Word: geminis
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1960-1969
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Electronic Tag. At Houston's Manned Spacecraft Center, unflappable Chris Kraft every day faced the decision of whether to keep Cooper and Conrad going for still another day. From start to finish, the "go-no go" decision hinged on Gemini's cantankerous fuel cell. A failure in its liquid oxygen supply tank nearly terminated the mission on the first day, and the faulty heating unit that caused the problem never did kick on. As the flight soared into the second day, the oxygen pressure slowly moved upward-and optimism soared at Houston command. "The morning headline," broadcast Kraft...
...gear stood up well, and much of it did better than anticipated, though malfunctions gave the flight a touch-and-go aura all the way. Two rocket thrusters jammed; the fuel-cell system was a constant problem. But the spacemen were pleasantly surprised by the capabilities of other equipment. Gemini's ultra-high-frequency radio transmitter, for example, showed remarkable clarity. Said Chris Kraft: "We're up there to learn systems performance and how to handle problems-and we're getting a good workout...
Static from Moscow. They were, indeed. The astronauts carried out 17 experiments-ten more than Gemini 4. Five of them involved photography. Clicking away with a modified Hasselblad 70-mm. reflex camera and a 35-mm. camera, Cooper and Conrad photographed the moon, the eye of Hurricane Doreen east of Hawaii, and the zodiacal light above the horizon just after twilight and just before dawn-gaining invaluable information for meteorologists and astronomers. They sighted and photographed the firings of two Minutemen missiles, launched to coincide with Gemini's passover. They took infra-red measurements of volcanoes, land masses...
...Gemini 5 had more military research assignments than any previous civilian space flight-a fact that caused Moscow to talk and squawk more about Gemini 5 than any earlier U.S. space mission. Moscow's Tass at first charged that the U.S. was recklessly gambling with the lives of the spacemen on an ill-prepared mission. When it became clear that Gemini would succeed and lead the U.S. far along on its timetable for reaching the moon, the president of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, Mstislav Keldysh, tried to deflate the news by proclaiming that nobody knows enough about...
...hydrogen to produce the electricity to run the craft's computer, radar, communications and environment-control systems. For reasons not yet fully understood, the pressure inside the oxygen tank increased as the volume of liquid oxygen decreased while it was being used. Soon the fuel cell was supplying Gemini with all the electricity it needed, and the astronauts began switching their systems back on. Fuel-cell experts had actually underestimated the system's efficiency, were surprised that they could get sufficient power with such low pressure and so little oxygen fueling the cells. Had they known this beforehand...