Breaking the Chains of Gravity

by Amy Shira Teitel

  Faget and Eggers compared notes at the Round Three Conference. For Eggers, the main problem was weight. A blunt body with enough inherent lift to follow a slightly more controllable semiballistic trajectory would be heavier than a simple ballistic spacecraft but would expose its occupant to less potentially devastating deceleration forces. Faget, meanwhile, held firm in defense of his ballistic design. But whatever details the men disagreed on, their main opposition came from proponents of boost-glide vehicles.

  The question between blunt bodies and gliders aside, the overall feeling of those attending the Round Three Conference was one of mounting pressure to solve the atmospheric heating and reentry issue associated with missiles. Everyone there knew that the missile solution would eventually inform both manned and unmanned satellite reentry methods. It wasn’t the immediate goal just yet, but the NACA was starting to think in terms of manned spaceflight.

  Spurred on by Sputnik, some industry partners were also beginning to consider immediate paths to manned spaceflight. The reality of the Soviet satellite hit Harrison Storms one night as he was leaving the North American Aviation plant in Los Angeles. Lighting a cigarette before getting into his car, he looked up to see Sputnik glinting overhead in the twilight sky. The X-15 was still in development and far from flying, but overseeing the project he knew its capabilities, and so did its chief engineer, Charlie Feltz. When Storms got home that night, he called Feltz with a radical solution to the new satellite problem: they could put the X-15 into orbit. It couldn’t fly in space in its current configuration, but beefed up it could become America’s first manned spacecraft. Storms conceded that it wouldn’t be an easy job. Turning the X-15 into a spaceplane would demand new materials and a couple of big technological breakthroughs to manage the hypersonic reentry. But on the whole the vehicle was aerodynamically up to the challenge.

  Inspired, Storms threw together a proposal for an orbit-capable variant of the X-15 called the X-15B, and, without stopping to undertake a detailed wind tunnel program, he took the proposal to Washington. His hastily assembled idea used two of North American’s Navaho boosters clustered together to form the first stage with a single Navaho serving as the second stage. Atop this launch system would be the beefed-up X-15B, its own engine acting as the third, orbital insertion phase. The actual vehicle was larger than the first generation X-15, with room for two pilots. It was also heavier, boasting a thicker Inconel X skin for the hypersonic reentry. Otherwise, the X-15B was roughly the same as its predecessor. Wind tunnel tests had proved the X-15’s design was sound. Changing the basics for an orbital variant seemed like an unnecessary way to complicate the proposed program.

  As he did with the overall design, Storms based the X-15B’s flight profile off the early X-15 flight studies as well. The stacked rocket would launch from Cape Canaveral, the second stage taking over from the first after eighty seconds of flight. At an altitude of four hundred thousand feet, the second stage would fall away and the X-15B’s own engine would ignite to accelerate the spacecraft and its pilots to an orbital velocity of eighteen thousand miles per hour. After circling the Earth three times, the pilots would use their engine to slow their orbital velocity and, following the same basic reentry profile as the X-15, glide from space to an unpowered landing on a runway at Edwards Air Force Base.

  Excited though Storms was, the brass in Washington was not receptive to his idea. Storms’s proposal might have been rooted in technology he knew would parlay into a viable spaceflight program, but it was almost too futuristic to be taken seriously. And his was also far from the only unsolicited spaceflight proposal to reach the nation’s capital in Sputnik’s wake. He returned to Los Angeles as one of 421 rejected spaceflight pioneers.

  Though engineers and industry professionals entertained different ways into space, and the president worked to soothe his anxious citizens, the weeks that followed Sputnik’s launch saw no signs of national fear ebbing. Unease over the American education system and a potential intellectual gap entered the conversation while security and defense issues remained popular topics.

  The national panic over Sputnik got markedly worse when on Sunday, November 3, the New York Times front page brought more very unwelcome news: SOVIET FIRES NEW SATELLITE, CARRYING DOG; HALF-TON SPHERE IS REPORTED 900 MILES UP. The corresponding article was small, relaying what scant details were known to the American readership. Like its predecessor, Sputnik II, which was launched to commemorate the fortieth anniversary of the great October revolution when the Bolshevik party seized power in Russia, emitted a beep to be heard the world over as it traced an orbit around the planet. But that’s where the similarities ended. This second satellite was six times heavier than Sputnik, the article said, and it carried a dog named Laika on board who, by all accounts coming from the Russian media, was still alive and well. The story continued in the days that followed with articles saying that Laika might be recovered and returned home alive.

  The articles of Sputnik II’s launch made reference to continued calm at the White House, but away from the public eye this second satellite was met with less calm than its predecessor. The satellite’s weight of more than twelve hundred pounds spoke more to the Soviet’s rocket power than the first Sputnik had, and the canine passenger was another source of concern. No American missile under development could hope to put something that heavy into orbit, let alone something as heavy as a life support system. Sputnik II strengthened the impression that the Soviets possessed a fully capable launch system and hinted ominously that a manned mission couldn’t be far behind. The pressure for Vanguard’s success increased while Eisenhower came under attack from Congress. Opposing Democrats in particular pointed to an ill-spent defense budget as the reason the Soviets had pulled ahead and left a missile gap in the wake of their orbiting satellites. It seemed as though the Soviets were fast outstripping the United States in military might.

  Eisenhower addressed the latest space development on the evening of November 7, a day that had begun with newspapers carrying Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev’s boastful promises of a Soviet victory over the United States in heavy industry. At eight o’clock, Eisenhower sat behind his desk in the Oval Office and began an address on a live television and radio broadcast. “My subject tonight is science and national security,” the president began, a topic he said was too large to be dealt with in just one address. After offering his congratulations to the Soviet satellite teams, Eisenhower began with the ongoing American satellite and missile programs. The first item on the agenda was the future of a scientific satellite as part of the International Geophysical Year. As a defense of the Vanguard program, Eisenhower reiterated the decision to separate the American satellite effort from the military missile program as a way to solidify the former as a purely scientific endeavor in line with the International Geophysical Year’s goals. Months earlier, in May, the president told his nation, the decision had been made to test the satellite launch system in 1957 with the view of launching a fully instrumented vehicle in March of 1958. He stood by this decision and this time line, saying that the satellite program had never been a race and rather had always been a part of American scientific activities. The intent of an American satellite had never been to match or best the Soviet Union.

  The president then laid out the next steps in the wake of the latest satellite launch. Foremost, he said, was to bring together the best minds the science community had to offer to address the space question. He announced the creation of the office of Special Assistant to the President for Science and Technology, a position Dr. Killian of MIT had agreed to accept and one he would fill with assistance from a strong advisory group of outstanding experts. Looking ahead at a larger-scale space effort, Eisenhower mentioned his agreement with the secretary of defense that any new missile or space-related programs would eventually fall under a single manager and administered regardless of separate services. In the meantime, the military would lead the way into space.

  Vanguard was now at the forefront of
national consciousness, an underfunded and highly experimental program bearing a nation’s hopes for leveling the technological playing field on its fragile shoulders. And the country expected Vanguard to work the first time. But Vanguard wasn’t carrying the nation’s space hopes alone. The day after Eisenhower’s press conference and five days after Laika launched into orbit, the Pentagon gave an elated von Braun the green light to launch a small satellite on a Jupiter C rocket. The strong separation between science and missiles had started to erode.

  By the beginning of December, the Office of Defense Mobilization’s Science Advisory Committee had been reconstituted as Eisenhower’s own science advisory committee with a membership of eighteen. The newly appointed Killian served as chairman over this group, which included in its ranks Hugh Dryden serving as a member out of office from his station with the NACA. On the whole, Killian considered this group to be composed of remarkably astute, uniquely skilled scientists and engineers whose experience made them credible political advisers, exactly the men Eisenhower needed as close consultants. The group also shared a deep sense of responsibility to science and a firm faith in its importance to both the nation and its citizens. Killian felt the group was more charismatic than bureaucratic.

  As the White House began incorporating science advising into its structure, the military’s stance on space changed as well, most notably within the air force. In the wake of the Sputnik satellites, a sudden, feverish rush hit the service, and the air force’s Air Research and Development Command sought to compile the pieces of a coherent space program that could recoup ground lost to the Soviets and also restore the nation’s damaged prestige. The feeling of national urgency prompted planners to discard the slow, measured approach to spaceflight in favor of a crash program that could deliver immediate results. Committees formed, and one led by Dr. Edward Teller was charged with addressing the fundamental question of what the air force’s immediate next step should be.

  The men on the Teller Committee broke the question into four parts for their own internal dissection. They asked why the United States was in second place in the missile race, and if this was the case, what were the long-term military implications. Was it possible for a long-range program to restore national prestige? And regardless, what sort of short-term stunts could have an immediate but finite payoff that could restore the nation’s image in the interim? The committee’s conclusions were synthesized in the so-called Teller Report that offered few answers. It suggested that the years from 1959 to 1962 be treated as a period of national emergency with serious emphasis on using available hardware to complete space goals, effectively merging the satellite and missile programs. As for the space program itself, the Teller Report first recommended a program with short-term aims focusing on upper atmospheric research that could be done as part of the IGY. Following this initial phase, the committee said, the air force should pursue a long-term lunar program that would fly around or land a payload on the surface of the Moon, possibly leaving fluorescent powder visible from the Earth. Eventually, manned spacecraft would build on this initial foundation in space. The committee recognized that men would be flying inside those orbiting satellites before too long.

  At the same time, Congress was also investigating the nation’s preparedness to enter the space age, and the air force argued that space should fall under its jurisdiction as the natural extension from atmospheric flight. The air force also had the most experience working with and managing large-scale exotic programs like the X-1, a knowledge that would be vital to any space program without military exploitation. Exploration, the air force maintained, must precede exploitation. There would certainly be military benefits to exploring space, but none should be seriously considered before gaining a detailed knowledge of the new arena. This latter point was not lost on the Department of Defense, which was beginning to accept that research was not something to shy away from.

  With the Sputniks soaring overhead, the air force devoted twelve research centers to studying various topics related to a future space program, including space medicine, propulsion, geophysics, communications, guidance, and test operations with the understanding that the Air Research and Development Command would eventually take control of the program. But the Air Force Ballistic Missile Command was also eager to grab the prize of space, though it preferred to skip over the short-term stunt phase of getting something into space as quickly as possible. Instead, it wanted to develop a lasting satellite program with real capabilities and a manned spaceflight system.

  Against this background—the plethora of committees investigating America’s space potential, changing attitudes in Washington, and the military branches—Vanguard TV-3 moved from the factory to the launchpad. The days leading up to launch were marked by surprisingly few problems. The second stage engine was replaced when a crack was found during an inspection. The first two stages passed static fire tests on the ground. The electronics and instrumentation were tested satisfactorily. All preflight operations proceeded without major hiccups. As November turned to December, thousands of people began migrating to Florida to witness America’s first satellite launch. It was less than ideal for the Vanguard team who, in the early era of rocketry, would have much preferred to carry out a test of a new system without the nation and the world following along in person or by radio and television broadcasts. The national interest left the Vanguard team with no choice but to carry on and approach the launch as though the test had always been a satellite mission.

  The rocket stood ready on the launchpad and the team was finally confident in their product, but the weather failed to cooperate. High winds and near freezing temperatures delayed the launch. The first attempted countdown was canceled on a cold Wednesday and started again on Thursday afternoon around five. The countdown proceeded slowly, pausing for a series of holds until ten thirty on Friday morning, December 6, when the countdown reached T-minus one hour; one hour to launch. The weather remained touch and go with gusts of high winds threatening to blow the small rocket off course at the moment of liftoff, but the Vanguard team pressed on. At T-minus forty-five minutes the men monitoring telemetry from the rocket got the all clear for launch. At T-minus thirty minutes, a blast from a bullhorn signaled it was time for crews to clear the launch area. The doors to the blockhouse where the launch team sat at consoles monitoring their rocket closed at T-minus twenty-five. The lights went out six minutes later. At the same time, a sign illuminated proclaiming the blockhouse to be a no smoking zone. At T-minus forty-five seconds, the electrical umbilicals powering from the rocket fell away, leaving Vanguard working on its own internal power supply. At T-minus one second, the test conductor signaled for a young Martin engineer to flip the toggle switch on his instrument panel.

  Eyes all around the country were on Vanguard, the technicians in the blockhouse glued to the windows watching their test-turned-satellite launch. The gathered crowd at Cape Canaveral and those watching the live television broadcast saw sparks appear at the base of the rocket signaling the pyrotechnic igniter in place to light the engine was working. Oxygen and kerosene fumes spilled out of the engine and caught fire, turning the spark into a raging tempest of flames. The rocket shook as the thrust from the engine built up. Then, slowly, Vanguard started lumbering off the launchpad. It rose, but two seconds later started to fall back down. The men in the blockhouse instinctively ducked for cover. Outside, the rocket settled uneasily on its engines before falling against the firing structure. The tanks ruptured as the rocket toppled, spilling its fuel and oxidizer into the line of fire, sparking an inferno. In an instant, the pad was engulfed in flames. The fire-control technician instantly began the water deluge, emptying thousands of gallons of water onto the launchpad to quench the fire. It was a spectacular failure, and the world had seen it all. The crew in the blockhouse was dejectedly straightening back up when they noticed a beeping sound. The men were stunned as they realized the sound was the Vanguard satellite. It had somehow been shot away from the inferno and was
triumphantly transmitting its signal as though it had reached orbit.

  Vanguard’s very public failure became, almost by default, a symbol of the American space program. And it garnered ridicule from around the world. International headlines in the days that followed offered new monikers for the small satellite including Puffnik, Flopnik, Kaputnik, and Stayputnik. The Soviet Union rubbed salt in the wound by offering assistance to the United States through a United Nations program that gave technological assistance to primitive nations. It was exactly the devastating blow to American prestige that von Braun had predicted three years earlier in his initial proposal to launch a minimum satellite, and something he knew could have been avoided. Within the United States, Vanguard’s failure had the effect of adding to the pressures already weighing on the president. Bowing in part to congressional and public demand, Eisenhower began to see that the country needed a centralized space program and an encompassing space policy; individual launches by the military would be fine in the interim, but it wasn’t a long-term solution.