Press Conference Flight of MA-6

8/7/2019 Press Conference Flight of MA-6

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,* N WS RE LEASENATiONAL o.ENAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION

Public Information Office, Cocoa Beach, FloridaFOR Pbvnes: SU 3-7781 &UL 3-6901I:OR RELEASE: IMMEDIATE

RELEASE NO. 62-41A

PRESS CONFERENCEFLIGffT OF MA- 6

February 239 l192

PARTICIPANTS:Mr. James E lWebbv Administrator, National Aeronautics and Space AdministrationMr. Robert R0 Gilruth, Director, Manned Spacecraft CenterLt. Col. John H. Glenn9 Jr.9 Mercury As ronautLt. Col. John A0 Powers9 Public Affairs Officer, Manned Spacecraft Center


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WEBB: Ladies an d gentlemen, sometHt ile r-,ie i:iornthl aJov he n Mercury hadmade its first dramatic demonstration of tr, ,'.jbdt of Le conuept of manned machines --r 'cecraft-booster combinations -- usil,:g wi~at ante hiac n U-re nation at that time, it was,, great pleasure.as ne w Admin strator to mec yord it Washinjtorn and arrange fo rCommander Alan Sheparci to tell you of his first fliqk ,rovirng this system.Today we are in another phase. In tile rneazr!me we have had a second proof byGrissom's flight and today we have th e oppo,;.rn;tv u!tr the policy of this nation ofrapid and accurate reporting ouhe features cf this p06s am to introduce the two menwho have been most responsible in this specific instance.Mr. Robert R. Gilruth, as you know, is Director of Project Mercury. He re-ceived the NASA Distinguished Service Medal from tl, President of the United Statestoday, as did John Glenn. So, here they are, an d I btKE /e Bo b Gilruth wants to saya word before we start.GILRUTH: Ladies and gentlemen, this is a tremendous occasion for nie an d I amsure in a very short moment John will be speaking fo r himself. This is John's day.It is more than a day, I am sure. I just want to say bed'ore I lose my brief spot herethat the part I played in today's program - the things that flash over my mind whilethe ceremony was going on were the names of my k.elf people like Walter Williams,Max Faget, Chuck Matthews -- I could go on a great lony list. These are thefellows that have really, on the planning and engineering side, done this job an d Iwas very, very proud and very happy to be a representative of theproject this morning.New I think you are all anxiously waiting to hear from the ma n whorea~ly was theIThor man on this team an d really puiled this job off, an d so it is my very, verygreat honor to pass this microphone over to Colonel John Glenn.GLENN: I know you are probably anxious to hear about what things were likeon the flight, and we might as well get sta,-ted On that. I ca n make a few brief remarksconcerning some of the major phases of it an d then we can field some questions hereif some of you have specific questions.First off it was quite a day. I don't know what you can say about a day in whichyou see four beautiful sunsets in on e day but it is pretty interesting -- three in orbitand one on the surface after I was back aboard sh~p. This is a little unusual, Ithink.We were asked some questions befohe the flight about ho w the delays affected ou rreadiness, and although I did not read some of the write ips, I understand there wereso~me considerable gross misconceptions pu t out about ho w the delays affected ou r

state of readiness.1 think C- ott Carpenter put it in probably the best light when he .aidI was the most fortunate one around with all the excitement going on and all the busi-ness around the Cape a.ea and all the preparations because all I had to do at the time


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was sit back and just hone the edge a little more an d keep in good shape. I think that pu tit in about its proper light. I certainly did not experience arny of the terrible sublimalimpressions or hallucinations that I was supposed to be receiving form all of this preflightactivity an d the cancellations.W e had out holds, of course, on previous launch attempts. The day, on the 20th,through that morning as the weather started to clear an d we could se e the big blue holescoming up, I really felt We were in a real go condition at that time, because the bc )sterwas ready an d everyone I think sort of gets go fever when you get all conditions se t

right. I felt that -- I think everyone was excited that morning.In the powered flight phase, the booster worked perfectly. Obviously it did fromthe fact that we came out within a very few feet per second of the velocity we plottedan d were shooting, of course, for velocities of a littJe over 25,000 feet pe r second,an d when you come out within just a few feet per second at that speed, this is veryaccurate control. It was a good insertion. I think the best words I have just aboutheard in my life were, "You have a seven orbit capability" from Al Shepard when hegave the go to me from the Capsule Communicator's position . That was a very wel-come sound. p oI don't want to go into a lot of details on the launch. I don't think they are necestsary, I think all of that ha s been pretty well covered from what I have seen in thepapers. As to our after-insertion then, as to the effect of zero g -- this, of course,is one of the big things we have wondered about through the earlier phases of theprogram -- wondering what effect zero g would have. This puts us into a ne w environmentthat we have ha d no experience with before, in airplanes, an d we extended this realm ofweightlessness of course, during the Redstone shots that Al an d Gus had, and we areextending it farther here. And I am very happy to report that there was just no illeffect at all that ! got from zero g. It was very pleasant, as a matter of fact. W e hadno tendency to particularly overreach switches or ha d an y trouble with the control as a

result of zero g. I'.was indeed a very, very pleasant experience.Someone told me last night after I ha d been talking so enthusiastically about thisit sounded like I was an addict to it. And I think that I probably am . It was a wonder-ful feeling. I thought that over a period of time we might experience some ill effectsfrom it in the way of nausea or disorientation, but there were none of these effects wha'.-soever -- no problem keeping oriented under zero g. I tried different head movementsto se e whether with certain head movements an d combination of head movements wewould get any discomfort or nausea. We did not experience any of these 'at all an dthese woundup with some rather violent head motions in roll, pitch an d yaw to se e if wewere going to induce any abnormal feeling. We did not. it was a very pleasant exper-

ience al I the way through.2


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Some of the things that happened under zero g sort of demonstrate ho w fast, though,a human being adapts to this situation. I recalled last night when we were discus-ingsome of these things -- the fact that I ha d ha d this little hand camera in my hand. I ha dtaken a picture and I worted to do something-with a switch immediately, an d 'l justseemed natural at that time after I ha d been weightless for I guess it was a half hour orforty-five minutes -- I had acclimated to this rapidly enough that it just seemed perfectlynatural rather than put the camera away I just put it out in mid-air an d let go of it andwent ahead with the switch position here and reached back for the camera an d went onwith the work.I rememn!er thinking afterwards we were treating this rather blase at the time here,but I think it demonstrates the point I am making -- that I think we all adapt very, veryrapidly to these new situations -- much more rapidly than even those of us who havebeen training for this for three years would have believed possible. But it seemed justthe natural thing to do. If you were just letting go of something for a minute, why youput it there and let go of it an d go back to it when you have time.Under this zero g condition, of course, it would be easy to lose different items --have them float away an d get out of reach some place. So far as I know, there was

only one item that got lost, an d that was a little can of film that I got out an d tried toput in the camera an d I let it slip out of my fingers an d vent to grab for it an d insteadof clamping onto it, I batted it an d it went sailing off around behind the instrumentpanel an d that was the last I sa w of it. I don't know where it went to.Eating experiments -- we ha d planned to do some of that. W e ha d tried this beforeon weightless flights in the airplanes, simulating weightlessness for a minute or so,an d it hadn't appeared to be an y big problem. However, we were going to try it an d Idid. I ha d one tube of food that I could squeeze into my mouth an d this presented noproblems, swallowing, or getting it down, at all. I think the only restriction, pro-bably, to the food will be that it not be of a particularly crumbly nature, like crumbly

cookies with a lot of little particles to them that might break off because you wouldn'tbe able to net all of these back unless you ha d a butterfly net of some kind, I guess.But as long as the food is solid, yo u can hold onto it an d ca n get it into your mouth,then from that point on there appears to be no problcmn. It is aUl positive action,Yomr tongue forces it back iito your throat, an d you swallow normally, anti it is allpositive -- a positive replacement machine all the way through.


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Speed sensat-ons, I have been AxKed . i.y since the flight aboutsensations of speed. Speedv, oF couCse 'ei..ve. if you are in a complete --if you have nothing to refer to, you ouWd {me go-ing almost any speed and youwouldn't any sensation of this, I -nirik 'til Cireaeest I cal come to it is mostof you have flown on jet airlinerls or hase Slo1 On jet airplanes at 30 thousandfeet or so and I think the feeling of sp-eeJ i.-float t~he same as fiing in anairliner such as that and looking door' ast -qaJs say maybe aL heights of 10thousand feet below you if ou are n0,ay I ti.;ok the speed at which theground goes out from under you, just. trie sen->azion of speed that you have,from orbital altitude, would be pretty ciose to that same speed.It is difficult to describe the sp~eed -en v, 0iohen you have nothing torelate it to, but I think that is probabiy e >,"st we can come to it.It as very noticeable over a good pat ;.i- track, there were cloudsof one type or another that obscured som'e &o 'II" treas we wanted to look at.Part of the western U0 SOD down across n&j -'he=n Mexico, almost the wholePacific was covered by one type cloud or ano-herBoth coming down around Austraila - Australia was always in the dark sowe never could see Australia, although wsoud see lights from Perth andcities around Perth too0The sunsets arc probably the most impress. ve rhing that you would seein orbital flight. These are very briiiiarViv/ coored hue and the colors(tretch out, way out from the sun to the horizon, the horizon stays light( J3r, I would estimate some four to five minutes after sunsets which I foundrather surprising, because 1 thought that darkness would come on much morerapidly than thato I thought it would be maybe just a matter of a minuteafter the sun went down, but apparently there is quite a it of light curvingaround through the atmosphere that keeps the horizon very visible for aperiod of some five minutes or so,This would bring us around to a suns7sc. Ancn this turned into a prettyinteresting area each time around, as I th:,Tk .s oost of you are aware0 Atthe first light of sunrise, the first sunrze : cane to, I was still facedback toward the direction I had come from in ormal orbital attitude, and justas the first rays of sun came up onto the capsule: I had glanced back downinside to check some instruments and do something, and when I glanced backout9 my initial reaction was that I was looking out into a complete star field,that the capsule had probably gone up while I wasn't looking out the windowand that I was looking into nothing buts new stat field, but this wasn't thecase because a lot of the little things that I thought initially were stars wereactually a bright yellowish green about the siize and intensity as looking at

a firefly on a real dark night0 And the!e lilttle particles that were outsidethe capsule were, I would estimate, some six to ten feet apart and there wereliterally thousands of them0 As far as I could look off to each side I couldsee them; I could see them back along the path, Later on I turned around sothat I as facing the direction from which they appeared to be coming andalthough in hat direction toward the bright sunlight of the dawn most of themdisappeared, you could still see a few of them coming toward the capsule. I*,A


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was moving very slowly through this ft.eei [ st mated that my velocitythrough this field was some three to f .1., -S pet hour0 They did notappear to emanate from the capsule,I thought of two things that they might be, initially. One was thecloud of needles that the Air Force put up some time ago and that appearsto have disappeared somewhere I thought we had suddenly found them againbut they didn't look like that. Thuy d1,din t look like they had any lengthto them at all,, The other thing I thought was perhaps as we use ourhydrogen peroxide jets, the hydrogen peroxide decomposes into steam andoxygen and comes out under high heat pressure and I thought perhaps thiswater vapor was then turning to snowflakes ana the luminous light from thesun was causing them to flouresce for some reason or other0 But when Iworked the thrusters on the capsules this did not appear to be causing anysnowflakes or anything like it at all0 So all I an say about these is hatI observed them and saw them for about from the first light of sun to aperiod of some three and a half to four minutes, that time period, madeclose observation of them0 Occasionally one would come drifting up by thecapsule window9 very close, in the shade from the sun, At that time itwould look like a very small white particle, And they would vary in sizeprobably from maybe pinhead size to maybe abotit three-eighths of an inchin diameter, of that order.There are numerous things that some of the people are thinking aboutand looking into, but others -- I have no theory myself except we observedthem, we saw them on all three orbits about the same length of time ateach sunrise; they were very luminous, a yellowish green color, andas George Ruff, our psychiatrist, listened to this and said, "What did theysay John?"We had some problems during the flight.. hle automatic stabilizationcontrol system was causing some difficulty and did not appear to becorrecting up the way it hould., I as able to use the manual controlduring that period and this appeared to -- idn't cause any trouble at all.It seemed very natural to take over manual control after all of the trainerwork we have done. Trainer simulations, incidentally, were very, very closeto the orbital control situation0 This was particularly true in he ly-by-wiremode where we control through the automatic thrusters, When we started havingthis problem at the end of the first orbit, I as largely on manual controlfrom there on until the end of the flight. Some of the other observationswe had planned to make had to go by the board while I tried to work out thecontrol system problems and we spenm most of the last two orbits working onthis, making some other observations. but largely concentrating probably 90percent of the time on the control systemGround 9 as probably most of you know, the ground telemetry receivers hadpicked up an impulse that we possibly had a loose heat shield, and for thatreason it as deemed advisable to keep the Mretro package in place duringreentry so that it would go ahead and buyn off, hut by that time we wouldbe in a high enough aerodynamic force field to keep the heat shield inplace, in case it was, in fact, loose..This made a pretty spectacular reentry from the capsule standpoint, because4 ~. as the retro pack -- as I retained the retro package and entered into the firstpart of the high heat area of the reentry9 the straps on the retro pack brokeloose and I elt a bump on the capsule and thought that the retro package hadjettisoned as it as supposed to do,, Apparently this was not true, but Ithought so at the time.


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As it went on into the higher heat pulse and the glow picked up outside to a sort ofbright orange olow outside the window, it became apparent that something was tearing up onthe heat shield end of the capsule, because there were large pieces as big as the end ofyour finger to pieces probably 7 or 8 inches indiameter were breaking off and falling off theedge of the capsule and coming back up past the window and were flaming very brightly;you could see the fire an d the glow from them as they would come back up past the window.This obviously was the retropackage tearing up and breaking off as we knew it wouldif it had been retained. I thought at that time, however, that the retropackage had alreadybeen jettisoned so there were some moments of doubt there whether the heat shield had been

damaged and whether it might be tearing up itself. An d this could have been a bad day al laround if that had been the case.But it "wasvery spectacular looking out into this orange glow outside the window --abright orange -low -- and seeing these big flaming chunks go back along the flight path.I understand there was some misconception also when we refer to this term"blackout" on reentry. I was questioned aboard ship as to how I had survived the blackout,when I regained consciousness and a ew things like this. When we refer to blackoutduring reentry, communications blackout is what we are referring to in this case. Weprobably should reterm this a comm loss, or something like that so we don't confuse itwith a blackout of the astronaut involved.0 This is due to high ionization around the capsule and makes it impossible for theradio frequencies we are using to get in and out from the capsule.G's during reentry got up to about 8. Th e parachute functioned in acompletelynormal fashion. That is probably the prettiest little old thing you ever saw inyour life.To look out the window and see that parachute. I remember Al Shepard making some com-ments about that after his flight, about how pretty that parachute was, and I concur. Thatis just about as pretty as anything you see at that point.The capsule was pretty hot after reentry, very hot inside, and I was getting verywarm inside. I was sweating rather profusely when I came down, when I landed, so Iremained as still as I could in the capsule, trying to adA as little heat load to it as Ipossibly could. The Destroyer Noa was close by, had me spotted, and came over andmade an excellent pickup of th e capsule, came aboard, and at that time I had been heatedup enough that I was sweating very profusely -- long enough that I decided after takingout the panel, the right side of the panel down, preparing to egress out through the top,I decided at that time since we were already on deck that it was hardly -wortish the effortand I should g-t on out in comfort, and so I did. And we blew the hatch on the side afterchecking to see that everyone was clear outside, and came on out through the side hatch.

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I was not in such bad shape at that time that could ro . have gotten out through the top if Iha d ha d to do it. I still cpuld have come out tLrOujgh We top, but at that time I was hot andha d been sweating for a long period of time an d it scwe] like the thing to do to get on out ofthere at that time.

I think perhaps the difficulties that we had an d the action I had to take may actuallyhave been a blessing in disguise in on e way, Lecause it showed when we had to a man ca ntake over control of the various systems, operate rqanivally, still know what he is doing,not have an y ill effects in this regard from zero g, an d probably if sufficient study of ourrecords from this flight warrants it, we probably ca n go on some future flights with consider-able less automation an d less complexity, we hope, as a result of some of the things welearned on this flight. W e certainly hope so ar'yway, bt't before we make any quick decisionsalong that line, of course, we want to review a lot of the data much more thoroughly than wehave so far.

These things are all step by step items. Al, of course, added to our knowledge alarge amount on his flight. Gus added more. I added a little more, I guess on this one, an dthere will be many more to come. Deke Slayton, of course, is up next, an d we are lookingforward to that flight with just as eager anticipation for him as I looked forward to this onefor me. I think we have really hardly scratched the surface. We have a lot of attentionfocused on this right now, but our efforts really have not gotten us very far into space, ifyou think about it.If you think of the diameter of the earth being represented at about 100 miles to theinch, this would mean that the earth's diameter could be represented by 80 inches, approx-

s imately, which would only be about ten inw'-s higher than I am , if I held my hand up overPhonhy head, this bould be on the order of 80 inches, if I were standing up. Our orbitalaltitude, if that was the surface of the earth, an d I was the diameter line of the earth, ou rorbital altitude would be about one-and-a-third inches above that 80 inches, So perhapsif we -- if you think of the enormity of space, it makes our efforts seem puny at this time..But these are all step by step functions we go through. As we said, all the manned flightswe have ha d to date have added information an d th;, flight, I hope, added a little bit more,and there are more to come.

We are interested, of course, in some of the reactions from abroad in regard to theflight. I think it is well to know that in this regard as far back as 1958 the President,at that time President Eisenhower, proposed that we make joint effort with other prople inregards to our exploration of space, an d these were largely ignored at the time. PresidentKennedy, shortly after his inauicturationl, o1r (lui rino his ilnauglqration in his address, Ibelieve, reiterated this again -- the desire for the peaceful exploration of space andpeaceful cooperation in this regard. So we don't want to let this particular initiative, Idon't think, be taken away from us. This has been proposed for quite some period of timeby our ow n leaders in this country.7

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I couldn't pass up any opporTunlLty Iie this without rendering a greatnote of thanks to all the people here at the Cape and the whole Mercurynetwork who performed so beautifully during the fiight, They acted like a realbunch of pros and it was teal gratifying after all the practice we have beenthrough with them to see everyone come through as they did during the flight,Now this goes for the blockhouse crew - I hate to start naming names because wejust wouldn't know where to turn it off and I would hate to hurt anxtody'sfeelings by missing them so I won't start tu t the blockhouse crew, and thepeople at the hangar who checked out all the capsule and the hoosters and thework on the pad, the range, the recovery efforts of the Navy, the Air Forcesupport we had -- it as just a big, across-the-board team effort, As I saidearlier, almost a cross cut of Americana,, all People in ifferent walkscombining together on a project and we got the results we did. It akes youproud to be associated with people like that when everyone does work togetherso cooperatively.

I think that President Kennedy in repeating our desire for peacefulefforts in space stated the case very aptly and properly, I on't know whatI could add to what he has said on it, Diplomacy, obviously, is ot myparticular field. But the results of this flight could possibly, I uess,have some far reaching effects in this regard, Ifit contributes any wayto peace from our efforts, I certainly would consider that there is no betterpurpose in my life for my endeavor that have contributed and that we mighthave a little more peaceful cooperation in he world in his area. Thank you.

I might add one thing here, one person I wanted to pay a real tribute towho has worked long and hard, particularly close with me during this, and thatis Scott Carpenter. Where is cott? He is around here someplace. Stand up.Nobody knows the hours that he put in for somebody else and we saw Scotta couple of days ago perform another feat too, lie risked his own life to saveanother man's life while swimming out at Grand Turk the other day, That maynot be generally known either. This was very impressive, When you have an

Aqua-lun& orn and you are down about 80 foot depth and you are trying to giveyour eon air to sorebody else to help them out, this is almost heroic in myboot..

Some of the people here, I think you may have seen this morning in omeof the activities. I would like to introduce them here, Here is he realbrains and the power-behind our household, my wifeL Annie, right here.My daughter, Lyn and son Dave, right next to her.My mother and dad who, as the President said this morning, started all.this trouble a long time ago,And Annie's father and mother, Dr, and Mrs, Caster.I think scattered around up here in front are the other astronauts andtheir wives. You know most of them by sight and I am afraid itwould taketoo much time to introduce everyone individually. Why couldn't we haveeveryone stand all at one time, and all the rest of the families who are here.We have quite a contingent here. Little ones too. Everybody.

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POYERS: John, in getting started with the question period, I would liketo ask, since we don't have mikes out in he audience, would you please standand identify yourself and let us hear your question,

Q: I would like to know, Col. Glenn, if you would like to make anothersuch trip, and if you know at this time whether other trips are plannedfor you-,

GLENN: The answer to the first questior3, obviously, yes. And the answerto the second question, no. I ave no knowledge of future flights. As I saidbefore, this stuff -- you can become addicted to-it rather rapidly0

IVEBB: Any man who flies as well as John Glenn will fly again0GLENN: I'm with you.Q: Col, Glenn, based on your experience and ability to fly the capsule

when the control problem developed, what changes are you going to recommendin he capsule's control for Deke Slayton's flight.POWERS: The question was, in view of the difficulties we had in ur

attitude control system, what changes was John going to recommend in ekeSlayton's spacecraft?GLENN: Was that the question, the changes in he system itself, or changesin is ability -- changes as a result of his ability to probably control itproperly,Q: Changes in he control system and also how much more do you think the

man can do?GLENN: Well, before we make any positive statement like that, as toexact recommendations for future flights, we need to do a lot more looking

into records and data and get all the tapes back from the various stationsaround the network0 We have several week's work to do just sitting downand analyzing the data0 I don't think I want to get into at this time anystatements that I recommend this or that on the preliminary look that wehave had on the information so far0

Q: Col Glenn, what did the stars and the earth look like from upthere:GLENN: The stars, I as a little bit surprised, I think I maybeexpected to see the stars in greater quantity, in greater numbers, than Ihad seen them before0 The nearest think I could compare them to and didcompare it o during de-briefing was the, I think, if ou have been out inthe desert on a very clear, brilliant night when there is nolmoon up and the

stars just seem to jump out at you 9 that is ust about the way the stars look,We get some light reduction because of the light having to come through thewindow of the capsule, of course, And apparently this reduction in light mayalmos* approximate the losses we normally get on a very clear night throughthe atmosphere0 So I didn't feel that I could see any greater number of stars.

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They were not bainlrng, they came through very clear., straight shining J At;there was no flickering on and off, But other than Tha:, it ooked vc/Isimilar to looking at the sky on a very, very clear niighT in he desert,QQ John, there were a number of experiments you svere rot able to makebecause, of course, you were busy flying the spacecraft Coily !ou give us.a general idea of some of those you woere not able to pe:fiDfm Tis t1TnL witha reflection here perhaps as to what we might expect fo-r Deke Slayton s flight?POW9ERS The question has to do with some of tIle experiments we did notaccomplish because John's attention and time and energy we- devoted tocontrolling the spacecraft, What some of those experiments might have been

would we do them in future flights? Were there very many?GLENNo There were several that we had wanted to look at. We had wantedto take some infrared pictures for the weather people.. We wanted to takesome ultra violet pictures around on the dark side, We had some eye checkswith some small instruments we wanted to make, There were several things ofthis nature. I was going to eat some more and never got around to that afterour difficulties started a little bit, That else did w. have ,The air glow filter that would only pass the ;ye'i_* ij.ght which is ofinterest to some of the weather people0 That's abo .,IQ: Col. Glenn, when did you know that you hiad p)ssible emergency onyour hands and how concerned were you about it?GLENN: Of the retro rockets?Q: Nos of the heat shield problem0 When did you first know about that,and how worried were you?GLENW'" I don't recall the exact time that I knew about it, nd I knewabout it for some time in advance of the retro sequence. I can't pin atime to it xactly. I didn't really contest this decision from the ControlCenter because I knew that the experts we had on the ground had certainlyth ought this thing out much more thoroughly than I could in light, tomake the recommendation that they could make0 I knew that there would notbe any change of this magnitude made unless it had certainly been consideredfrom every possible angle by many, many experts on the ground, all the peoplewho designed the system and all the other experts who were in he Control

Center0 So while it as of some concern of course because it as a malfunction;we never have had a capsule reenter with a retro pack on it before -- somethinguntried like that, you look at it with a little bit askance before you try it,of course.So there was some concern about it. I think the major concern, thoughs wa

when these chunks started breaking off during reentry and I could see them goinjback by the capsule. This was a period where I wasn!t sure whether it was aretro pack or whether it was the damaged heat shield beginning to break up.Obviously, it was the retro pack0i> ~0 J


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Q: Is there anything no w that stands out in your mind as the most spectacular or mostinteresting thing which yo sa w of the surface of the earth?

GLENN: The ijestion1 is regarding what wvere the most spectacu ar things I could see.Well, tnumber one, it is a; very spectacular fromt p there. You ca n se e a tremendousdistance. You are tip above the atmosphere. You Zee this little horizon band, very brilliantblue colors, even on the (lay side. It would be difficult to pin down an y one thing as beingmore spectacuiar than others. Certainly, one of the most beautiful th-ngs is to be on the darkside with the full mo, out, and se e this coming off of the clouds down below, and thenrunning over and seeing the very shdrp demarcation line to where the stars keep coming downbelow the horizon. It is interesting to note that your sunsets an.d the stars moving downbehind the horizon occur at approximately '8 times their normal speed. This makes for apretty speedy sunset. It's very rapid.POWERS: John, you mentioned at the debriefing that you made some observationsabout ho w you could se e the earth's surface. Were yo u able IMea l the difference betweenland an d sea7GLENN: Yes. You ca n se e different patterns in the ocean current, liKe the GulfStream, for instance. You ca n se e the changing colors there. Yo U ca n se e on the earth --on e area that was, I could observe very clearly -- was the area n Fewest of El Paso, and

that is an area where there is a lot of desert with a big irrigate, rc -i'-at comes down avalley northwest of El Paso. And that stood out very much. vu ca n see the squares of theirrigated areas from that distance. I wouldn't guarantee that I '.s seeing the small irri-gated squares that they ha d -- each individual patch -- but the larger irrigated squaresthat probably ha d major dikes around them, I could se e these very clearly.Patterns like that, I think you may . . . patterns around a city, where you think,well, now, there is a bridge. You can se e a little dot or a little spot. You think thereis a bridge. I think you determine a lot of this by possibly the fact that you see a valleyan d a river an d you know at a town like that if there is a spot there, there is probably abridge across that river, so you ca n say that is a bridge. But you can't pick out things

like a bridge, or a railroad trestle or anything like that with an y certainty, from thistype distance, of course.

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Q: What did you identify, Col. Glenn, at El Centro, California. . .perhaps, and larger nearby cities like San Diego?GLENN: I didn't see San Diego. I saw part of the Imperial Valley,and I could see the Salton Sea. This was an area where there was a sort

of a gap in he clouds at that time0Once again I could see the irrigated district around El Centro. I

had lived in l Centro a number of years ago for a short time, so I wasfamiliar with the area, The Salton Sea area was very visible. Towns over .you cai: see blocks or squares in owns. Ile had figures before we wouldprobably be able to pick out items down to say 100 yards to 150 yards long,and I think this was probably a fair estimate.

Q: I think Dr0 Douglas said yesterday that after checking you out hewouldn't mind sending his wife and his 14-year old son on a spaceflight if hewas sure he would get them back. Do you agree that future astronauts mightneed much less physical training than you and your colleagues have gotten in thelast three years'?

GLENN: The question was a remark that Bill Dougla, made about that becauseof the condition I came back in he would be willing to send his wife and sonalong, and did this mean that we probably could do iWith less physical condi-tioning in the future.Well, I would have been very happy to have had Mary and Mike along but itwas a little bit crowded. As far as lessening our physical training, I don't

think so. You don't know what you might run into on future flights. Wecertainly would not want to makea categorical statement that because we hadone successful outing we would never run into any more strenuous things,physically than we ran into this time0 And I think that in t least theforeseeable future we would want to be as prepared as we could for anycontingency we would run into as we were this time.

POWERS: It is important to indicate that Dr0 Douglas qualified hisstatement yesterday, referring specifically, for example to a geologist, andhe indicated that we would first select a group of geologists and then takethe most physically fit fran among those.

Q: John, in the future we plan to experiment with a so-calledrendezvous or docking technique in space. Itis going to be important toknow how your depth perception is in space. Did you have any trouble figuringout where the booster was when it started leaving you behind?

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GLENN: This was qi[ite a sight. Right at turiarc'und - I was separated from thebooster -- the camsuie dcrmped -- star(ed1 iZS tLitlaroLuird, and as it swuing aro,:rid the boosterwas sitting there ptrobao:y A hit a hundreJ yards, very visible, very clear. W e talked about.this during debriefing. That. if I had the capabiLhty of having a litte b.t of thrusL to move overin that direction, Coni.d0 ItiI\. iaiuuvered toward it I thierk very defi ,-tely you could, I don't Ithink this WOUld be a; y pirobicm at all frmni that di sta1 ce The booster, because of its differ-ent velocity assumes a i i;e :ifererIt orbit than I had, aAd it wVellt s!igilt!y Linder me and waspassing ahead of ,it aoid *`te; ;A lolver orbit, the last time salt i. This was olt . . . prettywell over toward the coast oG Africa, and I did not see it again after thaL.

Q: Witih o ref. p;,coint, woimid you have an y trouble catching up and meeting some-thing fairly closely"GLENN: You say Ft Nmlo reference point. We would hlave no troubllcJ. I think you arealways doing Lo have a refeienct' pii:-r of starts; it. 1DnI ' hbe -t`,l or it ma y be an artificial hori-zo n that you have set up at a certain gyro anqie, but I don't think you are -- in effect you aresaying that you couldn't rendezvous V th a blirnd person. "Il.,s is triue, I think yo u will alwayshave some reference, thoiyli. I dow t think you will be colItpleely without reference.Q: We know that answers aren't all i, vet, bit o:,; the ',-sis of your l)reserit judgment,where would you pin down the coritrJd problein -- to the hior0iZU! scmnners that reset the gyros,to the gyros or to the reaction jets?GLENN: i think it was a combination of things. I thinik v- ihadk a little bit of thrustertrouble. I think we . . 0n the horizon scanners I am not sre I u.I...:k perhaps some ofthe horizon scanner trouble could have been eliminated had fik_ to a free gyro position.W e did not do this. W e are still getting our horizon scai ne, . ;ts This may possiblyhave added to our troubles . . its easy, though, to hindsight 'tie 20/20 after you are onthe ground. But we are still looking into these things.Q: Could you tell me what the highest cabin temperature was?GLENN: I think the onboard cabin temperature, about the highest I observed was about105. Once again, we are checking telemetry records an d will probably have more accurateinformation on that later on.Q: I assume you had an opthalmological examination an d I wonder whether the phy-sician found an y cosmic ray tracks in tihe lenses of your eyes. If so , ho w dense are they?GLENN: The question is whether I ha d ha d a complete eye examination following thisflight, whether there were any cosmic ra y indication of damage to the eyes. Where's BillDouglas'? I think he shouid answer all of this on the medical.Q: Dr. Douglas, an y damage'DOUJGLAS: No damage.Q: I asked if there were an y tracks -- Dr. Douglas, any tracks?DOUGLAS: No tracks. 13


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Q: I'd like to ask two questions, Colonel Glenn. First of all, elaborate preparationswere made prior to the flight an d during the flight to ascertain certain facts with regard tointernational records. First of all, what records were we after an d what will we claim inthe way of records.Anid the other is what pictures did you manage to take, have they been developed,an d what do they show, if anything, and will we get them?GLENN: The international flight records. I did not go into this in any great detailas to all the flight records that might be claimed as a result of something like this. Weunderstood that there had been some question of verification during some of the earlierorbital flights and I have no comment on that on e way or the other. If they wanted toadequately verify these flights . . . I was busy enough on the preparation that I did not

worry too much about certification, ! am afraid.POWERS: I mignt say tnat tne FAI did witness the flight; tne\ niadwitriessesOil boLn ends. They have acquired the proper certificated an d we will turn our dataover to them.Q: What about the pictures, John?GLENN: Pictures were taken of general views of different land areas, areas thatwere partici4Jarly clear; Florida here, southeastern part of the United States taken froman angle; Af rica, the desert area; many cloud pictures, many sunrise pictures. I triedto get pittures of the little glowing objects I described. Apparently they were not ofsufficient intensity to come through, at least on the first look we look at some repro-Q uctions we took of the pictures the other day. As to when these will be released, I haveno idea. \Ale are still looking at them.Q: Did you notice any difference in the accelerated effect on the body as opposedto the decelerated effects on the body, at the en d of the flight, as the result of this periodof weightlessness?GLENN: I can notice no effects at all. This I felt just the same on reentry as

our runs on the centrifuge where we were practicing reentry, for instance. It got up toabout 8 g's and this is a very tolerable level .. . with the body in the couch the waywe are, an d I ha d no ill effects from it at all.At 8 g's you are not just lying back relaxed; you are working against it, but we haveall been up to the neighborhood of 14 to 16 g's previously on the centrifuge, so 8 g's is notintolerable at all.Q: Can you be just a little more specific on when you got the indication of troublewith the heat shield? We were told it was in the first orbit. I'd like to know if it was in thefirst or second orbit. Secondly, apparently there was some discussion about aborting themission after the second orbit or ending the mission prematurely. I was wondering whetherit was on your decision that they went on into a third orbit.() GLENN: I really don't recall heat shield trouble. Do you recall, Alan? You wereon Cap Com.POWERS: The people on the Control Center knew about it much earlier in the flight.Perhaps the first you knew about it, John, was not until the third orbit?


16/19

GLENN: You knew it, I believe, at the end of She first orbit. I tink they knew it at theend of t,:, ivst o;bit. Don't oin me down on this. I think they Knew it at the end of the firstorbit, and I tl ink tGere wnre cl1 e-Aon S )Ut Ou t to rm e about it during the second orbit,about w;:eL; er I had a liglit indication or not.This is -- once again we will plan back the tapes and we can Dare it down almostto the second. I don't bel ieve t hi s was of any si gni f i cance, however.The second part of your question was whether we were going to termi nate the"I ght at the end of two orbit s. Thei e was a deci si on to be made there, because wehad some control system probl ems. ;-.t that ti me I think the Control Center feltwe had the capsul e under ,' i ne enough control that we wool d g..i n nothi ng by re-ent er i ng at t hat t i me. I .elt t he sa r e way. Fk recoi; menclat i on was that wewe. e st i I I i n a go st at u,. .-And they agreed we wer e st i I o, Jo we wenL to threeorbits. Ir anythi ng, at a time I ike ;.at, i, you a e goi ng to have to make a mianuialretr ofi re, you mi ght as wel I st ay up and get mo- e pr act i ce.Q--John, you sai d "boy, that was a real ii ( ebal I, " when you started the reentryprocess. Can you describe to us your sensations as you started and during reentryand the ki nd of control I i ng you were doing during reent rv unt il the chute openi ng.GLENN: the sensations during reentry, duei ing the fi rtbal i, I guess you wouldsay cauti oU s apprehension, o, something I ike that, and th! s i . rn unknown area,ofcourse, and we have had very little experience with a mar, ir:.ide o a glowingI fire like this that you can see outside the window. 'imle have con idence that theablation shield will take care of this. It did.But this ik a completely new experience and you are a little apprehensive ofit at the tir'ie, I think.

r hat kind of control were you doing ?GLENN: The control was damping. It was not controlling to a specific attitude.As the capsule would set up psci!iations you just try to damp them out and keepthe thing to as near a zero rate as you can. The only movement the capsule ismaking is -- you do have a constant roll rate pLu in at that time of about 10degrees per second, which gives us omr even ilight path: as you coise down so youdon't get any dispersion from cg being oT r location.!) : Colonel,how large a view did you have at any one time. F-or example, couldyou see all of Florida in one glance.GLENN: Yes, well, when I was well off the eat.,coc.sL he.e once I could seeback across Florida and I remember stating that I could see the r'Jssissippi Deltaat that time. It was pretty clear al ong the Gul. coast. Yourview to the horizonapproaches 9,O0 miles.Q: The question was when we go on manual control and switch back and forthfrom automatic to manual, whether we waste fuel doing this, since the capsul edrops into this high torque orientation mode.A: The answer to that is you don't drop into this high torque Orientation modeif you position the capsule accurately on your orbit attitude that you want tobegin wi th before you swi tch over. If you swi tch over to automati c mode, whenyou are a way out at some odd ball attitude, thee it kicks into this high toquemode, and uses fuel at a rather rapid rate. So you don't want lo do that too manytimes. If we are on manual and you position this accurately before you switchback to automatic, then you use no more fuel than you would normally.

1115


17/19

Q. Colonel Glenr, did you observe anything that was at varia'nce with the two Russiancosmonauts?GLENN: I don't know that we had complete reports from the Russian cosmonauts onwhat they observed or saw, or felt. We have had some reports. I don't believe I would careto comment on it any further than that. I think probablv this will be the subject of more dis-cussion as we learn more about their programs. Perhaps we should ask them. Our program iscompletely open. Theirs is a secret one. They can compare with what I saw.Q: To get back to the fireflies . . . did you have any point of reference to measureor estimate the. size of these or conceivably could they have been much iarger an d fartheraway ?GLENN: No, I don't think so because I could se e some drifting up very close to thewindow, and coming in the shadow of the capsule, an d they would lose most of their phos-pherescence or luminescence as they came into this shadow area right close to the capsule.You could see them just right outside of this window, you could se e the little diameters.Also you could look off to the side an d as you moved through this field of particles or what-ever it was you cobild see them changing relative position to the capsule as you went by, andthis gives you a sort of depth perception.Q: Would you elaborate on the reports tha yo u sa w some orange and blue bands atsunset?GLENN: Yes, you do, you see . . .The question was whether I had orange and blue bands visible at sunset. Whenthose pictures are released, I think they will show some of this. As the su n goes down,it is a very white brillianit light, as it goes below the horizon, yo u get your light comingto yo u through the atmosphere. It is a very bright orange color down to the surface, it palesout into sort of a blue, a darker blue an d then off into black. It is sort of like looking ata spectograph. It takes your white light, broadens it out into all of its color element andthat is just about what you see. It is not quite like a rainbow, but it is the same principleinvolved, anyway.Q: How long did you control on fly by wire and how long on manual?GLENN: This is something we want to total out. It was for very extended periodsof time. The last practically all of the last two orbits I was on either fly by wire or manual,so there will be probably an hour and fifteen minutes average for each control mode, butthat is not a real definitive statement. We have to total these times out when we get therecords analyzed.Q: What was the noise level inside the capsule?GLENN: The noise level of the capsule in orbit was very similar to what it is oil U',pad out there. You have the whine of the inverters, gyros, valves, the hiss of the oxygenO inhe helmet hose, it is not a loud intensity. I don't know what the decibel level of it isexactly, but it didn't appear to be any different in orbit than it is out here when they arerunning checks on the pad. 16


18/19

Q: Ca n yo u give us some idea of your schedule for the next few days, particularlywhen do yo u have to get back to work?GLENN: I don't know, I think ou r schedule for the next few days is a little bit vagueat the moment.. I don't know what we are putting ou t on that.WEBB- May I sa y just a word there? The Speaker of the House ha s invited Col. Glennan d all of the astronauts an d their wives to a joint session of the Congress on Monday. It isnot yet determined whether all wish to go, or ca n go, but certainly Col. Glenn will be there,I say, because lie ha s been invited to address the joint session. Beyond that, it is plannedto have a press conference ii; Washington fo r the Washington press, following a luncheon

which the Vice President and I will give on Monday. Beyond that, it is planned that thefour astronauts who have not yet flovn vwill continue with their prog.jam, znd the Mayor of Ne wYork ha s invited Col Glenn and Commander Shepard an d Captain Grissom and Bob Gilruth upto see the welcome of the city an d have a parade and to be received in City Hall by his Honor,the Mayor. All of this is at sort of tentative or somewhat indefinite planning stage. We aregoing to have a conference right after this meeting with all the astronauts to see what theitdesires are. Dr. Dryden, Dr. Seamans, an d I are going to meet with Bo b Gilruth an d flyback together tonight to try to figure out precisely what the situation is. I ma y say that theMayor of St. Louis ha s asked very urgently that I bring Alan Shepard with me there tomorrowwhere I am going to make the Founder's Day Address at Washington University. Again, thisis a subject we will discuss after the meeting.GLENN: Any other questions about my schedule?Q: Col. Glenn, did yo u hear Commander Shepard advise yo u to try to jettison yourretropack when you reached one to on e an d a half g's on reentry?GLENN: No, I did not, an d this occurred just at the beginning of communicationsloss, an d the reason we know this is last night after we had finished the meeting, we finallygot copies of the onboard recorder tape an d we played these over last night rather late andwent through the reentry and Al comes on the air just at the start of this communication andstarts to tell me to jettison this, and the people-who were listening with me said that that iswhat he went ahead and said. He is about halfway through his transmission and it fadesright out to nothing, an d I never received it. If we had had three more seconds, I guess, oftime before we got our communications blackout during reentry, I would have received themessage.Q: Were the straps gone by then?GLENN: Yes, the straps were gone by then, anyway. The straps burned off . . .when we had, I estimate, not over a half g on the capsule. It was early in the program.

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Coi. Glen.:,, your wnite shoIRed us this morning th e pin that you gave her -- theIN c. o'rital Friendship 7. Whai other personal effects did you have in the cap-sule ?GLENN: None to speak of'.Q: Did yo u Lse the little red lights at the end of your fingertips?GLENN: Yes, I found these very handy. I could turn them on an d off with alittle switch on the back of the hand -- the little ringertip lights with a smallbulb -- fo r looking at charts, ,or checking a map in Whe c psule type lighting wehad. These turned out to be very handy, an d I used Lheni repeatedly. I like themvery much, and am glad they decided to put them on.Q: I woul d like to know if it ha s been determined as yet as to whether theheat shield was in danger of becoming loose or whether it was a false signal ?GLENN: No, it was a false signal. I think this has been reasonably welldetermined now that it was a false signal.GILRUTH: It was the da y iBef ore yesterday, Walt, before you came over toGTI that it was a malfunctio ning limit switch that gave a false signal. Theheat shield was securely latched all the time we were worry hi y so. -Q: Colonel, if we could get back to your schedule... do you have any plans

to go outside the United States or would you object to being utilized in theway that Major Gagarin was ?GLENN: Well I think this gets into a little different field than I am qualifiedto comment on right now. We may have to discuss some things like this in thefuture. I think there are no plans immediately that I know of.WEBB: Obviously this program ha s many implications for the total foreignpolicy image of the United States abroad. We, of course, want to learn allwe can about space. W e want to learn the use of men in space, but we mustbe conscious of these other implications. These questions will be debatedwith great care. Col. Glenn an d the other astronauts will be consulted withrespect to the workout or L::e 'p l .ns 'nd I think you ca n expect more activitythan in the past.As a matter of fact, I told Al an Shepard and Gus Grissom this morning thatafter the Ne w York parade, if they wanted to have some time out of jail, theywould not be under the same. ;est-ictions they have been in the past.No w I believe I forgot to mention the fact that Col. Glenn's home town isvery anxious to have him on Friday after the New Yorkparade, ..ut I think all

of this will come oult pretty. soon after .we decisions yave been ..ade. Obviously,he is going to decide himselh what he is going to do .0 POWERS: We are out of time. Thank you very much.- LN -

Documents

Press Conference Flight of MA-6