OUT-STUNTING THE SOVIETS

On December 4th, 1965, sixty years ago as of this writing, NASA set out to allow the United States to out-stunt the Soviets. Back on June 14th, and 16th, 1963 the Soviets had launched Vostok 5 and 6 which passed one another within about 4.03 miles. Like their other Vostok and especially Voskhod flights this was little more than a stunt allowing them to, not only put the first female in space, but also try and take credit for the first ever space rendezvous. Of course there was no real rendezvous, it was simply that their launch azimuths came close for a brief few moments. 

NASA’s actual rendezvous mission was to be Gemini VI in 1965. That attempt was scrubbed when the Agena target vehicle exploded upon its engine start command. This left astronauts Wally Schirra and Tom Stafford with no mission. Theirs was last battery-powered Gemini spacecraft thus it could only remain in orbit for about four days. To make matters worse, their Titan II (GLV-6) booster was configured to loft only the GT-6 spacecraft, (each Gemini Launch Vehicle was configured to launch a specific spacecraft). Considering that the Gemini Agenas had some sort of inherent fault that needed to engineered out, there was no ready replacement. On the day of the scrub, it looked pretty dim for the Gemini VI crew and their Gemini spacecraft.

While the bits and pieces of Gemini VI’s Agena were reentering the atmosphere, McDonnell’s Spacecraft Chief Walter Burke rounded up his deputy John Yardley at the Cape control center and began a quick discussion that involved using Gemini VII as a replacement target vehicle for Gemini VI. Shortly after the discussion began the two men pulled Frank Borman, Gemini VII’s command pilot aside and brought him into the plan. It was all based on a recent study for a quick turn-around of a Gemini Titan II vehicle and soon Raymond Hill, McDonnell’s man at the Cape who was in charge of the hands-on movement of the hardware was brought into the loop. Hill was familiar with the plan and brought everyone else up to speed. Next Burke and Yardley took their idea to NASA’s upper management and that was where the roadblocks went up.

 Management felt that there were too many “impossibles” in the Burke-Yardley scheme and that the best plan was to simply stack the Gemini VII spacecraft atop the Gemini VI booster and fly that mission alone.

But then the engineers did the math and found that the Gemini VII spacecraft was too heavy to be boosted by the GLV-6 booster. Only then did the Burke-Yardley plan begin to gain traction. Of course, Chris Kraft said it was “impossible,” but he tended to say that about most things. Soon the roadblocks began to fall and eventually the plan found its way to NASA Administrator James Webb.

Unlike his underlings, Webb was all in favor of the plan; it was bold, it was forward thinking and although risky, it would make history and it would score a beat on the Soviets. Indeed, this was an era when NASA’s administrator pointed his agency toward doing bold and historic things. He approved the plan and forwarded it to the President. LBJ also approved and just three days after their mission had been scrubbed, Schirra and Stafford had their mission back.

On October 28th, the same day the White House made the announcement that Gemini VII and Gemini VI would rendezvous in space, Gemini spacecraft 6 and the GLV 6 second stage were deerected at Launch Complex 19. Then, the following day, Thursday October 29th, the GLV 6 first stage was also deerected. Spacecraft 6 was stored in the Pyrotechnics Installation Building at the Merritt Island Launch Area while the booster was stored under guard at the Cape Canaveral Satellite Checkout Building where it was kept in a climate-controlled environment. This bonded storage was done to maintain the integrity of the pre-launch check-out of the booster. Now that equipment would wait until after Gemini VII had been launched. Then GLV-6 could be launched without another protracted pre-launch check-out. The Burke-Yardley plan was now in full motion.

 

Command Pilot Frank Borman and pilot Jim Lovell were launched at two seconds past 2:30 on the afternoon of Saturday December 4^th, 1965. Although I had just come inside from playing in the fresh snow and had to quickly shed my wet boots, socks, pants, mittens, hat, jacket and shirt, in order to thaw my benumbed toes over the heater vent. Meanwhile, the final countdown to the launch got my attention.

 

Keep in mind that in the mid-1960s Gemini was THE spacecraft of the era. The GLV booster was best described to me by Dick Gordon as “…a real hotrod.” Unlike later boosters, the Titan II was a true ICBM meant to deliver an atomic bomb upon the Soviet Union from an underground silo. It had to get up and GO! With a Gemini as its payload the crew found the ride to orbit to last 5:41 from bolts blowing to SECO. We who were watching from our TV sets at home did not hear a word from the astronauts. Everything they said was fed to the public through NASA’s PAO (Public Affairs Officer). In fact, live communications from the astronauts during the boost phase first took place on Apollo 10 and that was largely due to Tom Stafford’s insistence. So, we watched the launch on our black and white TV sets, saw animation shortly after staging and listened to what the newsmen such as Cronkite, Bergman and McGee told us. Yet, for a 3rd grader like me, it was really exciting.

 

Although I had shed my snow caked garments before the launch, Borman and Lovell were far better dressed than I had been. They were sporting the new G5C lightweight spacesuits. These suits had no attached helmet, but rather sported a soft hood with a faceplate. Inside the hood each astronaut wore a helmet similar to the standard helmet worn by fighter pilots of that era. The suits were supposed to have greater comfort in the cockpit of the Gemini spacecraft and were also supposed to be easily removed and quickly donned in the event of some sort of cabin depressurization; neither was true. In fact, the suits were hot and uncomfortable in flight and once they were removed there was no way to get them back on quickly— it took the better part of an orbit.

 

On that cold winter Saturday afternoon in 1965, Borman and Lovell rocketed into space seeking to set the world’s record for spaceflight and prove that humans could live in space for extended periods.

 

Although immediately after separation from their Titan II’s second stage the crew did manage to station keep with the spent booster for a while, no matter how anyone looks at it, the flight of GT-7 was purely a medical mission. When asked years later,

 

“…did you feel like you were an experimental rat up there…?”

 

 Lovell replied,

 

“A guinea pig. Absolutely a guinea pig!”

 

 

They were, however, much more prepared to avoid the garbage can syndrome that Cooper and Conrad had experienced. Both crewmen had spent countless hours in the Gemini trainer figuring out how to take every single bit of waste paper or discarded container and painstakingly fold it as small as possible and then stow it. They spent nearly as much time doing that as they spent practicing some of the flight maneuvers. Thus, they started their mission with a very clear view of the problems ahead— and that would pay off.

 

Interestingly, the Gemini VII crew were not the first Gemini astronauts to take their pressure suits off during a flight. After he had left the program, Pete Conrad admitted that at the beginning of his 8-day long Gemini 5 mission, one of the first things that he and Gordon Cooper did was get out of those suits. It was their plan from early on and while on-orbit they said nothing about it among themselves or when talking to mission control. Those space suits traveled quite well stuffed down in the spacecraft’s foot wells.