The Phoenix

"The Phoenix" describes an accidental fire which claimed the life of an astronaut. In the song, the astronaut's soul comes to inhabit a spaceship as his new body: flying up out of the ashes as a Phoenix.

The song is most likely about the Fire on Pad 34 on January 27, 1967, which was retroactively given the mission designation Apollo 1. During a launch simulation, the spacecraft, Command Module 12 (called "Capsule 12" in the song), had an electrical fault, which in the high oxygen environment of the test caused a massive fire inside the capsule, killing all three astronauts on board: Command Pilot Virgil "Gus" Grissom, Senior Pilot Edward H. White, and Pilot Roger B. Chaffee.