Project Mercury

McDonnell Mercury spacecraft
The Mercury spacecraft with escape tower
Description
Role:	Suborbital and orbital spaceflight
Crew:	one pilot
Dimensions
Height:	11.5 ft	3.51 m
Diameter:	6.2 ft	1.89 m
Volume:	60 ft³	1.7 m³
Weights (MA-6)
Launch:	4,265 lb	1,935 kg
Orbit:	2,986 lb	1,354 kg
Post Retro:	2,815 lb	1,277 kg
Reentry:	2,698 lb	1,224 kg
Landing:	2,421 lb	1,098 kg
Rocket engines
Retros (solid fuel) x 3:	1,000 lbf ea	4.5 kN
Posigrade (solid fuel) x 3:	400 lbf ea	1.8 kN
RCS high (H2O2) x 6:	25 lbf ea	108 N
RCS low (H2O2) x 6:	12 lbf ea	49 N
Performance
Endurance:	34 hours	22 orbits
Apogee:	175 miles	282 km
Perigee:	100 miles	160 km
Retro delta v:	300 mph	483 km/h
Mercury spacecraft diagram
Mercury spacecraft cutaway
McDonnell Mercury spacecraft

Project Mercury was the first human spaceflight program of the United States. It ran from 1959 through 1963 with the goal of putting a human in orbit around the Earth. The Mercury-Atlas 6 flight on February 20, 1962, was the first Mercury flight to achieve this goal.^[1] The program included 20 unmanned launches followed by six flights with astronaut pilots. Early planning and research was carried out by the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics,^[2] and the program was officially conducted by the newly created NASA.

The project name came from Mercury, a Roman mythological god who is often seen as a symbol of speed. Mercury is also the name of the innermost planet of the solar system, which moves faster than any other and hence provides an image of speed, although Project Mercury had no other connection to that planet.

The Mercury program cost approximately $384 million,^[3] the equivalent of about $2.9 billion in 2010 dollars.

Goals and Guidelines

The goals of the program were to orbit a manned spacecraft around Earth, investigate man's ability to function in space and to recover both man and spacecraft safely.^[4] NASA also established program guidelines: existing technology and off-the-shelf equipment should be used wherever practical, the simplest and most reliable approach to system design would be followed, an existing launch vehicle would be employed to place the spacecraft into orbit, and use of a progressive and logical test program. Project requirements for the spacecraft were that it must be fitted with a reliable launch-escape system to separate the spacecraft and its crew from the launch vehicle in case of impending failure, the pilot must be given the capability of manually controlling spacecraft attitude, the spacecraft must carry a retrorocket system capable of reliably providing the necessary impulse to bring the spacecraft out of orbit, a zero-lift body utilizing drag braking would be used for reentry, and that the spacecraft design must satisfy the requirements for a water landing.^[5]

Research and development

On October 7, 1958, T. Keith Glennan, the first Administrator of NASA, approved the Mercury project.^[6] On December 17 Glennan announced Project Mercury publicly.^[7]

On December 29, 1958 North American Aviation was awarded a contract to design and build Little Joe boosters for test flights.^[8] In January 1959 McDonnell Aircraft Corporation was chosen to be prime contractor for the Mercury spacecraft, and the contract for 12 spacecraft was awarded in February. In April seven astronauts, known as the Mercury Seven or more formally as Astronaut Group 1, were selected to participate in the Mercury program.

In May 1959 North American Aviation delivered the first two Little Joe boosters, and in June the Big Joe booster was delivered. In July the planned use of Jupiter boosters in the Mercury program was canceled in favor of Atlas flights.^[9] In October General Electric delivered to McDonnell the ablative heat shield designated for installation on the first Mercury spacecraft. In December the launch vehicle for Mercury-Redstone 1 was ready to begin static tests installed on a test stand at ABMA.

In January 1960 NASA awarded Western Electric Company a contract for the Mercury tracking network. The value of the contract was over $33 million.^[10] Also in January, McDonnell delivered the first production-type Mercury spacecraft, less than a year after award of the formal contract. On February 12, Christopher C. Kraft, Jr. was appointed to head the Mercury operations coordination group.^[11] Kraft was asked to, "come up with a basic mission plan. You know, the bottom-line stuff on how we fly a man from a launch pad into space and back again. It would be good if you kept him alive." In April, the first spacecraft was delivered to Wallops Island for the beach-abort test. The test was completed successfully on May 9.^[12]

Spacecraft

Mercury program monument at LC-14

Because of their small size, it was said that the Mercury spacecraft were worn, not ridden. With 1.7 m³ of habitable volume, the spacecraft was just large enough for the single crew member. Inside were 120 controls: 55 electrical switches, 30 fuses and 35 mechanical levers.^[13] The spacecraft was designed by Max Faget and NASA's Space Task Group.^{[14][15]:26-28}

Despite the astronauts' test pilot experience NASA at first envisioned them as "minor participants" during their flights, causing many conflicts between the astronauts and engineers during the spacecraft's design. Nonetheless, contrary to other reports, the project's leaders always intended for pilots to be able to control their spacecraft, as they valued humans' ability to contribute to missions' success.^[15]:23-25 John Glenn's manual attitude adjustments during the first orbital flight was an example of the value of such control.^[15]:33 The astronauts requested—and received—a larger window and manual reentry controls.^[15]:24-25

During the launch phase of the mission, the Mercury spacecraft and astronaut were protected from launch vehicle failures by the Launch Escape System. The LES consisted of a solid fuel, 52,000 lbf (231 kN) thrust rocket mounted on a tower above the spacecraft.^[15]:28 In the event of a launch abort, the LES would fire for 1 second, pulling the Mercury spacecraft and the astronaut away from a defective launch vehicle. The spacecraft would then descend on its parachute recovery system. After booster engine cutoff (BECO), the LES was no longer needed and was separated from the spacecraft by a solid fuel, 800 lbf (3.6 kN) thrust jettison rocket that fired for 1.5 seconds.

To separate the Mercury spacecraft from the launch vehicle, the spacecraft fired three small solid-fuel, 400 lbf (1.8 kN) thrust rockets for 1 second. These rockets were called the posigrade rockets.^[15]:28

The spacecraft was only equipped with attitude control thrusters; after orbit insertion and before retrofire they could not change their orbit. There were three sets of high and low powered automatic control jets and separate manual jets, one for each axis (yaw, pitch, and roll), and supplied from two separate fuel tanks, one automatic and one manual. The pilot could use any one of the three thruster systems and fuel them from either of the two fuel tanks to provide spacecraft attitude control. The Mercury spacecraft were designed to be completely controllable from the ground in the event that something impaired the pilot's ability to function.

The spacecraft had three solid-fuel, 1000 lbf (4.5 kN) thrust retrorockets that fired for 10 seconds each.^[15]:28 One was sufficient to return the spacecraft to Earth if the other two failed. The firing sequence (known as ripple firing) required firing the first retro, followed by the second retro five seconds later (while the first was still firing). Five seconds after that, the third retro fired (while the second retro was still firing).

Mercury heat shield and retrorocket pack

There was a small metal flap at the nose of the spacecraft called the "spoiler". If the spacecraft started to reenter nose first (another stable reentry attitude for the spacecraft), airflow over the "spoiler" would flip the spacecraft around to the proper, heatshield-first reentry attitude, a technique called 'Shuttlecocking'. During reentry, the astronaut would experience about 8 g-forces on an orbital mission, and 11-12 g's on a suborbital mission.

Initial designs for the spacecraft suggested the use of either beryllium heat-sink heat shields or an ablative shield. Extensive testing settled the issue - ablative shields proved to be reliable (so much so that the initial shield thickness was safely reduced, allowing a lower total spacecraft weight), and were easier to produce (at that time, beryllium was only produced in sufficient quantities by a single company in the US) and cheaper.

NASA ordered 20 production spacecraft, numbered 1 through 20, from McDonnell Aircraft Company, St. Louis, Missouri. Five of the twenty spacecraft, #10, 12, 15, 17, and 19, were not flown.^[16] Spacecraft #3 and #4 were destroyed during unmanned test flights.^[16] Spacecraft #11 sank^[16] and was recovered from the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean after 38 years.^[17] Some spacecraft were modified after initial production (refurbished after launch abort, modified for longer missions, etc.) and received a letter designation after their number, examples 2B, 15B. Some spacecraft were modified twice; for example, spacecraft 15 became 15A and then 15B.^[18]

A number of Mercury Boilerplate spacecraft (including mockup/prototype/replica spacecrafts, made from non-flight materials or lacking production spacecraft systems and/or hardware) were also made by NASA and McDonnell Aircraft.^[19][20] They were designed and used to test spacecraft recovery systems, and escape tower and rocket motors. Formal tests were done on test pad at Langley and at Wallops Island using the Little Joe and Big Joe Atlas rockets.^[21]

Boosters

Mercury Atlas 9.

The Mercury program used three boosters:^[15]:28-30

• Little Joe - 8 suborbital robotic flights, 2 carrying monkeys. Launch escape system tests.
• Redstone - 4 suborbital robotic flights, 1 carrying a chimpanzee; 2 piloted suborbital flights.
• Atlas - 4 suborbital robotic flights; 2 orbital robotic flights, 1 carrying a chimpanzee; 4 piloted orbital flights.

Little Joe and a Mercury Boilerplate^[22] was used to test the escape tower and abort procedures.^[23] Redstone was used for suborbital flights, and Atlas for orbital ones. Starting in October, 1958, Jupiter missiles were also considered as suborbital launch vehicles for the Mercury program, but were cut from the program in July 1959 due to budget constraints. The Atlas boosters required extra strengthening^[24] in order to handle the increased weight of the Mercury spacecraft beyond that of the nuclear warheads they were designed to carry. Little Joe was a solid-propellant booster designed specially for the Mercury program. The Titan missile was also considered for use for later Mercury missions;^[25] however, the Mercury program was terminated before these missions were flown. The Titan was used for the Gemini program which followed Mercury.

The Mercury program used a Scout booster for a single flight, Mercury-Scout 1, which launched a small satellite intended to evaluate the worldwide Mercury Tracking Network. The rocket was destroyed by the Range Safety Officer after 44 seconds of flight.^[26]

Unmanned flights

Mercury Control - Cape Canaveral, Florida

The program included 20 robotic launches. Not all of these were intended to reach space and not all were successful in completing their objectives. Four of these flights included non-human primates, starting with the fifth flight (1959) which launched a Rhesus macaque named Sam^[27] (after the Air Force's School of Aerospace Medicine). The Mercury program's complete roster of non-human space-farers is given below:

• Sam, a Rhesus macaque, launched 4 December 1959 on Little Joe 2 to 85 km altitude.
• Miss Sam, a Rhesus macaque, launched 21 January 1960 on Little Joe 1B to 15 km altitude.
• Ham, a chimpanzee, launched 31 January 1961 on Mercury-Redstone 2 for a suborbital flight.
• Enos, a chimpanzee, launched 29 November 1961 on Mercury-Atlas 5 for a 2-orbit flight.

Manned flights

The "Mercury seven" astronauts pose with an Atlas model July 12, 1962. L to R: Grissom, Shepard, Carpenter, Schirra, Slayton, Glenn, Cooper.

Wernher von Braun and astronaut Gordon Cooper in the blockhouse during MR-3 recovery operations May 5, 1961.

Astronauts

The first Americans to venture into space were drawn from a group of 110 military pilots^[28] chosen for their flight test experience and because they met certain physical requirements. NASA announced the selection of seven of these - known as the Mercury Seven - as astronauts on 9 April 1959,^[29] though only six of the seven flew Mercury missions, after Slayton was grounded due to a heart condition.

• Malcolm Scott Carpenter, USN (born 1925)
• Leroy Gordon "Gordo" Cooper, Jr., USAF (1927–2004)
• John Herschel Glenn, Jr., USMC (born 1921) First American to orbit the Earth.
• Virgil Ivan "Gus" Grissom, USAF (1926–1967) Died during Apollo 1 Pre-Launch Test
• Walter Marty "Wally" Schirra, Jr., USN (1923–2007)
• Alan Bartlett Shepard, Jr., USN (1923–1998) First American in space
• Donald Kent "Deke" Slayton, USAF (1924–1993) Grounded in 1962 due to irregular heartbeat, reinstated in 1972 and later flew on the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project in 1975.^[30]

Beginning with Alan Shepard's Freedom 7 flight, the astronauts named their own spacecraft, and all added "7" to the name to acknowledge the teamwork of their fellow astronauts.

Piloted Mercury launches

Piloted Mercury Launches.

Mercury flight insignias

Flight patches that purport to be patches from various Mercury missions are available to the public. In reality, these patches were designed by private entrepreneurs long after the Mercury program ended. When genuine flight patches were created by crews in the Gemini program, this caused a public demand for Mercury flight patches, which was filled by these private entrepreneurs. The only patches the Mercury astronauts wore were the NASA logo and a name tag. Each manned Mercury spacecraft, however, was decorated with a flight insignia. These are the genuine Mercury flight insignias.

~ Project Mercury Issue of 1962 ~

Project Mercury stamp

In 1962 the US Post Office honored the first orbital flight of a U.S. astronaut with the Project Mercury Commemorative stamp. This was the first U.S. postal issue to depict a manned spacecraft. The stamp first went on sale in Cape Canaveral, Florida on February 20, 1962, the same day as the Project Mercury launch putting the first U.S. astronaut into orbit.

See also

Man In Space Soonest Manned Space Flight Network#Mercury MSFN stations Mercury Seven Mercury 13

Navy Mark IV - Mercury "spacesuit" Splashdown Vostok program Spacecraft

References

1. ↑ "Mercury-Atlas 6 (23)". NASA. http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/mercury/missions/friendship7.html. 
2. ↑ "Major Events Leading to Project Mercury". NASA. http://history.nasa.gov/SP-4001/p1a.htm. 
3. ↑ "The history of NASA's Mercury Program". Helium.com. http://www.helium.com/items/1429240-the-mercury-space-program. 
4. ↑ "Project Mercury". NASA Public Affairs Office. http://www-pao.ksc.nasa.gov/history/mercury/mercury-goals.htm. 
5. ↑ "Mercury Goals and Guidelines". NASA Public Affairs Office. http://www-pao.ksc.nasa.gov/history/mercury/mercury-overview.htm. 
6. ↑ Prepared by James M. Grimwood. "Research and Development Phase of Project Mercury". NASA MSC. http://history.nasa.gov/SP-4001/p2a.htm. 
7. ↑ "Project Mercury". U.S. Centennial of Flight Commission. http://www.centennialofflight.gov/essay/SPACEFLIGHT/Mercury/SP17.htm. 
8. ↑ "Little Joe Launch Vehicle". Boeing. http://www.boeing.com/history/bna/little_joe.html. 
9. ↑ "Mercury-Jupiter 2 (MJ-2)". Encyclopedia Astronautica. http://www.astronautix.com/flights/merr2mj2.htm. 
10. ↑ "Chronology - Quarter 1 1960". Encyclopedia Astronautica. http://www.astronautix.com/chrono/19601.htm. 
11. ↑ "Christopher C Kraft, Jr American Manager. Born 1924.". Encyclopedia Astronautica. http://www.astronautix.com/astros/kraft.htm. 
12. ↑ "PART II (B), Research and Development Phase of Project Mercury, January 1960 through May 5, 1961". NASA. http://history.nasa.gov/SP-4001/p2b.htm. 
13. ↑ "Project Mercury". U.S Centennial of flight commission. http://www.centennialofflight.gov/essay/SPACEFLIGHT/Mercury/SP17.htm. 
14. ↑ "Biographical Data, Dr. Maxime A. Faget". NASA. http://history.nasa.gov/Apollo204/faget.html. 
15. ↑ ^{15.0 15.1 15.2 15.3 15.4 15.5 15.6 15.7} Logsdon, John M. with Roger D. Launius (editors) Exploring the Unknown: Selected Documents in the History of the U.S. Civil Space Program / Volume VII Human Spaceflight: Projects Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo The NASA History Series, 2008.
16. ↑ ^{16.0 16.1 16.2} "APPENDIX 6 - LOCATION OF MERCURY SPACECRAFT, AND EXHIBIT SCHEDULE". NASA. http://history.nasa.gov/SP-4001/app6.htm. 
17. ↑ "Liberty Bell 7 capsule raised from ocean floor". CNN. http://www.cnn.com/TECH/space/9907/20/grissom.capsule.01/. 
18. ↑ "Mercury MA-10". Encyclopedia Astronautica. http://www.astronautix.com/flights/meryma10.htm. 
19. ↑ "Boilerplate Mercury Capsule". NASA. http://grin.hq.nasa.gov/ABSTRACTS/GPN-2000-003008.html. 
20. ↑ "Mercury". Encyclopedia Astronautica. http://www.astronautix.com/project/mercury.htm. 
21. ↑ NASA Mercury History Sections #44 and #47
22. ↑ A Fieldguide to American Spacecraft
23. ↑ Mercury Boilerplate Tests
24. ↑ "MA-2: Trussed Atlas Qualifies the Capsule". NASA. http://history.nasa.gov/SP-4201/ch10-4.htm. 
25. ↑ "More Than a Spacecraft". NASA. http://history.nasa.gov/SP-4203/ch3-2.htm. 
26. ↑ "Mercury Scout 1". NASA. http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/spacecraftDisplay.do?id=MERCS1. 
27. ↑ "Sam the Monkey After His Ride in the Little Joe 2 Spacecraft". NASA. http://grin.hq.nasa.gov/ABSTRACTS/GPN-2002-000042.html. 
28. ↑ "Alan B. Shepard, Jr.". NASA. http://history.nasa.gov/40thmerc7/shepard.htm. 
29. ↑ "The 40th Anniversary of the Mercury Seven". NASA. http://history.nasa.gov/40thmerc7/intro.htm. 
30. ↑ "APOLLO-SOYUZ". NASA. http://history.nasa.gov/apollo/apsoyhist.html. 

Further reading

Chris Kraft, Flight: My Life in Mission Control (March 2001). Factual, written by one of the pivotal figures in America's space programme, whose involvement ran from the early days of NACA through the formation of NASA, Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, ASTP, Skylab and the early days of Shuttle operations. Hardcover, 371 pages, ISBN 0-525-94571-7 or paperback (2002) ISBN 0-452-28304-3. Gene Kranz, Failure is Not an Option. Factual, from the standpoint of a chief flight controller during the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo space programs. ISBN 0-7432-0079-9 Tom Wolfe, The Right Stuff. (Wolfe interviewed many of those involved). Schirra, Grissom, Glenn, Slayton, Shepherd, Carpenter, Cooper, We Seven. (ISBN B00005X54G); Simon & Schuster - 1962. Factual; a collection of articles written by the seven Mercury astronauts describing events from their points of view.

Francis French and Colin Burgess, Into That Silent Sea:Trailblazers of the Space Era 1961-1965. ISBN 978-0-8032-1146-9. History of the Mercury program with many unique first-hand interviews with the participants. James M. Grimwood, This New Ocean: A History of Project Mercury James M. Grimwood, Project Mercury - A Chronology Mae Mills Link, Space Medicine In Project Mercury Results of the first US manned orbital space flight - Feb 20, 1962 (Friendship 7) NASA report - (PDF format) Results of the second u.s. manned orbital space flight, May 24, 1962 (Aurora 7) NASA report - (PDF format) This New Ocean: A History of Project Mercury - NASA report (PDF format) Chronology of Project Mercury - NASA report (PDF format)

External links

• The Mercury Project (Kennedy Space Center)
• Project Mercury A Chronology (Prepared by James M. Grimwood)
• Space Medicine In Project Mercury By Mae Mills Link
• Project Mercury Drawings and Technical Diagrams
• Project Mercury Simulator for Mac and PC
• The Mercury Redstone Project (PDF) December 1964
• Project Mercury familiarization manual (PDF) November 1961
• Various PDFs of historical Mercury documents including familiarization manuals.
• NASA History Series Publications (many of which are on-line)
• U.S. Spaceflight History- Mercury Program

Project Mercury Missions Little Joe 1 · Big Joe 1 · Little Joe 6 · Little Joe 1A · Little Joe 2 · Little Joe 1B · Beach Abort · Mercury-Atlas 1 · Little Joe 5 · Mercury-Redstone 1 · Mercury-Redstone 1A · Mercury-Redstone 2 · Mercury-Atlas 2 · Little Joe 5A · Mercury-Redstone BD · Mercury-Atlas 3 · Little Joe 5B · Mercury-Redstone 3 · Mercury-Redstone 4 · Mercury-Atlas 4 · Mercury-Scout 1 · Mercury-Atlas 5 · Mercury-Atlas 6 · Mercury-Atlas 7 · Mercury-Atlas 8 · Mercury-Atlas 9 · Mercury-Atlas 10 Subprograms Mercury-Atlas · Mercury-Redstone · Mercury-Scout · Mercury-Jupiter · Little Joe · Big Joe Rockets Atlas · Redstone · Blue Scout II · Big Joe · Little Joe · Jupiter See also: Mercury 13 · Mercury Seven · Navy Mark IV

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