“We had to come up with a system that would allow us to plan in real time and accommodate the science people. If something interesting happened on the Sun, which it has done several times, then we had to schedule the ATM. [Apollo Telescope Mount] work,” he said in 2006.
“We invented a way to do flight planning in real time, or cycles,” said Windler, where one day the science guys were talking about what they wanted to do, and the ‘Science Czar’ joined them and said, ‘Okay, then, we need these particular goals for tomorrow.’
After the Skylab missions ended, Windler went to work on the space shuttle and the development of the remote manipulator system or “Canadarm”, the robotic arm of the winged orbiters contributed to Canada’s program. He then retired from NASA and joined private industry to work on what would become the International Space Station, consulting on the operational aspect of the orbiting laboratory, and later, as modules were produced, on some of the verification procedures.
‘Be more careful’
Born on January 10, 1932 in Hampton, Virginia, Milton Windler graduated from Virginia Tech (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University) in 1954 with a degree in aeronautical engineering. He joined the US Air Force’s Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) while still in school and then worked for the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), the predecessor of NASA, before serving four years in the Air Force.
Windler rejoined NACA at the Langley Research Center in Virginia and was there for its transition to become a NASA facility. He moved to Houston, Texas, just as the Manned Spacecraft Center (now Johnson Space Center) was established.
Milt Windler stands with fellow Flight Director Glynn Lunney, Gene Kranz and Gerry Griffin for President Richard Nixon’s presentation of the Presidential Medal of Freedom to the NASA Apollo 13 mission operations team on April 18, 1970.
Credit: NASA
Milt Windler stands with fellow Flight Director Glynn Lunney, Gene Kranz and Gerry Griffin for President Richard Nixon’s presentation of the Presidential Medal of Freedom to the NASA Apollo 13 mission operations team on April 18, 1970.
Credit: NASA
As a member of mission control during the Apollo 13 mission, Windler and his fellow flight directors and controllers were awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by then-President Richard Nixon in 1970. Windler was also honored with NASA’s Exceptional Service Medal.
Milton and Betty (née Selby) Windler had three children and eight grandchildren. A memorial service will be held in the coming weeks at the family’s former church in Friendswood, Texas.
“If I were to do it again, I would probably try to do something more to pay more attention,” Windler said. “Apollo was – well, all of [the missions] were… bang-bang-bang. You couldn’t enjoy it, really, in a way that you couldn’t enjoy it, as it might have been better to do.