Gemini 8
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| Duration: ||10 heures
41 minutes
26 seconds
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| Distance covered: ||293.206 km
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| Orbits: ||6,75
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| Apogee:
||271,9 km
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| Perigee:
||159,9 km
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| Period:
||88,83 min
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| Slope: ||28,91 deg
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| Mass: ||3.789 kg
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! colspan=" 2" cellspacing=" 0" cellpadding=" 2" bgcolor=" #FFDEAD" |The crew
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|colspan=" 2" align=" center" |
(GD: Scott, Armstrong)
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! colspan=" 2" cellspacing=" 0" cellpadding=" 2" bgcolor=" #FFDEAD" |Crew of Gemini 8
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Gemini 8 (officially Gemini VIII) is the sixth live mission of the Programme Gemini and the twelfth American inhabited space mission.
Crew
- Neil Armstrong (1), pilot commander
- David Scott (1), pilot
Crew of reserve
- Charles Conrad, pilot commander
- Richard Gordon, pilot
Objectives
The mission had two main aims, only one was carried out:- To carry out an appointment then a stowing with a rocket-target Agena.
- To make a extra-vehicular exit longer than the 20 minutes of White with Gemini 4.
Course of the flight
Launching was without problem and, with Armstrong with the orders, the vessel makes a success of its maneuvres of approach and Amarrage with the Agena rocket-target. Little time after, the two men noticed a strange behavior of the Gemini-Agena unit: a rotation on the axis of Rolling. After having stopped this rotation, the astronauts noticed that it began again of more beautiful. Arsmtrong then decided to separate from Agena. Rotation became increasingly marked and Scott noticed an abnormal fall of the fuel level. Its commander deduced from it quickly that an engine of attitude of Gemini was to be blocked with the full power. He had to help himself of the engines of re-entry to stop rotation, which precipitated the return to earth of the vessel. Rotation was such as both pliotes approached the limit of the loss of consciousness, with the tragic consequences which one imagines. Remarkable coolness with which Neil Armstrong was left this problem (regarded as one of most serious in flight lived by NASA until the flight Apollo 13 and the explosion of the shuttles Challenger and Columbia) probably played a part when the first man should have been chosen having to go on the the Moon.
See the capsule Gemini 8
It is exposed to Neil Armstrong Air and Space Museum, Wapakoneta, Ohio, the United States.
Sources
Kennedy Space Center: Gemini VIII
Category: Program Gemini Category: 1966
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