Space Cowboys

Corrected entry: In the first mess hall scene, Eastwood has his ID card but after the young astronaut team sends them drinks the ID card is gone but is seen again in the next shot.

Correction: The ID is on a chain around Clint's neck. It's not visible because James Garner's shoulder is blocking Clint, but that doesn't mean the ID is no longer there.

ChiChi

Corrected entry: Have you ever heard of them re-naming a shuttle based on the first team that flies it?

Correction: Eastwood refused to do the mission if he didn't get his team and the shuttle name.

Grumpy Scot

Corrected entry: Frank is told that Hawk didn't pass his physical and has cancer. However, later on, the lady with the dark hair says that Hawk passed his physical even with the cancer and can still go into space. Make sense? Nope.

Correction: The implication is that Hawk *could* be disqualified on the basis of his cancer, but seeing as he is otherwise healthy and capable, they can still let him fly on the mission.

Corrected entry: To save the day, Hawk decides to stay with the IKON as he blows it out of harm's way using the onboard rockets. If Hawk was the only available pilot (the other got knocked out), how could Eastwood fly the shuttle? We never saw him in a simulator or piloting anything!

Correction: True, he wasn't shown piloting anything, but it was said at other times in the movie that he was a pilot. For example, in the scene where he's introducing the guys to Marcia Gay Harden, he says Hawk is "the best pilot the Air Force ever had, next to me."

Corrected entry: They only have a month to train. In that time they would train for the mission and just let a trained pilot/commander fly. Also, they wouldn't take time out from training to go to CA to be on Leno.

Correction: The flight training of the geriatric pilots is a critical plot point since they do in fact end up having to pilot the shuttle. As is explained in the movie, NASA decides that the publicity value of the astronauts is more important than the details of the mission. NASA would certainly have made the elderly astronauts available for the Leno show's taping, and probably could have accomplished it in a half day by using NASA executive jets between Houston and Burbank.

Correction: While in space, Ethan tells Frank that his team was nothing but a publicity stunt. A publicity stunt would be sent to Leno. Besides, they all love to fly fast. They would get to CA in no time.

Corrected entry: If the satellite is that dangerous, why not just shoot it down with a tactical nuclear missile? It would destroy the satellite and its missiles and 1000 miles up is more than enough to ensure that radioactive fallout would not re-enter the atmosphere. Or better yet, strap a nuclear device to the side and blow it up by remote instead of going to all the trouble to disarm it. The satellite doesn't react to physical contact, only radar.

Grumpy Scot

Correction: How many other satellites, worth billions of dollars, would be destroyed by the EMP? What would effect the loss of communication satellites have on the world's economy? Loss of weather satellites? Loss of spy satellites?

Rlvlk

Corrected entry: The Junior Astronaut pulls a plug on the dodgy Russian satellite and explosion follows following which the shuttle is hit by debris. There is a small fire in the shuttle. The smoke goes up. As the shuttle is supposed to be in weightlessness this means smoke will hover around the fire rather than go up (the fire could in theory extinguish itself due to carbon dioxide building up near it as well (which would normally go down to the floor as it is heavier than air) (for the physicists amongst us: that's why a candle can't burn in weightlessness).

Correction: Candles burn just fine in zero-G. See:http://microgravity.grc.nasa.gov/combustion/cfm/mir_results.htm.

Corrected entry: Bless his soul. Tommy Lee Jones has sacrificed his life in order to get the dodgy Russian satellite to crash on the moon. Rather than disintegrate on impact (as it should) you can see big bits of the satellite on the moon's surface AND the dead astronaut sitting against a rock.

Correction: Now, why would the satellite disintegrate? The moon has no atmosphere. If the satellite really DID make it to the moon (a highy, highy unlikely event), parts of the satellite would be on the moon's surface.

Visible crew/equipment: You can see reflections of film crew and lighting boards in Clint Eastwood's sunglasses several times during the scenes where he is gathering the old members of team Daedalus.

More mistakes in Space Cowboys

Sara Holland: I have never met a kid who didn't dream of being an astronaut when he grew up.
Col. William 'Hawk' Hawkins: Did you ever meet a kid who didn't grow up?

More quotes from Space Cowboys

Question: What are the chances of four guys of their age ACTUALLY passing the physical to the required standards? I know they all kept reasonably fit but they struggled with running etc. so it seems unlikely they would pass all the tests. I know movie rules dictate suspense of disbelief to a certain degree, I'm just wondering what their chances would be in reality.

The_Iceman

Answer: Eastwood would be out on height alone and the rest probably have high blood pressure. https://www.nasa.gov/centers/johnson/pdf/606877main_FS-2011-11-057-JSC-astro_trng.pdf.

Chosen answer: It wasn't a matter of how physically fit they were, but that their particular combination of knowledge, skills, and past experiences were needed for this specific mission. The physical criteria would be amended in order to recruit them for that mission.

raywest

They were specifically told they wouldn't be given an easier ride and would need to pass the exact same tests as the younger astronauts. The physical criteria wouldn't have been amended to suit them so is it possible for 4 guys of this age to pass?

The_Iceman

Remember that at some point in the process it became a political issue - the old cowboys were wanted for their PR value, so physical test results would have been "fudged", if not ignored altogether.

ReRyRo

Agree that the physical requirements were a major plot point and part of the 'deal' for the team to go, but there was some relaxing of requirements and politics. In general, the answer is YES, old folks can go to space without major fudging of the requirements as was demonstrated by lots of astronauts in their late 50s, a few in their 60s, and John Genn at 77. Just recently an 82-year-old woman flew on Jeff Bezos' tourist rocket.

More questions & answers from Space Cowboys

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