User:MLilburne/Storms

PART OF MY SANDBOX, NOT THE ENCYCLOPEDIA

Harrison "Stormy" Storms is an aeronautical engineer best known for his role in managing the design and construction of the command module for the Apollo program.

Storms grew up in Chicago's North Shore, the son of a travelling salesman. As a boy, he was a member of the Boy Scouts and enjoyed building model airplanes. He attended Northwestern University, where he graduated at the top of his class, and where he remained for a Masters degree in mechanical engineering. He then went to the California Institute of Technology to study for a second Masters degree in aeronautical engineering under Theodor von Karman.

Storms became an employee of North American Aviation. In 1955 he successfully led North American's bid for the contract to design and build the X-15 airplane, and two years later he became chief engineer of North American's Los Angeles division.

In 1960, he was offered the opportunity to become head of North American's Missile Division, which at the time had only one contract, the AGM-28 Hound Dog missile. Storms was to be given the chance to lead North American's expansion into the business of spaceflight. On September 11, 1961, North American won the contract for the S-2 engine, the second stage of the Saturn V rocket. While this was a very significant achievement, Storms was not satisfied, as he was also aiming for North American to win the contract for the Apollo spacecraft itself.

Reputation
Screenwriter Mike Gray profiled Storms in a somewhat controversial book titled Angle of Attack. Publishers Weekly described it as a "swaggering portrait of NASA's Apollo project [which] might well be called Indiana Jones and the Engineering Mission of Destiny."