The date: 9 February, 1972...

    On that Wednesday evening AS-511, the Saturn V that would boost Apollo 16 to the moon was quietly rolled back to Pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center. It was an event that was hardly noticed by the news media of the era, but it was unique. No other manned Saturn V was ever rolled out twice to the pad. Although the news media on the big three networks were busy covering Vietnam and the upcoming presidential election, the rollback was significant for me, a space-crazed 14-year-old doing my best to follow the Apollo 16 events from my room in mid-Michigan.

    Through the autumn of 1971 I had been counting the days until the scheduled launch date of Apollo 16. Then, however, for the first time in the history of manned Apollo launches there was a delay in the launch due to a hardware failure. The Apollo 16 vehicle had been rolled out to launch Complex 39A on the 13th day of December, 1971 for a scheduled launch date of March 17, 1972. But, in the first week of January, 1972 a helium pressure test ruptured a Teflon bladder in one of the Command Module’s reaction control system fuel tanks. On January 7th NASA announced that the problem would require a rollback to the VAB which would delay the launch for at least a month. 

    Exactly 20 days after that announcement a flight-rated Saturn V was rolled back to the VAB for the first time. Repair of the fuel tank required that the Command Module had to be de-mated from the stack and opened to separate the heat shield from the upper Command Module in order to permit access to the fuel tank. 

    Once all of that was accomplished the spacecraft was re-stacked and Apollo 16 was once again rolled out Pad 39A. A new launch date was set for Sunday, April 16, at 12:54 pm. This little delay was to work out in an unexpected yet favorable way for me, the space-crazed eighth-grader.

    As the launch day grew near I was determined to be much more prepared to record Apollo 16's audio from the television then I had been for Apollo 15. This time I had a brand-new cassette tape recorder that I had gotten for Christmas after having run to death the cassette player that I had "borrowed" from my younger sister, (a wrong which, to this day, she has never forgiven me for, but I'm sure one day she may work it out in therapy somewhere.) I had adapted a small tripod from an old telescope and a wooden school ruler to hold the tape recorder’s microphone at a measured distance from the living room TV’s speaker. In this the era prior to cable TV being commonplace, I had to run audio checks on each channel of the three television networks that we received over the airwaves in order to discover which one presented the least 60hz hum in the audio recording of this particular microphone. Additionally, I dragged my black-and-white portable TV into the living room to augment the family TV. That, however, brought to light my greatest problem for recording the launch itself; the family. Since launch day was scheduled on the weekend there was the issue of the entire family "living" in the "living room" while I was trying to record. The background noise, the chatter, the inane questions directed at me would all be superimposed onto the tape recording that I intended to keep and play forever. I, however, lucked out as my problem was solved in the early hours of that Sunday morning.

    My younger brother awakened on launch day with symptoms of a appendicitis. He had to be rushed to the hospital. As they got ready to leave, mom looked at me and pointlessly asked, "Are you going too?" but instinctively I think she knew better. 

    “GO?” To sit in some hospital waiting room? On the day of the Apollo 16 launch!?!... I THINK NOT! 

    When they left she remarked that they would call me and let me know how little brother was doing. I responded by saying "Okay, just don't call between noon and two, because I'll be recording the launch." 

    As they rolled out of the driveway I laughed maniacally- now it would be just me, the TV, the tape recorder, my 1/200 AMT Saturn V model and Apollo 16- all alone for launch day. Other than being at KSC in person, it was a 14-year-old space-buff’s dream come true. It was all thanks to my little brother and his belly pain, what luck! The delay of the launch back in December had placed the new launch on exactly the right day for me.