Sickness to Health
Agena's woes were by now chronic. The Gemini Agena target vehicle GATV was pacing the program by mid-1965, prompting GPO to consider removing the first production model, GATV 5001, from its job as a test vehicle so it could be used in Gemini VIII.2 All such plans went up in smoke with the explosion of GATV 5002, which ignited the most demanding piece of engineering detective work in the entire Gemini program. Efforts to cure Agena's ailments spanned more than four months, much of it on a...
Attempted Launches
Everything was ready for Gemini IX on 17 May 1966. In the Mission Control Center, Eugene Kranz assumed his duties as flight director, presiding over a three-shift operation. The other two flight directors were Glynn S. Lunney and Clifford Charlesworth. Only 200 newsmen were on hand, compared to the thousand or more who had covered Gemini IV the year before.33 Gemini was becoming more routine, hence less newsworthy. After a smooth countdown, Atlas launch vehicle 5303 rose from pad 14 at 10 12...
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63 See chap. X, pp. 228-29, McDivitt interview TWX, Mathews to McDonnell, Attn. Burke, Contract NAS 9-170, Gemini V Mission Plan, GV-12129, 13 July 1965 memo, Everett E. Christensen to dist., GT-5 Operations Readiness Review, 13 July 1965. 64 GT-4 Flight Crew Report, Tape 5, p. 1 GT-4 Air-to-Ground, pp. 318, 340 NASA MAC Management Meeting 18 September 1964, p. 2 NASA MAC Management Meeting 18 December 1964, p. 3 memo, Collins to Mgr., GPO, Status of space suits for GT-5, GT-6, and GT-7,...
Titan II in Jeopardy
Gemini's biggest question mark in mid-1963 was the launch vehicle. Flight tests of the Titan II missile, suspended in June after two successive failures, had yet to produce results good enough to convince anyone that a booster derived from this missile was a safe bet for Gemini. To make matters worse, Brigadier General John McCoy, director of Titan programs for the Air Force Ballistic Systems Division BSD , strongly opposed any changes in the missile to meet Gemini standards and for sound...
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54 Albert and Verlander interviews Gemini VII Voice, I, pp. 6, 136 Kleinknecht, Daily Report No. 1, p. 13 Alexander C. Kuras and John G. Albert, Gemini-Titan Technical Summary, 24 Jan. 1967, pp. 14445 TWX, Mathews to McDonnell, Attn Burke, Contract NAS 9-170, Gemini, Need for Radar and Transponder for Tests at the Cape, GP-7392, 5 Nov. 1965 memo, Mathews to Asst. Dir., Flight Crew Ops., Rendezvous radar transponder test for the Gemini VII mission, GV-66279, 27 Nov. 1965. 55 Gemini VII Voice, I,...
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56 Eggleston, Inter-NASA Research and Space Development Centers Discussion on Space Rendezvous, 16-17 May 1960, pp. 1-2. 57 The papers presented are abstracted, ibid., pp. 2-6. The Langley presentation pp. 24 was the most elaborate, as the Langley delegation was the largest. It included a general introduction and conclusion by Houbolt and papers by David F. Thomas, Harold D. Beck, Eggleston, Terrance M. Carney, Richard A. Hord, Bert B. Burton, and Wilford E. Sivert-son, Jr. 58 Eggleston,...
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Map Plans after Gemini 6 Setback, The Evening Star, Washington, 26 Oct. 1965 John Troan, Space Shot in November The Washington Daily News, 26 Oct. 1965. 24 Low interview John D. Hodge, interview, Houston, 12 March 1968 Gerald M. Truszynski, interview, Washington, 13 Sept. 1966 memo, Mathews to Asst. Dirs., Flight Ops. and Flight Crew Ops., Real and delayed time telemetry data recording, Gemini VI-A and Gemini VII, GT-65197 3 Dec. 1965 TWXs, Mathews to dist., Gemini Mission Designations,...