Apollo 1: The Moon Race and a Fire Dismissed as a Technical Error

On the afternoon of 27 January 1967, three astronauts sat inside the Apollo command module at Launch Complex 34 at Cape Kennedy. Virgil "Gus" Grissom, Edward White and Roger Chaffee were running a ground test for the first crewed Apollo flight. The rocket had not left the pad. No launch fuel was burning below them. The command module had been filled with high-pressure pure oxygen to simulate flight conditions.

At 18:31 local time, a voice inside the capsule reported a fire. Less than a minute later, pressure rose sharply, the fire ruptured the cabin and the communications went silent. Ground crews needed about five minutes to open the layers of the hatch. Firefighters arrived after eight or nine minutes. Doctors arrived after about twelve. All three astronauts were dead before the hatch opened.