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

Exploring the Unknown 191
9. We urge a considerable expansion of the scientific base of the
medical program. Working consultants, additional in-house
personnel and sufficient funds to permit implementation of a
sound program, based on the resources and capabilities of several
university laboratories and utilizing additional contracts with DOD
and other government facilities, are essential if we are to insure
reasonable programs toward orbital flight.
General Conclusion
The Mercury program has apparently been carried through with great
care and there is every evidence that reasonable stops have been taken to obtain
high reliability and provide adequate alternatives for the astronaut in the event
of an emergency. Nevertheless, one is left with the impression that we are
approaching manned orbital flight on the shortest possible time scale so that the
number of over-all system tests will necessarily be small. Consequently, although
it is generally assumed by the public that manned flight will not be attempted
until we are “certain” to be able to return the man safely and that we are more
conservative in our attitude toward human life than is the USSR, the fact seems
to be that manned flight will inevitably involve a high degree of risk and that the
USSR will have carried out a more extensive preliminary program particularly in
animal studies than we will before sending a man aloft.
It is difficult to attach a number to the reliability. The checkout procedures
on individual components and for the flight itself are meticulous. There appear
to be sufficient alternative means by which the pilot can help himself if the
already redundant mechanical system fails. However, there is no reliable current
statistical failure analysis and although we feel strongly that such analyses should be
certainly be brought up to date before the first orbital flight we see no likelihood
of obtaining an analysis which we would really trust. One can only say that almost
everything possible to assure the pilot’s survival seems to have been done. [18]
The area of greatest concern to us has been the medical problem of the
pilot’s response to the extreme physical and emotional strains which space flights
will involve. On this score the pilot training has been thorough and it has been
demonstrated that a man can perform under the conditions of acceleration and
weightlessness to which he will be subjected. Nevertheless, the background of
medical experimentation and test seems very thin. The number of animals that
will have undergone flights will be much smaller than in the USSR program.
Consequently, we are not as sure as we would like to be that a man will continue
to function properly in orbital missions although the dangers seem far less
pronounced in a suborbital flight.
Altogether, the probability of a successful suborbital Redstone flight is
around 75 percent. The probability that the pilot will survive appears to be around
90 to 95 per cent although the NASA estimates are somewhat higher. This does
not appear to be an unreasonable risk, providing the known problems are taken
care of before the flight, and those of our members who have been very close to
the testing of new aircraft fell that the risks are comparable to those taken by a test
pilot with a new high performance airplane.