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After a thorough probe of the accident that crippled Apollo 13 and endangered the lives of Astronauts James Lovell, Fred Raise and Jack Swigert, NASA Deputy Administrator George Low announced last week that the space agency had determined the probable cause: a short circuit that led to the explosion of an oxygen tank in the service module.

Investigators believe that the short occurred either in a fan used to stir supercooled oxygen in the tank, or in wiring leading to the fan. In the presence of pure oxygen, the short could have ignited insulation, wires, or even the aluminum parts within the tank. The resulting heat would have produced the pressure that burst the tank. Though NASA may never learn the exact cause of the accident, it has ordered numerous small design changes to prevent any recurrence of an oxygen-tank explosion; the fan will be removed, wiring will be changed and aluminum structures inside the tank may be replaced.

The required changes can be made easily and so quickly that NASA officials have tentatively decided to proceed with the scheduled launch of Apollo 14 in October. And at a planning session in Houston last week, space agency scientists recommended another try for the lunar landing site that Astronauts Lovell and Haise were to have explored last month: the ancient highlands near the crater Fra Mauro.

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