Continuing today with the odyssey of Williams Tompkins,aerospace engineer deluxe at Douglas...

...During the early NASA Atlantic Missile Range (AMR) there was a Saturn program briefing that I attended way before my briefing to NASA. This is when the C-1 Vehicle consisted of only the S-I NASA / Chrysler booster and the Douglas S-IV stage. At a meeting that contractors attended, Dr. Kirk Debus (Director of Launch Operations) expressed his concern about the checkout and launch capabilities of the entire Saturn Program.

Even in Douglas Missile and Space Engineering design of the Apollo S-IV there was a sort of a complacent expectation of we are just glad to be a part of this wonderful Moon Program that the “great thinkers” at that big NASA organization have given us. Look at the DAC APOLLO Engineering Organization Chart nearby. Almost all those other engineering section chiefs were concerned with specific areas of design, not needing to address the entire S-IVB systems; let alone study the Apollo vehicle and the Moon and planet missions, the assembly/checkout and launch - even what facilities were required, and the mission to the Moon.

And what if we have a problem during the mission and need to abort? This would involve systems checkout and launch test equipment that must provide an absolute infallible reliability, unlike any other system ever designed. However, look at our last eight years of the Thor/Delta WS-325 IRBM Missile that produced the Thor/Delta Heavy, the most reliable liquid rocket payload booster in history. The NIKE AJAX and NIKE ZEUS Anti-Missile “Star Wars” systems are some of the most reliable in history. The exception was some of the warhead strikes in Zeus R& D test programs, where NIKE ZEUS missiles were launched from Kwajalein in the South Pacific and launched towards ICBM’s from Vandenberg AFB. In some cases, the ET’s distorted our warhead final targeting.
https://exploringrealhistory.blogspot.com/2021/03/part-6-selected-by-extraterrestrials-my.html