Gemini Spacecraft

It wasn’t that the American engineers and designers were unaware of the fire hazard. If weight had not been such a crucial issue when designing the Mercury capsule, they would not have gone withb pure oxygen design. As I mentioned aerlier, the original Apollo Command Module was being designed even before Mercury had flown, so pure oxygen was retained as a basic requirement for Apollo as well- again to save weight.

By 1967, the technicians had become so used to dealing with pure oxygen that they had grown casual and blase about the risk and minimised the hazard in their own minds, On January 27 1967, they paid the price for that lax atitude.

Hi all, I remember reading a book translated from Russian on the design and use of spacecraft. The book was written in the either the late 1950’s or I am thinking of something mentioned in one of Cosmonaut Titov’s books from the 1960’s. This was before Apollo 1 fire. ‘A manned spacecrafts atmosphere should not be more than ?? so many pounds per sqaure inch pressure, and should be composed of a mixture of oxygen and nitrogen. An atmoshpere of pure oxygen is to be avoided, should there be a fire’.
Unfortunately, it was all in writing years before the fire.

It was in that context that he was making those comments. I wonder what the astronauts’ opinion was when it was announced in 1972 that the same company (now Rockwell of course) got the contract for the Shuttle Orbiter?

What a lot of people often don’t realse is that NA were actually building two very different kinds of Command Modules in the mid 1960s, called Block 1 and Block 2 respectively. The Block 1 design dated back to 1959/60 when the successor to Mercury was being formulated. It did not have any EVA or docking capabilities as these requirements were not envisaged at that time. Once JFK announced that America was going to the moon and Apollo was going to be the vehicle to get there, NA had to totally redesign the Command Module to allow docking and EVA. To save time, they cointinued with the original concept – the plan being that the early Apollo flights, which would not carry a Lunar Module, could go ahead more quickly if the earlier spaceship was used. Apollo 1 would have used a Block 1 Command Module.

After the fire, the whole idea of using Block 1 spacecraft was dropped and no Block1 ever carried men into space.

The astronauts felt that the NA people were far too arrogant and unwilling to take on board the astronauts’ suggestions

Which is a terrible shame given what happened to Apollo 1.

No you didn’t – but the thread title is about Gemini capsules – and not everyone here may be up to speed on who flew what spaceships. 🙂

Since we have deviated onto other US space programmes, I am currently reading Gene Cernan’s autobiography. He explains early on in the book how unhappy the astronaut corps were with North American who built the Apollo Command Module. They MUCH preferred dealing with McDonnell, who had built the Mercury and Gemini capsules. The astronauts felt that the NA people were far too arrogant and unwilling to take on board the astronauts’ suggestions – unlike McD who were far more receptive and co-operative.

Of course, did I say otherwise? 😉

Which is a Mercury capsule, of course.

I remember going to see John Glenn’s capsule at the Chambers Street Museum a very very long time ago…

I suppose it logical that it came from Manchester perhaps after their loan period was up. I will see how it is described in the literature when the area is open fully to the public

Good guess by me then 🙂

I’ve always been a fan of the Gemini programme. It kind of gets forgotten because it came between Mercury and Apollo and yet they carried out some dramatic and important tasks during those flights. The photos and film taken on the Gemini missions are some of the most spectacular manned spaceflight images ever.

This link gives the locations of all the US capsules:
Spacecraft locations
Assuming the one discussed is the one that was in Manchester then it is TTV-2 (Towed Test Vehicle) for use in the Paraglider programme

Tony Andrews

If it’s the same Gemini it was transported across circa 1985 .

Is it full size or a boiler plate I wonder? I’ve seen photos of a black and white dummy Gemini capsule being towed aloft behind a DC-3 and I’m pretty sure it had a fixed wheeled undercarriage.

The big question is, how did this device end up in the UK?

The Gemini spacecraft was indeed originally designed to land on retractable wheels. The Rogallo wing design for these spacecraft is credited with giving birth to hang gliders, so more than adequate credentials for being on here.

Is it the example that was at the Manchester Museum of Science and Industry ? I don’t believe they were used as such.