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Episodes Tagged with "Wally Schirra"

Posted on December 15, 2016

“I am in a big mass of some very small particles, they’re brilliantly lit up like they’re luminescent. I never saw anything like it! They round a little: they’re coming by the capsule and they look like little stars. A whole shower of them coming by....

Posted on December 16, 2016

Mercury Control was still undecided on the course of action to take with the heat shield problem. Some controllers thought the retrorocket pack should be jettisoned after retrofire, while other controllers thought the retro pack should be retained, a...

Posted on June 4, 2015

A few seconds after liftoff, a fin-vane at the base of the booster stuck and started the 13-meter-tall spacecraft-booster combination spinning like a bullet. Twenty-six seconds into the flight the vehicle started coming apart. The abort-sensing syste...

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Little Joe II- On Pad, Complex 36 (December 7, 1964)

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A pad abort test at White Sands, left, helped determine that the launch escape system could propel the Apollo command module away from danger if a Saturn launch vehicle explosion should threaten

A desert area at White Sands Test Facility, New Mexico, was used for testing the spacecraft propulsion system module

Posted on July 30, 2015

Selection of Group Two virtually depleted the pool of qualified candidates from the small corps of test pilots in the country, and it was the last group for which test-pilot certification would be a requirement. The new trainees reported to Houston i...

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2-Back row- See, McDivitt, Lovell, White, & Stafford. Front row- Conrad, Borman, Armstrong, & Young

1- Project_Mercury_AstronautsBack row- Shepard, Grissom, Cooper; front row- Schirra, Slayton, Glenn, Carpenter.

Posted on August 5, 2015

With Group 4, for the first time, the selection criteria did not include a requirement for test pilot proficiency. Selectees who were not qualified pilots would be assigned to the Air Force for a year of flight training. The primary scientific requir...

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4-Group 4 L-R- Garriott, Gibson. Front row, L-R- Michel, Schmitt, Kerwin.

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Posted on August 13, 2015

“Some of those guys came in figuring, “I’ll write my textbooks and my thesis and teach [university courses] and I’ll come by twice a week and be an astronaut.” Well, that didn’t work …. We were devoting our lives to this whole thing, and you couldn’t...

5-Back row, from L-R- Swigert, Pogue, Evans, Weitz, Irwin, Carr, Roosa, Worden, Mattingly, Lousma. Front row, from L-R- Givens, Mitchell, Duke, Lind, Haise, Engle, Brand, Bull, McCandless

Posted on September 3, 2015

At the beginning of the Apollo program, Kraft retired as a flight director to concentrate on management and mission planning. In 1972, he became director of the Manned Spacecraft Center, following the path of his mentor Robert Gilruth.

3-Robert F. Thompson (center) and Christopher C. Kraft Jr. (right) brief Rear Admiral W.C. Abhau

2-Kraft with his new flight directors before the Gemini 4 mission Clockwise from lower right Kraft, Gene Kranz, Glynn Lunney and John Hodge

1-Kraft Kranz Gemini Fuel Cell problem

Posted on September 10, 2015

As Procedures Officer, Kranz was put in charge of integrating Mercury Control with the Launch Control Team at Cape Canaveral, Florida, writing the “Go/NoGo” procedures that allowed missions to continue as planned or be aborted, along with serving as ...

3-Kranz and his teacher Kraft

2-Kranz at his console on May 30, 1965, in the Mission Operations Control Room, Mission Control Center, Houston

1-Kranz-F86 Sabre Cat

Posted on November 5, 2015

What went wrong?  Even years after the investigators began to sift through the wreckage of Apollo 1 piece by piece, no one could say exactly.  But within weeks the general picture became clear:  The fire was a disaster waiting to happen.

Deputy Administrator Seamans, Administrator Webb, Manned Space Flight Administrator George E. Mueller, and Apollo Program Director Phillips testify before a Senate hearing on the Apollo accident

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Posted on November 12, 2015

Posted on March 23, 2016

Had it not been for the fact that Eisele damaged his shoulder during a zero-G training flight aboard a KC-135 aircraft just before Christmas 1965, he might have been in the senior pilot’s seat aboard Apollo 1, instead of Ed White.

3-Cunningham during the Apollo 7 mission

2-Donn_F._Eisele prior to launch of ap17

1- Schirra as the Commander of Apollo 7 crew

Posted on March 30, 2016

Command Service Module-101 started through the manufacturing cycle early in 1966. By July, it had been formed, wired, fitted with subsystems, and made ready for testing. After the Apollo 1 fire in January 1967, changes had to be made, mainly in the w...

3-Apollo 7 Launch

2-Schirra, Eisele, and Cunningham (left to right) practice climbing out of the spacecraft into a life raft, to perfect recovery procedures

1-Saturn 205’s first stage rests on the pedestal at Launch Complex 34 before mating with other stages for launch

Posted on April 6, 2016

SCHIRRA: You’ve added two burns to this flight schedule, and you’ve added a urine water dump; and we have a new vehicle up here, and I can tell you at this point TV will be delayed without any further discussion until after the rendezvous. CAPCOM (J...

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2u-Distant view of the S-IVB stage

1u-Apollo 7 S-IVB rocket stage in orbit

Posted on April 13, 2016

CAPCOM Number 1 (Deke Slayton): Okay. I think you ought to clearly understand there is absolutely no experience at all with landing without the helmet on. SCHIRRA: And there no experience with the helmet either on that one. CAPCOM: That one we’ve g...

10-The Apollo 7 Command Module as exhibited at The Frontiers of Flight Museum

9-Barbara Eden, Bob Hope, the Apollo 7 astronauts, and Paul Haney (voice of Mission Control) on The Bob Hope Show (November 6, 1968)

8-Crew after recovery aboard USS Essex

6-The crew is welcomed aboard the USS Essex

5-A crewmember being hoisted into the recovery helicopter

3U-At the end of the nearly 11-day mission, flight controllers Gene Kranz, Glynn Lunney, and Gerald Griffin left to right with cigars celebrate splashdown

2U-View of Florida from Apollo 7

1u-Mission Control watches the first live television beamed by an American spacecraft, as Eisele and Schirra signal, %22Keep Those Cards and Letters Coming in, Folks

Posted on June 2, 2016

The successful Apollo 7 flight cleared the way for a US moon landing in 1969.  Still a lot of flight and ground testing remained and there would probably be surprises.  The greatest concern was Nasa had to complete three virtually flawless missions a...

3-Lovell family watch launch of A8

2-Jim Lovell

1-Apollo 8 Crew

Posted on July 6, 2016

Just a few minutes after Apollo 8’s second TV broadcast, Borman, Lovell, and Anders passed Earth’s  gravitational hill top and crossed into the Moon’s gravitational sphere of influence.

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Posted on November 23, 2016

Thomas P. Stafford was the first member of his Naval Academy Class of 1952 to pin on the first, second, and third stars of a General Officer. He flew six rendezvous in space; logged 507 hours and 43 minutes in space flight and wore the Air Force comm...

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Posted on December 7, 2016

John Young enjoyed the longest career of any astronaut thus far. Over the course of 42 years of active NASA service he made six space flights and is the only person to have piloted, and been commander of, four different classes of spacecraft: Gemini,...

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Posted on December 21, 2016

On May 18th 1969, a king, some congressmen, other distinguished guests, and a hundred thousand other watchers waited at scattered vantage points around the Cape area. At 49 minutes past noon, Rocco Petrone’s launch team sent Apollo 10 on its way to t...

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Posted on August 15, 2013

Over 52 years ago, in the early hours of May 5th, 1961 the US prepared to launch its first man into space. Three weeks earlier, the Soviet Union had sent Yuri Gagarin on an orbital mission. This was a suborbital mission planed to last only 15 minutes...

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Posted on August 29, 2013

Mercury-Redstone 4 was the fourth mission in the Mercury-Redstone series and the second U.S. manned suborbital spaceflight. The mission was essentially a repeat of Alan Shepard’s Freedom 7 flight.   So why was it necessary to launch another sub-orbit...

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Posted on September 13, 2018

Cronkite did not look good. He called Schirra over and thrust a sheet of wire-service copy at him. Schirra scanned the text hurriedly, and with each sentence his heart sank. This was bad. This was worse than bad. This was . . . unheard of. He had a t...

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P1-Jules Bergman abc science editor

Posted on September 26, 2013

Mercury Control was still undecided on the course of action to take with the heat shield problem. Some controllers thought the retrorocket pack should be jettisoned after retrofire, while other controllers thought the retro pack should be retained, a...

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MA6-dye released

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Posted on August 10, 2023

“The thing I remember about reentry was not positioning some RCS switches correctly. We got behind and Owen could not read my notes in the checklist because of the limited space (and my ‘unique’ penmanship). I said, ‘Give me the book, and I’ll reconf...

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Posted on August 23, 2023

“I felt like that mission was from my viewpoint the highlight of my career, as being the best astronaut that I could be. I felt like our crew was the best crew we could be because we had done the best we could. We got sick; we couldn’t help that. We ...

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Posted on May 29, 2014

Posted on June 5, 2014

From the previous episode, it was decided that the name of Gemini VI would be changed to Gemini VI-a to distinguish it from the originally planned mission whose objective was to rendezvous with the Agena target vehicle. Gemini VII would be launched f...

GT7 Launch

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Lovell before the launch, in the special G5C space suit, which had a zippered hood with a visor instead of a solid helmet

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Moon and clouds over the Western Pacific as seen from Gemini 7

Borman and lovell boarding

Posted on June 12, 2014

From the previous episode, we have Gemini VII waiting in orbit for Gemini VI-A to launch and rendezvous.  Remember, Gemini VII could only remain in orbit for 14 days, the maximum duration of its flight.  The goal was to launch Gemini VI-A on or befor...

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Gemini 7 as seen by Gemini 6

Posted on June 18, 2014

The Gemini Program was conceived after it became evident to NASA officials that an intermediate step was required between Project Mercury and the Apollo Program. The major objectives assigned to Gemini were: 1-To subject two men and supporting equip...

G7 crew

GT on Wasp

Gemini 7 spacecraft on display at the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center

Recovery of G7

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Posted on August 28, 2014

After the untimely deaths of Elliot See and Charles Basset, NASA assigned the Gemini IX prime crew positions to Tom Stafford and Gene Cernan.  This was the first time in NASA’s manned space flight history that a backup crew had taken over a mission. ...

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Posted on June 24, 2015

Over 52 years ago, in the early hours of May 5th, 1961 the US prepared to launch its first man into space. Three weeks earlier, the Soviet Union had sent Yuri Gagarin on an orbital mission. This was a suborbital mission planed to last only 15 minutes...

Posted on September 24, 2015

Mercury-Redstone 4 was the fourth mission in the Mercury-Redstone series and the second U.S. manned suborbital spaceflight. The mission was essentially a repeat of Alan Shepard’s Freedom 7 flight.   So why was it necessary to launch another sub-orbit...