Chapter 8: Training for space
Theme: April 1959 to April 1961. This chapter describes the astronaut training program and the strange devices used to simulate space flight.
When the astronauts reported aboard on April 9, 1959, we had no training devices, no manuals or text books. The spacecraft which they were to learn to operate had never flown; in fact, did not exist. Even the designs for it were not yet complete. Nevertheless, training had to begin, because we were hopeful of being ready to fly within a year. Actually, two years were to pass before the first manned flight, but we did not know this at the time.
We began with what we had. At first, the training consisted of classroom lectures and trips to visit the contractors’ plants. On these trips the engineers who were designing the spacecraft would describe their particular part of the system. We would get a chance to see the large blueprints and the first bits and pieces of hardware. We had our first experience of being closed up within a space slightly smaller than a phone booth in the Mercury mockup.
At Cape Canaveral we watched a launching of a Thor IRBM from the closest above-ground point which the safety office would allow. It was a beautiful night. A few dark cotton-puffs of clouds, their borders laced with reflected moonlight, sailed slowly across the sky. A broken silver path led across the waves to the rising moon. The rocket, an upright silver spike, stood on the pad, bathed in arc light. The count came to us over the radio -- 4,3,2,1 -- for a moment the whole Cape was illuminated with a brilliant flash. Slowly, carefully balanced on its jet of flame, the missile rose directly skyward until only its fiery tail could be seen. This was the first large missile launch that any of us had seen. All of the men came back highly excited. Each, visualizing himself a passenger, thrilled over the adventure that lay ahead.
As training equipment became available, we began to provide the astronauts with simulations of the unusual conditions they would meet in space. They felt the acceleration forces of launch, their weight multiplied many times, making even breathing a chore. They experienced weightlessness by flying roller coaster trajectories in a large jet transport. This was probably the most pleasant part of the braining program. They could literally fly, floating through the air doing twists and somersaults, having more fun than kids jumping on a bed. They were measured and fitted for pressure suits, and learned how it felt to be knights in shining armor, trying to carry around a stiff outer shell. They worked for hours learning how to squeeze through the small escape hatch of the spacecraft while encumbered with the suit and its bulbous helmet. They were sweated in heat chambers and tossed and turned in rotational devices. Every simulator which appeared to have any applicability to the flight was used to provide the astronaut with the training he needed for his job in space. We wanted the flight to provide no surprises. We hoped that everything experienced in space would have been encountered in training. We seem to have succeeded. Several of the astronauts reported that they thought the flights were easier than their training experiences.
A number of training devices originally considered were not used. It had been proposed that a series of training flights should be made with the Mercury capsule carried to an altitude of twenty miles on a large balloon. It was also suggested that an astronaut should sit in the spacecraft atop the Redstone rocket while it was being statically fired on the ground. These and a number of other proposals were studied, and at least initial plans were made to actually conduct the training. But in the end they were dropped because they appeared too costly or involved too much risk.