, a trading post established by the Hanseatic League in 1350.
The colorful storefronts of Bryggen The two storefronts at left, and the brown triangular roofs behind them, are actually the Radisson Blu hotel, where we stayed during our final two nights in Bergen. Bryggen’s primary export was dried cod. In its dried form, it could be preserved12 months ago Read more -
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Blog postWe said goodbye to the Viking Star this morning and checked into our hotel in Bergen. We have two days on our own before we leave for home. Now it was time for us to venture out, independent of tour buses and groups. We hopped onto Bergen’s light rail train for the town of Hop (pronounced hoop) and a one-mile walk to the home of Norway’s greatest composer, Edvard Grieg.
The back door at Troldhaugen Grieg and his wife Nina selected a site on Nordås Lake, south of Bergen, to build12 months ago Read more -
Blog postThe port of Narvik was our last stop north of the Arctic Circle. Although it’s a very small town, Narvik’s ice-free harbor at the terminus of a railway bringing iron ore from Sweden made it a key strategic objective of both Britain and the Germans at the outset of WWII. After a fierce naval battle that sent numerous ships to the bottom of the fjord, the British held Narvik for more than a month, surrendering it only when they had to send their resources south to evacuate their troops from Fra12 months ago Read more
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Blog postOur northernmost port of call for this voyage was Alta, a city of about 20,000 inhabitants. Alta was the German navy’s largest base of operations outside of Germany in WWII. The Germans burned the city to the ground when they retreated in 1944; only one church remained standing, and the population was forcibly relocated. Today, Alta is a center for salmon farming, Arctic research, and mining.
Alta’s museum is built on the site of an amazing set of petroglyphs that date back more than12 months ago Read more -
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Blog postWe docked at Tromsø on Tuesday morning. The main part of the city sits on a small island, one that is relatively densely populated for this part of the world. The city and its environs have about 130,000 inhabitants and is the world’s third largest city north of the Arctic Circle. They call it “The Paris of the North” because it is relatively cosmopolitan. Foreigners make up 10% of the population, and it’s a major hub of Arctic scientific research.
It was from here that Roald A12 months ago Read more -
Blog postOur first scheduled port call at Stavanger was two days ago, but it was canceled due to high winds. That meant an extra sea day, and a chance to relax and watch the Norwegian coast slip by as we sailed north.
The Order of the Blue Nose
Yesterday was a scheduled sea day. The highlight was a 3 pm ceremony for bestowing “The Order of the Blue Nose.” It’s one of those seafaring traditions stretching back at least 100 years – an initiation for sailors crossing the Arctic Circle for1 year ago Read more -
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Blog postWe had a delayed start today due to an issue with the car (low tire pressure, and all the air hoses at the four gas stations in the nearby town were frozen solid!). However, our intrepid guide Ingólfr got us on the road in plenty of time to make it to all of our destinations.
Waiting in the hotel restaurant for the start of our day We drove north along a river to Þingvellir (pronounced THING-vet-leer) National Park. This amazing place was the site of Iceland’s first natio1 year ago Read more -
Blog postToday saw us taking Highway 1 along the south coast of Iceland. Fog and low clouds covered much of the landscape, but thankfully they burned off as we headed east toward our first stop, the Lava Centre.
Hekla, Iceland’s most active volcano The Lava Centre opened about three years ago to educate the public on Iceland’s volcanic past and present. Interactive exhibits, creative use of multimedia, and real-time data made for a very informative visit. You could see the location and magnitu1 year ago Read more -
Blog postIt’s been far too long since Mike and I last checked in, for which we apologize!
I’m writing this from the airport terminal at Newark after a whirlwind weekend in the New York City area. Mike and I spoke on Saturday at the Northeast Astronomy Forum, the annual shindig thrown by the Rockland Astronomy Club. It’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen. The exhibit hall in the field house was filled with an eye-watering (wrong expression) display of telescopes and accessories that told me that I3 years ago Read more -
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Blog postIt’s hard to believe that it is less than two months since Bringing Columbia Home was “officially” released. The book’s momentum continues to be very strong, as evidenced by both sales data as well as the feedback we’re receiving from readers.
We learned this week that the book is going into its third printing! Pre-orders were so strong that the second print run was ordered before the book even officially went on sale in January. Sales stats show that it’s selling well all over the co3 years ago Read more -
Blog postWow, what a rush! I can’t believe how energizing—and exhausting—the past four weeks on the road have been! And that was on top of the month spent preparing for the book’s rollout.
You may have heard that marketing a book is harder work than writing a book. I will tell you from first-hand experience that it’s true.
Recall that Mike and I met in St. Augustine, Florida on December 18 and 19, where we signed 350 books and mailed more than 200 of them to people who had placed pre-o3 years ago Read more -
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Blog postMike and I were invited to speak at the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum (NASM) on February 12. While I always feel honored to speak to groups, this venue held a special place in my heart. I worked as a volunteer tour guide at the NASM back in the summers of 1971 and 1972, while I was a student in high school. I can’t tell you how excited I was to be back again in the capacity of a subject matter expert!
We began our Washington, DC weekend with a signing at the Smithsonian’3 years ago Read more -
Blog postWhat a whirlwind this past week has been!
Mike and I finished the final events (*so far) of the Texas portion of our book tour this week.
We drove back from Hemphill on Friday morning, to be greeted by a Texas-sized traffic slowdown on I-10 near Baytown as we rushed to reach our noon appointment at Johnson Space Center. We were only a few minutes late meeting Lori Wheaton of JSC External Affairs who whisked us away to the Sonny Carter neutral buoyancy lab north of JSC.
3 years ago Read more -
Blog postI’m at a loss to describe what an incredibly powerful day we had in Hemphill, Texas, on this the fifteenth anniversary of the Columbia accident.
We spent Wednesday night at the Fin and Feather Resort on the Toledo Bend Reservoir six miles south of Hemphill. (This was the base for Navy salvage operations during the Columbia recovery.) The Sabine County Memorial Committee threw a nice Texas-style party for us in the resort’s convention center that evening.
Thursday morning began3 years ago Read more -
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Blog postToday I’m sharing the last of the three videos I produced in January as a tribute to the final crew of Columbia.
Bringing Columbia Home: STS-107 Recovery, Reconstruction, and Return to Flight: This eight and one-half minute video centers on rarely-seen EPA and NASA footage of the debris recovery operations in East Texas, activities inside the reconstruction hangar at Kennedy Space Center, and America’s return to manned spaceflight in the STS-114 mission of July 2006. The melancholy mo3 years ago Read more -
Blog postToday’s offering in our reflection on the fifteenth anniversary of the STS-107 accident is a music video tribute to the crew.
A Tribute to the Crew of Columbia: Sixteen Minutes from Home: Set to an original song by Kyle Breese, this video helps us reconcile our grief at the loss of the crew of STS-107 with the knowledge that the crew was doing what they loved best. We see footage of the crew enjoying themselves during their flight preparations and mission. At the end, the song reassur3 years ago Read more -
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Blog postThis month I assembled three videos to memorialize the crew of STS-107 and to recognize the sacrifices of those who fought so hard to bring Columbia home and prepare the shuttle fleet to fly again. These videos were first shown publicly at the “Columbia: Lessons and Legends of Recovery” event at Kennedy Space Center on January 26.
I understand that versions of these videos may be officially shared later on, but I wanted to give you the opportunity to see them this week as we reflect o3 years ago Read more -
Blog postOn January 26, 2018 I had the distinct honor of being one of several guests in a panel discussions entitled, “Columbia—Lessons and Legends of Recovery.” The panel was produced by Michael “Chach” Ciannilli, head of NASA’s Apollo Challenger Columbia Lessons Learned Program, and it was held in Kennedy Space Center’s Training Auditorium. Several hundred people … Continue reading "“Columbia—Lessons and Legends of Recovery”"3 years ago Read more
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The dramatic inside story of the epic search and recovery operation after the Columbia space shuttle disaster.
On February 1, 2003, Columbia disintegrated on reentry before the nation’s eyes, and all seven astronauts aboard were lost. Author Mike Leinbach, Launch Director of the space shuttle program at NASA’s John F. Kennedy Space Center was a key leader in the search and recovery effort as NASA, FEMA, the FBI, the US Forest Service, and dozens more federal, state, and local agencies combed an area of rural east Texas the size of Rhode Island for every piece of the shuttle and her crew they could find. Assisted by hundreds of volunteers, it would become the largest ground search operation in US history. This comprehensive account is told in four parts:
- Parallel Confusion
- Courage, Compassion, and Commitment
- Picking Up the Pieces
- A Bittersweet Victory
Featuring a foreword and epilogue by astronauts Robert Crippen and Eileen Collins, and dedicated to the astronauts and recovery search persons who lost their lives, this is an incredible, compelling narrative about the best of humanity in the darkest of times and about how a failure at the pinnacle of human achievement became a story of cooperation and hope.
Thousands of workers labored at Kennedy Space Center around the clock, seven days a week, for half a year to prepare a mission for the liftoff of Apollo 11. This is the story of what went on during those hectic six months.
Countdown to a Moon Launch provides an in-depth look at the carefully choreographed workflow for an Apollo mission at KSC. Using the Apollo 11 mission as an example, readers will learn what went on day by day to transform partially completed stages and crates of parts into a ready-to-fly Saturn V. Firsthand accounts of launch pad accidents, near misses, suspected sabotage, and last-minute changes to hardware are told by more than 70 NASA employees and its contractors. A companion to Rocket Ranch, it includes many diagrams and photographs, some never before published, to illustrate all aspects of the process. NASA’s groundbreaking use of computers for testing and advanced management techniques are also covered in detail.
This book will demystify the question of how NASA could build and launch Apollo missions using 1960s technology. You’ll discover that there was no magic involved – just an abundance of discipline, willpower, and creativity.
Jonathan Ward takes the reader deep into the facilities at Kennedy Space Center to describe NASA’s first computer systems used for spacecraft and rocket checkout and explain how tests and launches proceeded. Descriptions of early operations include a harrowing account of the heroic efforts of pad workers during the Apollo 1 fire. A companion to the author’s book Countdown to a Moon Launch: Preparing Apollo for Its Historic Journey, this explores every facet of the facilities that served as the base for the Apollo/Saturn missions. Hundreds of illustrations complement the firsthand accounts of more than 70 Apollo program managers and engineers.
The era of the Apollo/Saturn missions was perhaps the most exciting period in American space exploration history. Cape Canaveral and Kennedy Space Center were buzzing with activity. Thousands of workers came to town to build the facilities and launch the missions needed to put an American on the Moon before the end of the decade.
Work at KSC involved much more than just launching rockets. It was a place like none other on Earth. Technicians performed intricate operations, and hazards abounded everywhere, including lightning, fire, highly-toxic fuels, snakes, heat, explosives, LOX spills, and even plutonium. The reward for months of 7-day workweeks under intense pressure was witnessing a Saturn V at liftoff.
For anyone who ever wished they had worked at Kennedy Space Center during the Apollo era, this book is the next best thing. The only thing missing is the smell of rocket fuel in the morning.