Word: orbit
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...week of intense activity. First rocket off the pad was a giant Saturn, its eight-engined booster still the most powerful the U.S. has ever aimed at space. With deceptive ease it ignited, accelerated and climbed out of sight. A few minutes later, the second stage blasted into orbit. Sizable pieces, which are dummy Apollo parts, detached themselves and moved away, leaving a curious folded apparatus exposed to space. Slowly that great gadget expanded its accordion pleats and flattened into a shiny aluminum wing for the Pegasus of the 20th century...
...sent a man into space since May 1963-when Astronaut Leroy Gordon Cooper stayed in orbit for 34 hr. 20 min. Cooper's flight signaled the end of the Mercury program and the start of the Gemini series of earth orbits in a two-man capsule. Gemini fell two years behind schedule because of technical problems and congressional heel-dragging on appropriations. This year the spacemen hope to make up for lost time: a three-orbit trip is scheduled for April, a four-day attempt for this summer, and if all goes well, there will be a week-long...
...study the effects of such a long period of weightlessness on humans. Plans also call for the men to release a "pod" with a flashing light, and to practice maneuvering their craft around the pod to get the hang of making a rendezvous with another space vehicle. While in orbit, the astronauts are expected to open a hatch and lean out into space; one of them may actually step out altogether...
...Gemini program, which was designed to test the ability of astronauts to control a rendezvous of spaceships in orbit, had a difficult enough time even getting off the ground. But last week it passed an important milestone in the air. A Titan II rocket took off from Cape Kennedy and carried a 6,900-lb. Gemini capsule 99 miles high. No attempt was made to orbit; the capsule arched like a missile and plunged down at 16.600 m.p.h. toward a spot in the Atlantic 2,129 miles southeast of the Cape...
Project Gemini is now about 18 months behind schedule. Next step, if no more trouble develops, will be a two-man, three-orbit flight some time in April...