Apollo nerve center comes alive again

Gone is the haze of cigarette, cigar and pipe smoke. Gone are the coffee, soda and pizza stains. With only a few exceptions, NASA’s Apollo-era Mission Control has been restored to the way it looked 50 years ago when two men landed on the moon.

It gets the stamp of approval from retired flight director Gene Kranz.

Seated at the console where he ruled over Apollo 11, Apollo 13 and so many other astronaut missions, Kranz pointed out that a phone was missing behind him. And he said the air vents used to be black from all the smoke, not sparkly clean like they are now.

Those couple of details aside, Kranz could close, then open his eyes, and transport himself back to July 20, 1969, and Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin’s momentous moon landing.

“When I sit down here and I’m in the chair at the console ... I hear these words, ‘Houston, Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed,’” Kranz said during a sneak preview at NASA’s Johnson Space Center.

The grand opening culminates years of work and millions in donations.

Meticulously recreated down to the tan carpeting, gray-green wallpaper, white ceiling panels, woven-cushioned seats, amber glass ashtrays and retro coffee cups, Project Apollo’s Mission Operations Control Room never looked — or smelled — so good.

The goal was “to capture the look and feel of July of ’69,” said NASA’s restoration project manager Jim Thornton.

Johnson’s historic preservation officer, Sandra Tetley, strove for accuracy. Her quest began in 2013, after the room had fallen into neglect. It was last used for space shuttle flights in the 1990s, then abandoned and opened to tourists.

Tetley and her team interviewed flight controllers and directors now in their 70s and 80s. They pored through old pictures and brought in specialists in paint, wallpaper, carpeting, electricity and upholstery. Original swatches of carpet and wallpaper and an original ceiling tile turned up.

Intent on authenticity, they scoured eBay and vintage shops.

And yes, Kranz got his missing rotary-dial wall phone.

“I fought for everything,” Tetley said. “But we’re getting everything we want to make it just completely historically accurate.”

MICHAEL WYKE / AP Retired flight director Gene Kranz sits at the restored console where he worked during the Gemini and Apollo missions.