Exploring the Unknown: Selected Documents in ... - The Black Vault

30 First Steps into Space: Projects Mercury and Gemini
(labeled ASS by everyone but the people involved in developing it) to monitor vehicle
performance and to provide early escape of the Mercury capsule if necessary. 95
Suborbital Flights
The first Mercury test flight took place on 21 August 1959, when a capsule carrying
two rhesus monkeys was launched atop a cluster of Little Joe solid-fuel rockets
(I-24). Other tests using both Redstone and Atlas boosters and carrying both chimpanzees
and astronaut dummies soon followed (I-25). The first flight of a Mercury-
Redstone combination took place on 21 November 1960 (Mercury-Redstone 1), but
only with a “simulated man” in its capsule. It pointed out serious problems with
the system. The rocket rose only 3.8 inches off the pad, and then it settled back
on its fins. The parachutes deployed and fell to the launchpad while the capsule
remained in place on the booster. The episode proved embarrassing, but NASA
soon found that faulty grounding on electrical circuitry had caused a short in the
system. They repaired the problem and the next test flight, Mercury-Redstone 1A,
flown on 19 December 1960, went somewhat better but still experienced problems.
The rocket boosted the capsule higher and at greater G forces than expected, pushing
it some 20 miles downrange beyond the target area. This led to the 31 January
1961, Mercury-Redstone 2 launch with Ham the chimpanzee aboard on a 16-minute,
39-second flight. Again, the booster overperformed and carried him 42 miles
higher and 124 miles further downrange than planned. In the process, Ham suffered
about 17 g’s going up and some 15 during reentry. NASA made one more test
flight, on 24 March 1961, and this time the mission took place as planned. 96
With these tests, NASA was prepared to move on to the piloted portion of the
suborbital Mercury program. As preparations for this flight progressed throughout
the spring, on 12 April 1961, the Soviet Union suddenly launched Yuri
Gagarin into orbit, counting coup on the U.S. space effort one more time. 97 This
spaceflight gave greater impetus to rescue national honor in the early launch
of an astronaut in the U.S.’s Mercury program. Interestingly, the leaders of the
program took extraordinary efforts to prepare for the release of public information
about the mission. They kept the name of the astronaut assigned to fly the
mission secret until only a short time before the scheduled launch.
Presidential science advisor Jerome B. Wiesner also expressed concern that
the media should be prevented from making the flight “a Hollywood production,
because it can jeopardize the success of the entire mission.” Wiesner, concerned
95. “Report of the Ad Hoc Mercury Panel,” 12 April 1961. Folder 18674, NASA Historical
Reference Collection, NASA History Division, NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC.
96. Swenson et al., This New Ocean, pp. 293–318; Linda Ezell, NASA Historical Data Book, Volume
II, pp. 134–143; NASA News Release, “Mercury Redstone Booster Development Test,” 22 March 1961,
NASA Historical Reference Collection (Doc. IV-I-24); Richard J. Wisniewski, for Warren J. North,
Head, Manned Satellites, to Director of Spaceflight Programs, “Mercury Status as of March 2, 1961,”
3 March 1961. Folder 18674, NASA Historical Reference Collection, NASA History Division, NASA
Headquarters, Washington, DC.
97. Swenson et al., This New Ocean, pp. 332–335; Thomas A. Heppenheimer, Countdown: A
History of Spaceflight (New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1997), pp. 189–192.