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LISA JAMES/ PressRetired engineer and technical writer Vern Westgate laughs as he recalls a lighter moment with the astronauts of the Apollo 1 mission. January 27 is the 50th anniversary of the cabin fire that killed the three American astronauts during a pre-launch test. Westgate wrote the technical manual for the Apollo and was the liaison between the astronauts and the engineers, getting to know them well in the process.

LISA JAMES/ PressRetired engineer and technical writer Vern Westgate laughs as he recalls a lighter moment with the astronauts of the Apollo 1 mission. January 27 is the 50th anniversary of the cabin fire that killed the three American astronauts during a pre-launch test. Westgate wrote the technical manual for the Apollo and was the liaison between the astronauts and the engineers, getting to know them well in the process.

January 24, 2017

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50 YEARS LATER
January 24, 2017 midnight

50 YEARS LATER

COEUR d’ALENE — Gazing into an operations manual, its edges beginning to yellow with age, Vern Westgate remembered his astronaut friends Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee.