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Home > Fact Sheets > Mercury Spacecraft
MERCURY SPACECRAFT
Posted 3/7/2007
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DAYTON, Ohio -- Mercury spacecraft in the Missile and Space Gallery at the National Museum of the United States Air Force. (U.S. Air Force photo)
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Project Mercury was the first American manned spaceflight program. Its goals were to put a man into orbit around the earth, to find out if he could survive and work in space, and recover the astronaut and spacecraft safely.
Project Mercury
Mercury was initiated in 1958 with the establishment of NASA and involved six one-man flights between 1961 and 1963. The first two manned missions were suborbital and used a modified Redstone missile as a booster with U.S. Air Force facilities and assistance. The other four manned flights used Air Force-developed Atlas boosters and launch crews to place the spacecraft into orbit.
Along with providing Atlas boosters, launch crews and facilities for the orbital Mercury flights, the USAF contributed critical biomedical support in studying how humans would react to space travel. USAF expertise in aviation medicine and its own interest in developing manned space flight meant that Air Force physicians and scientists were closely connected to NASA's early spaceflight programs.
The Air Force also contributed communications, airlift, mapping, rescue and weather services. Three of the original seven astronauts selected for Project Mercury -- Gordon Cooper, Virgil "Gus" Grissom and Donald "Deke" Slayton -- were Air Force officers.
Mercury Spacecraft
The Mercury spacecraft weighs about 2,000 pounds and is nine feet tall with a diameter of 74.5 inches. The pilot reclined on a couch contoured to his body. There was very little room for movement in the spacecraft, but not much was required -- flights lasted from 15 minutes to 34 hours, with most lasting less than 9 hours.
The pilot needed to move only his arms and head, and he never left the spacecraft during flight. The craft re-entered earth's atmosphere blunt end first to slow the spacecraft and to shed the heat caused by friction with the air as the spacecraft descended into the atmosphere. The curved heat shield was coated with layers of heat resistant ablative resins which charred away to reduce structural heating, protecting the crewman and preventing damage to the spacecraft.
The Mercury spacecraft on display at the museum is a flight-rated production spacecraft that never flew. Manufactured by the McDonnell Aircraft Corp., it was shipped to Cape Canaveral, Fla., on April 18, 1963, and was used to provide parts in support of the final Mercury mission, flown by astronaut L. Gordon Cooper Jr. on May 15-16, 1963. The spacecraft is on loan from the Smithsonian National Air & Space Museum.
Click here to return to the Missile & Space Gallery.
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