When an oxygen tank explodes on Apollo 13 - crippling the Command & Service Module (CSM) – the moon landing must be aborted – no LFA kit can be deployed – instead it remains strapped to the external ladder of the LM inside an expensive thermal tube – protected from exhaust gas temperatures reaching 1,090 °C – with a λ ≈ 10^9 nm – the astronaut’s S-band communication system uplinks & downlinks in the microwave spectrum – as the failed flight takes a circumlunar trajectory – passing 254 km above the Moon’s black side – 400,171 km from Earth - & the farthest any human has ever strayed from home