Word: astronaut
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...Glenn's flight is only the beginning. The next man to orbit will probably be Astronaut Donald K. Slayton, 37, an Air Force major, a combat veteran of World War II, a fighter test pilot and an aeronautical engineer. Slayton is scheduled to take off on a three-orbit flight sometime this spring...
...approached Australia. Glenn radioed Astronaut Gordon Cooper in the tracking station at Muchea: "That was about the shortest day I've ever run into. Just to my right, I can see a big pattern of light, apparently right on the coast." The glow was the city of Perth, which had prepared? a welcome for Glenn that was also a test of his night vision. Street lights were ablaze. Families turned on their porch lights, spread sheets out in the yard as reflectors. Taxi drivers flicked their lights on and off. When the lights were explained to him, Glenn radioed Cooper...
...Astronaut Glenn's adventure involved far more than mere sightseeing in space. He encountered difficulties that turned his journey into a nightmare of suspense. Passing within radio range of Guaymas, Mexico, on his first orbit, his attitude control system began to act up. A small jet, designed to release hydrogen peroxide steam to keep the capsule in a stable position, was not working properly. The capsule, reported Glenn, "drifts off in yaw to the right at about one degree per second. It will go to 20 degrees and hold at that...
...radio audiences were told by Lieut. Colonel John ("Shorty") Powers, press chief of Project Mercury (see PRESS) that there had been "an indication of a problem with the heat shield deployment switch. The signal apparently was erroneous." But at the time, neither the men on the ground nor the astronaut in the sky were so sure that the signal was wrong...
...ground. Astronaut Alan Shepard, the capsule communicator at Cape Canaveral, lost radio contact with Glenn. At the same time, other instruments tracking the capsule stopped registering. The blackout was predictable, caused by ionization from the heat of reentry. It lasted for seven minutes and 15 seconds. Then came John Glenn's exultant voice. "Boy!" he cried. "That was a real fireball...