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

8 First Steps into Space: Projects Mercury and Gemini
While initially criticized as an inelegant, impractical solution to the challenge
of human spaceflight, the ballistic spacecraft concept gained momentum as NACA
engineers, led by Maxime A. Faget, championed the approach. At a meeting on
human spaceflight held at Ames on 18 March 1958, a NACA position emerged on
this approach to human spaceflight, reflecting Faget’s ideas. 22 By April 1958, NACA
had completed several studies “on the general problems of manned-satellite vehicles,”
finding that they could build in the near term “a basic drag-reentry capsule”
of approximately 2,000 pounds and sufficient volume for a passenger. 23
In August 1958, Faget and his designers developed preliminary specifications
that then went to industry, especially the McDonnell Aircraft Corporation, for a
ballistic capsule. Faget and his colleagues emphasized the simplicity, if not the
elegance, of a ballistic capsule for the effort:
The ballistic reentry vehicle also has certain attractive operational
aspects which should be mentioned. Since it follows a ballistic path there
is a minimum requirement for autopilot, guidance, or control equipment.
This condition not only results in a weight saving but also eliminates
the hazard of malfunction. In order to return to Earth from orbit,
the ballistic reentry vehicle must properly perform only one maneuver.
This maneuver is the initiation of reentry by firing the retrograde rocket.
Once this maneuver is completed (and from a safety standpoint alone it
need not be done with a great deal of precision), the vehicle will enter
Earth’s atmosphere. The success of the reentry is then dependant only
upon the inherent stability and structural integrity of the vehicle. These
are things of a passive nature and should be thoroughly checked out
prior to the first man-carrying flight. Against these advantages the disadvantage
of large area landing by parachute with no corrective control
during the reentry must be considered. 24
The Mercury spacecraft that flew in 1961 to 1963 emerged from these early
conceptual studies by NACA engineers (I-9).
International History of Astronautics Symposium, Vienna, Austria, 13 October 1972, pp. 31–32.
22. Swenson et al., This New Ocean, p. 86; James M. Grimwood, Project Mercury: A Chronology
(Washington, DC: NASA SP-4001, 1963), p. 17; “How Mercury Capsule Design Evolved,” Aviation
Week, 21 September 1959, pp. 52–53, 55, and 57.
23. Paul E. Purser, Aeronautical Research Engineer, NACA, Memorandum for Mr. Gilruth,
“Langley Manned-Satellite Program,” 11 April 1958. Folder 18674, NASA Historical Reference
Collection, NASA History Division, NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC.
24. Maxime A. Faget, Benjamine J. Garland, and James J. Buglia, Langley Aeronautical
Laboratory, NACA, “Preliminary Studies of Manned Satellites,” 11 August 1958. Folder 18674,
NASA Historical Reference Collection, NASA History Division, NASA Headquarters, Washington,
DC; Grimwood, Project Mercury: A Chronology, pp. 19–24; Gilruth, “Memoir: From Wallops Island to
Mercury,” pp. 34–37.