Watch the launch and booster separation of Gemini spacecraft as it is lifted off the ground by a Titan II rocketThe Gemini program was conducted between 1964 and 1967 to give NASA engineers and astronauts information about spacecraft maneuvering, rendezvous, and ground control and about human performance in microgravity, in preparation for the Apollo voyages to the Moon. This video shows a Gemini spacecraft launch and booster separation. A Titan II rocket, a modified version of a rocket designed to carry nuclear warheads, lifts the spacecraft off the ground. Once the craft has cleared the Earth's atmosphere, the rocket is jettisoned, and it falls back to Earth. The Gemini craft was an enlarged version of the Mercury capsule and measured 5.8 metres (19 feet) long and 3 metres (10 feet) in diameter.
Ed White: space walkGemini 4 astronaut Ed White during his historic 23-minute space walk on June 3, 1965. White was secured to the Gemini spacecraft by a 7.6-metre (25-foot) umbilical and tether line. He used a self-maneuvering unit to facilitate movement outside the craft.
Buzz Aldrin performing an extravehicular activityAstronaut Buzz Aldrin, pilot of the Gemini 12 spacecraft, performing an extravehicular activity (EVA) on November 12, 1966, the second day of the four-day mission in space. Aldrin is positioned next to the Agena workstation.
Gemini, any of a series of 12 two-man spacecraft launched into orbit around Earth by the United States between 1964 and 1966. The Gemini (Latin: “Twins”) program was preceded by the Mercury series of one-man spacecraft and was followed by the Apollo series of three-man spacecraft. The Gemini program was chiefly designed to test the ability of astronauts to maneuver their spacecraft by means of manual control. The Gemini series, directed by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), helped to develop the techniques for orbital rendezvous and docking with a target vehicle, procedures that were vital to the subsequent Apollo Moon-landing program. It also provided NASA engineers with an opportunity to improve environmental control and electrical power systems of spacecraft. During the Gemini 4 mission (launched June 3, 1965), astronautEdward H. White performed the first American spacewalk, maneuvering outside the spacecraft for 20 minutes and demonstrating man’s increasing ability to function in space. Gemini 5 (Aug. 21, 1965) completed an eight-day mission, the longest spaceflight undertaken up to that time. Gemini 7 and 6 (Dec. 4 and 15, 1965, respectively) performed the first orbital rendezvous of two manned spacecraft. Gemini 12 (Nov. 11, 1966), the last in the series, made the first automatically controlled reentry into Earth’s atmosphere.
A chronology of spaceflights in the Gemini program is shown in the table.
After graduation from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in 1954, Scott transferred to the U.S. Air Force and took flight training. He earned an M.S. in aeronautics and astronautics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and went to Edwards Air Force Base in California to train as a test pilot. In 1963 he was among the third group of U.S. astronauts chosen.
Scott and commander Neil Armstrong crewed the flight of Gemini 8 (March 16, 1966). They successfully rendezvoused and docked with an uncrewed Agena target vehicle, which was the first space docking, but an electrical failure caused the Agena-Gemini craft to tumble wildly. The Gemini capsule was separated from the Agena. Control was finally reestablished, but the mission had to be aborted. Scott and Armstrong landed 10 hours 42 minutes after takeoff.
Scott served as command module pilot of the Apollo 9 flight with commander James McDivitt and lunar module pilot Russell Schweickart; their mission was launched on March 3, 1969. In Earthorbit these men rendezvoused and docked the command module with the lunar module, which was on its first crewed flight, and they successfully tested all systems necessary for a lunar landing.
Newton's law of gravitation: Apollo 15 gravitation experimentApollo 15 commander David Scott dropping a 1.32-kg (2.91-pound) aluminum geological hammer and a 0.03-kg (0.07-pound) falcon feather on the surface of the Moon and proving that objects undergo the same acceleration in gravity, August 2, 1971.
On July 26, 1971, Scott, lunar module pilot James Irwin, and command module pilot Alfred Worden were launched on the Apollo 15 flight. After a 31/2-day trip Scott and Irwin landed on the Moon, at the base of the Apennine Mountains near a gorge called Hadley Rille. Using the Lunar Roving Vehicle, they covered about 28 km (18 miles) on three separate treks and spent more than 17 hours outside their lunar module. The mission returned to Earth on August 7.
From 1972 to 1975 Scott was a member of the administrative staff of the Apollo-SoyuzTest Project. He then became director of the Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base. He left the space program in 1977 to enter private business in Los Angeles. In 2004 he wrote a book, Two Sides of the Moon: Our Story of the Cold War Space Race, with Soviet cosmonaut Aleksey Leonov.
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