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

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First Steps into Space: Projects Mercury and Gemini
also been instrumental in achieving our perfect record of astronaut safety thus
far. The redundancy designed into the retro-system for return from orbit is
optimized for crew safety. The orbital parameters of the next Gemini mission are
planned so that the orbit will decay to reentry within 24 hours after the planned
termination of the flight, should all other provisions for initiating the de-orbiting
landing sequence fail.
We are actively continuing our studies of all aspects of space rescue. The Mission
Analysts Division of our Office of Advanced Research and Technology has evaluated
the Martin Company’s proposal for the development of a space rescue capability
over a ten-year [2] period. It is our judgment that the knowledge needed to begin
the design of such a space rescue system is not yet available, but will come from
our present developmental and flight program.
You may be assured, Mr. President, that we shall continue to give first priority to
considerations of astronaut safety.
[Signed]
James E. Webb
Administrator
Cc:
AD/Dr. Dryden
AA/Dr. Seamans, M/Dr. Mueller, W/Adm. Boone
Document I-62
Document Title: Julian Scheer, Assistant Administrator for Public Affairs, NASA,
Memorandum to Mr. Marvin Watson, The White House, 24 May 1965.
Source: Folder 18674, NASA Historical Reference Collection, NASA History
Division, NASA Headquarters, Washington DC.
Document I-63
Document Title: Marvin Watson, The White House, Memorandum for the
President, 24 May 1965.
Source: Folder 18674, NASA Historical Reference Collection, NASA History
Division, NASA Headquarters, Washington DC.
As the Gemini program evolved in 1965, questions about the propriety of lauding the
program as a “space spectacular” emerged. NASA, the White House, the media, and the
public had treated the various Mercury flights as singular events worthy of intense reporting.
Each Mercury launch was exhaustively covered on all three television networks and the