NASA's Crew-13 Astronauts Embrace 'Unlucky' Number

NASA just assigned its first "mission 13" crew since Apollo 13 famously declared "we've had a problem" on the way to the Moon in 1970. Instead of avoiding the supposedly unlucky number, the four astronauts are embracing it with style.

Jessica Watkins and Luke Delaney from NASA, Joshua Kutryk from the Canadian Space Agency, and Russian cosmonaut Sergey Teteryatnikov will launch as Crew-13 aboard a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft this September. They'll spend about five months on the International Space Station conducting scientific research.

The crew designed their mission patch as a tribute to the Apollo 13 astronauts Jim Lovell, Fred Haise, and Jack Swigert. A golden dragon takes center stage, mimicking the golden horses from the 1970 design while nodding to SpaceX's Dragon capsule.

The dragon's tail wraps around Earth just like the blue contrail on the original Apollo 13 patch. The crew even used Roman numerals for "XIII" and left names off the patch, staying true to the Apollo 13 design.

NASA hasn't always been this bold about the number 13. After Apollo 13, space shuttle managers created a confusing numbering system to avoid STS-13, which became STS-41-C instead.

"My friend Jim Beggs, who was the administrator of NASA, had triskaidekaphobia, and he said, 'There's not going to be another Apollo 13 or a Shuttle 13, so come up with a new numbering system,'" recalled Commander Bob Crippen. The shuttle program returned to simple numbers only after the Challenger tragedy in 1986.

The Bright Side: This mission shows how far NASA's confidence has grown. While past leaders worried about superstition, today's astronauts are turning it into inspiration.

Russia's space program has flown six missions numbered 13 without incident. Even when one director suggested skipping the number in 2008, Soyuz TMA-13 launched on schedule anyway.

The Crew-13 astronauts will work on experiments preparing humans for future Moon and Mars missions. Their patch describes space exploration as "possibilities born out of human collaboration toward a common goal."

Crew-13 proves that sometimes the best way to handle fear is to fly straight through it.