Space is already terrifying enough without adding superstitions into the mix. Think about it. You’re floating in a vacuum, protected by a few millimeters of aluminum and Kevlar, traveling at 17,500 miles per hour. Most astronauts are engineers, pilots, or scientists. They’re data-driven people. But even the smartest PhDs at NASA have their quirks when it comes to Friday the 13th in space.
It’s not just about black cats or broken mirrors. In the aerospace world, luck is often seen as the residue of design, yet certain dates still make people lean back and double-check their calculations.
Does the universe actually care about a calendar date? Probably not. But the history of spaceflight is littered with "unlucky" coincidences that happen to fall on this specific day, making the connection hard to ignore for the folks sitting on top of millions of pounds of rocket fuel.
The Mission That Almost Ended in Disaster
If you want to talk about bad luck in orbit, you have to look at the Apollo 13 mission. While it didn't launch on a Friday—it actually took off on a Saturday, April 11, 1970—the "13" was everywhere. The launch time was 13:13 CST. The explosion of the oxygen tank happened on April 13th.
It was a Monday.
But the psychological fallout of that mission changed how we view "13" in the context of space exploration forever. NASA didn't stop flying on Friday the 13th, but they certainly became more aware of the public's perception of it. For decades, mission planners have had to balance the rigid mathematics of orbital mechanics with the very human reality of superstition.
The most famous actual event involving Friday the 13th in space happened in 1970, just months after the Apollo 13 drama. On Friday, November 13, 1970, the Soviet Union's Lunokhod 1 was sitting on a launchpad, preparing to become the first remote-controlled robot to land on another world.
It actually worked.
The Soviets didn't care about Western superstitions. They launched Luna 17 on November 10, and it was cruising toward the Moon on that Friday. It landed successfully on November 17. To the Soviet engineers, the date was just a number on a page. This highlights a fascinating cultural divide: what scares a Houston flight controller might not even register for a Roscosmos engineer in Moscow.
Why 2029 is the Date Everyone is Watching
We need to talk about Apophis.
Specifically, Asteroid 99942 Apophis. This is a massive chunk of rock, roughly 370 meters across. For a while, it was the "poster child" for a potential doomsday scenario. Scientists were genuinely worried it might hit Earth.
When is it coming back? Friday, April 13, 2029.
You couldn't write a more cliché Hollywood script. On that specific Friday the 13th, Apophis will pass within 20,000 miles of Earth. That is closer than the orbits of our own geostationary satellites. You will actually be able to see it with the naked eye. It’ll look like a moving star crossing the sky.
For a long time, the "Keyhole" theory was the big scare. If Apophis passed through a specific 600-meter-wide stretch of space during its 2029 flyby, Earth's gravity would tweak its orbit just enough to guarantee an impact seven years later.
Thankfully, newer data from radar observations in 2021 has basically ruled out an impact for at least the next 100 years. We’re safe. But the fact that such a significant astronomical event is scheduled for Friday the 13th in space keeps the superstition alive in the public consciousness.
The Astronaut's Perspective on Luck
I’ve looked into how astronauts actually feel about this. Most of them will tell you they don't care. They’ll say they trust the hardware. But then you see the rituals.
Astronauts at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan have a long list of traditions that look a lot like superstitions. They plant trees. They get haircuts on specific days. They watch the movie White Sun of the Desert the night before a launch. They even pee on the tire of the bus taking them to the launchpad—a tradition started by Yuri Gagarin.
If you asked an astronaut to launch on a Friday the 13th, they’d do it. But they might hold their breath a little longer during Max-Q.
There have been plenty of mundane successes on this date, too. On Friday, June 13, 1983, Pioneer 10 became the first man-made object to leave the central solar system, passing the orbit of Neptune. It was a massive milestone for humanity. No explosions. No glitches. Just a quiet crossing of an invisible line in the dark.
Then you have the Space Shuttle era. STS-76, involving the shuttle Atlantis, was docked with the Mir space station on Friday, September 13, 1996. The crew was busy performing EVAs (spacewalks) and transferring supplies. Everything went fine. It turns out that when you have thousands of people at NASA monitoring every heartbeat and bolt, luck becomes a very small variable.
Dealing With the "Omen" in Modern Spaceflight
Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin have changed the cadence of launches. We launch rockets so often now that avoiding a specific day of the week or date of the month would be a logistical nightmare.
SpaceX has launched on Fridays that fell on the 13th multiple times. They don't publicize it as an "omen" because, frankly, it’s bad for business. In the commercial space sector, reliability is the only currency that matters.
However, there is a weird psychological phenomenon called "selective memory." We tend to remember the bad things that happen on "unlucky" days and forget the thousands of successful, boring events. If a Falcon 9 were to have a sensor glitch on a random Tuesday, nobody cares. If it happens on Friday the 13th in space, it’s a headline.
Real Data vs. Folklore
Let’s look at the numbers. Does the hardware actually fail more often?
Astrophysicists and data analysts have combed through decades of launch data. There is zero statistical evidence that rockets fail more on Friday the 13th. In fact, some data suggests that crews and ground controllers are more focused on these days because they are subconsciously aware of the stigma. They check the valves three times instead of twice.
It's a bit like the "Full Moon" effect in hospitals. Nurses swear things get crazy, but the admission records don't actually show a spike. We create the narrative.
That said, the vacuum of space is unforgiving. It doesn't need a cursed date to kill you. A tiny piece of space junk—a paint fleck traveling at orbital velocity—can punch through a module regardless of what the calendar says.
What We Can Learn from Space Superstitions
The persistence of the Friday the 13th in space myth tells us more about humans than it does about physics. We crave patterns. We want to explain the unexplainable. When a multi-billion dollar mission fails, saying it was "bad luck" is sometimes easier to swallow than admitting a human engineer made a math error that cost a decade of work.
But we are moving past it. As we become a multi-planetary species, our Earth-centric calendars will start to matter less. A "Friday" on Mars doesn't exist in the same way. A "13th" depends on which calendar you're using.
If you are planning to follow the upcoming Apophis flyby or a future launch, here is how you should actually handle the "luck" factor:
- Trust the redundancy: Modern spacecraft have triple-redundant computers. Luck is for people without a backup plan.
- Watch the weather, not the date: High-altitude winds and lightning are 1,000% more likely to scrub a launch than a "curse."
- Check the TLEs: If you want to see a satellite or a close-approach asteroid, use Two-Line Element sets (TLEs) from sites like Heavens-Above. Science gives you the exact time; superstition only gives you anxiety.
- Acknowledge the human element: It's okay to have a "lucky" pair of socks. Even Gene Kranz, the legendary flight director, had his "lucky" white vest. Just don't let it replace the pre-flight checklist.
The next time a Friday the 13th in space rolls around, don't look for disasters. Look for the engineers who are working twice as hard to prove the "curse" wrong. They are the ones actually keeping the astronauts safe.
The real danger in space isn't a date on a calendar; it's complacency. As long as we keep fearing the unknown and respecting the environment of orbit, we'll keep moving forward, one "unlucky" day at a time.
Keep your eyes on the 2029 Apophis flyby. It's going to be the greatest scientific show of our lifetime, and it just happens to be on a Friday.
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Actionable Next Steps
- Mark your calendar for April 13, 2029. This isn't for a disaster, but for a once-in-a-thousand-year event where a massive asteroid passes under our satellites.
- Use the NASA Eyes on Asteroids tool. It’s a real-time 3D visualization that lets you see exactly where "scary" objects like Apophis are right now. It strips away the mystery and replaces it with actual orbital paths.
- Research the "Flight Director's Vest" tradition. If you're interested in how NASA manages stress and "luck," look into the different vests worn during the Apollo missions. It's a great deep dive into the psychology of high-stakes mission control.
- Track the ISS. Use the "Spot the Station" website to see when the International Space Station is passing over you. Whether it's Friday the 13th or a sunny Sunday, seeing that speck of light reminds you that physics, not luck, keeps us aloft.