Word: orbiteer
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...Wind & Orbit...
Before it blasted off from Cape Kennedy last week, the two-man spacecraft Gemini 10 faced a flight plan that was easily the most complex and ambitious ever designed for U.S. astronauts. By the time they splashed into the Atlantic after three days in orbit, Gemini's crew had collected an impressive variety of space-age records. With one after an other intricate exercise, Command Pilot John Young and his colleague, Michael Collins, wrote bright new chapters into the record book of space travel...
Ominous Shortage. Using the knowledge of orbital mechanics that had been refined during earlier Gemini missions, Young and Collins gradually maneuvered toward a rendezvous with the Agena 10 target vehicle that had been placed in orbit with a precise launch just 100 minutes before their own blastoff. They established radar contact with the Agena 10 during their second revolution, finally sighted the target some 50 miles ahead and 17 miles above. After rising to meet the Agena and nudging Gemini's nose into the Agena's receiving collar, Young coupled the two ships...
...aerodynamic shape, which provides substantial lift in a fast-flowing airstream. Two sturdy rudders enable the craft to turn, and small flaps can be used to pitch its nose up or down. With such controls, a lifting body returning to the atmosphere from orbit at 18,000 m.p.h. might start on a trajectory designed to terminate near Kansas City, and still have the capability of flying to a landing at any point within the continental...
...Sloshing. Then, with the SIV B in orbit and its engine shut down, the TV screens showed a weird transformation in the fuel tank. Now weightless, globules of liquid hydrogen ripped loose from the churning surface and began to drift upward. Ground controllers immediately radioed signals that opened the SIV B's tank vents, allowing escaping gases to accelerate the vehicle slightly. On the screen, the globs could be seen obediently settling back to the surface. "It looks calm," the controllers reported. "It's behaving itself. There's no sloshing...