Space Race

by Deborah Cadbury

  The press wanted to know what had gone into the making of these lionhearts who were committed to risking so much for the glory of America. Finding out was not easy. What does your wife think about what you are doing? But tough heroes don’t waste time on small talk. They answered simply, keeping the replies short, giving nothing away. Their wives were all with them, it seemed. Then Marine Lieutenant-Colonel John Glenn, the oldest at thirty-seven, summed it up: ‘I don’t think any of us could have gone with something like this if we didn’t have pretty good backing at home.’

  Somehow their answers did not satisfy the press, who wanted to know what made them tick. Why were they doing it? Were they religious? Standard answers came back, somewhat disappointing. Navy Lieutenant-Commander Walter Schirra admitted to being Episcopalian. The handsome Air Force Captain Gordon Cooper was a Methodist. Navy Lieutenant Scott Carpenter sometimes went to church. When they had finished, the sober-minded John Glenn took over. ‘I am a Presbyterian,’ he said, ‘and take my religion very seriously … I have taught at Sunday school … I was on the Board of Trustees at the last duty station … We are very active in Church work and all things connected with the Church.’ The press were interested. The other six astronauts shifted uncomfortably at the image emerging from one of their number. ‘I believe we are placed here with certain talents and capabilities,’ John Glenn continued. ‘It is up to each of us to use those … as best we can … I think there is a power greater than any of us that will place opportunities in our way if we use our talents properly.’ This was rather more what the press had been expecting: an adventurous spirit which, guided by religious conviction, was also facing the possibility of making the ultimate sacrifice.

  For Navy Lieutenant-Commander Alan Shepard the religious emphasis was sounding the wrong note. He had a practical intelligence that could go immediately to the heart of the problem. His love of racing fast cars until they became all but airborne and the tyres burned out, he regarded as nothing more than just taking fresh air. He decided to put the record straight and get the focus back on to what they were doing. ‘I don’t mean to slight the religious angle, but the Mercury project is merely one step in the evolution of space travel,’ he said, his face expressionless. ‘I would like to discount the fact that this project is extremely hazardous. It is not a technical race. It is a step in the evolution of space travel.’ He wanted it understood that they were simply doing a job – a job where the prospect of a most fearful annihilation was par for the course.

  The questions flew for what seemed an eternity and the reporters found themselves thoroughly charmed as the astronauts replied with the sentiments of small-town Middle America with its farmland and prairies. They were clearly the sons of the early settlers, born holding the badge of courage. This was confirmed when someone asked the big question: did they believe they would be coming back from outer space? John Glenn, the mystic, gave them the answer they wanted to hear. ‘I got on this project because it probably would be the nearest to heaven I will ever get and I wanted to make the most of it.’

  Intrigued about the women behind such men, the press descended on their wives and families. All blemishes airbrushed out, the wives appeared on the cover of Life magazine, examples of American womanhood at its best, perfect partners for heroes. The astronauts were fêted and admired, role models for American boyhood. ‘From a nation of 175 million, they stepped forward last week: seven men cut of the same stone as Columbus, Magellan, Daniel Boone, Orville and Wilbur Wright …’ declared Time magazine appreciatively on 20 April, marvelling at their bravery in electing to be shot beyond the atmosphere to a height of 125 miles at a speed of 18,000 mph. ‘Rarely were history’s explorers and discoverers so clearly marked out in advance as men of destiny.’ They were called on to give talks and speeches, visited the White House, held up as examples of the kind of men the free world was blessed with. What was there to say against them? They were going to kill the Minotaur, bring back the head of Medusa, slay the dragon.

  In May – the month that Korolev finally won approval from the Soviet government to start building his Vostok – the American astronauts visited McDonnell in St Louis to see their space capsule for the first time. This proved to be something of a surprise. It was dishearteningly small, a mere 6 feet across. It looked like the sort of precarious equipment that might be found at the end of a centrifugal arm in an amusement park, with unbelievably thin walls giving little confidence that it would cope with the unknown eccentricities of being flung into space and hurled through fire. The interior was a miracle of ingenuity with equipment and parachutes skilfully packed away. But the ‘one size’ astronaut’s couch designed to accommodate all body types was inches from the heat shield and the instrument panel was just 2 feet from the astronaut’s face. The overall impression was one of claustrophobia with a small entrance hatchway and no window; just a tiny porthole and a periscope. It seemed unfeasible to embark on such a hazardous journey with no means of direct observation. The astronauts made a fuss and demanded a window, even though this would add to the weight of the capsule. They also had concerns that they themselves had no means of controlling the craft. ‘All we are is guinea pigs,’ they complained endlessly. ‘They insisted on getting as much control of the vehicle as possible,’ recalled Max Faget. This was a great worry to the engineers, who felt the risk of human error was greater than the risk of failure of automatic controls.

  On 18 May 1959, the seven astronauts were gathered at Cape Canaveral to see their first launch of the Atlas rocket that was to carry them into orbit. To place the 4000-pound Mercury capsule into earth’s orbit, the rocket had to reach a speed of 18,000 mph. Despite its continual teething problems, hopes were pinned on the air force’s Atlas, which had a thrust of 367,000 pounds and was America’s first intercontinental ballistic missile. As usual, the adoring press was in attendance as well as a sprinkling of VIPs, congressmen and captains of industry. The seven astronauts had a part to play: they needed to look impressive, to attract funds, make small talk, all of which Glenn and Shepard did superbly. The atmosphere was relaxed and convivial. In the background, flood-lit against the night sky, the mighty Atlas rocket waited for its moment.

  Liftoff was faultless; the exhibition of such power was thrilling. The crowd watched, utterly absorbed by the spectacle. Slowly the rocket lifted as though resisting the titanic pressure. It was up, almost away; then, with a drunken lurch, it became unsteady, toppling sideways, its thin skin wrinkling like burning paper. As the crowd looked up, horrified, an almighty explosion ripped the whole thing apart, shooting out fiery debris, sending everyone running for cover. From the safety of the bunker, Shepard turned to Glenn: ‘Well, I’m glad they got that one out of the way … I sure hope they fix that.’

  As a step towards the more successful takeoff desired by the astronauts, testing the complete vehicle that would launch an American astronaut into space began in June 1959. The first team of engineers from the Space Task Group began to arrive at the Cape. Scott Simpkinson was in overall charge of the party whose job it was to launch the hybrid union of an Atlas missile married to a Mercury space capsule – otherwise known as ‘Big Joe’. The capsule itself was a ‘mock-up’ of the real thing assembled purely for the purpose of testing the heat shield. They wanted to know how it would survive under the extreme conditions of re-entry as temperatures soared to over 3000 degrees F. What effect would this have on the temperatures inside the capsule?

  The engineers from the Space Task Group were guests of the air force who quickly decided they were of small importance in the scheme of things and roped off some space in an old hangar, which they were to share with naval research. They found themselves in what amounted to a dirty shed with no facilities – not what they had expected when signing up for state-of-the-art space research, imagining a clean and sterile laboratory in which to assemble the craft. The office staff were limited to a storage corridor, their desks filling the tight space. If someone at the far end wanted to leave the area, every
one had to stand up and move from the room to allow the departing person to squeeze out. The conditions were unpleasant, with long working hours. Even at night the heat was unbearable and the mosquitoes so ravenous that in desperation workers resorted to spraying themselves and the mosquitoes with ammonia from the capsule’s cooling system. It was clear that they were not at the smart end of space engineering, but obviously considered something of an anomaly. They decided to go along with this and cultivated a sense of individuality: Scott Simpkinson, bypassing air force bureaucracy, arranged with his supervisor for $50,000 petty cash with which to buy the tools he needed from the local hardware store, rather than filling in forms and dockets for a hammer or some screws which would be delivered several months later.

  When they were finally ready to fit the capsule to the Atlas out at the launch pad, they had no specialized vehicle to transport the precious object, and were forced to use their ingenuity. Lashing an old mattress to a pick-up truck, they placed the Mercury capsule on it and made their way to the Atlas, waiting in splendid isolation. But on top of the gantry, all was not well. The capsule did not fit. It was half an inch too big in diameter. And time was not on their side; the test launch was imminent. Back in the workshop with the mosquitoes, they decided that the heat shield was too big, not the capsule. Simpkinson, never at a loss, queued up at the local hardware store again for the tools he needed to get a precision-crafted job done, gouging off that extra half-inch from the heat shield.

  After delays not just with the capsule, but also with the Atlas rocket, ‘Big Joe’ was sent heavenward on 9 September 1959, weeks later than planned. At first it looked successful as it blazed away into the night sky like a great torch, but the rocket travelled too high and separated late from the capsule. Unable to separate at the right stage, the capsule used all its fuel trying to get into the correct position for re-entry. Since it was upside down, it was expected to burn up on re-entry. To everyone’s amazement it righted itself on descent and dropped into the Atlantic five hundred miles off course. Despite the fact that the capsule had survived, the press notched up yet another failure to America, mystified that the Soviets never had a setback, unaware that in Russia failures were simply kept secret.

  The astronauts, having watched the disintegration of the Atlas rocket at Cape Canaveral, were more than pleased when, in due course, NASA announced that the Atlas, with its haphazard record of success, would no longer be used to send the very first American into space. Initially, von Braun’s Redstone rocket would be the basis of space exploration. Until work was done on boosters, however, the Redstone, with its more modest 70,000 pounds of thrust, did not have enough power to launch a Mercury capsule into orbit around the earth. But it could be used for a twenty-minute ballistic mission, literally to punch the Mercury capsule into space, perhaps reaching a maximum altitude of 130 miles before returning for re-entry. The first flight the astronauts would take would therefore be suborbital. This would not match a Soviet orbital flight – but it would get an American into space, defined as sixty miles above the earth.

  Much work had to be done to ‘man-rate’ the rocket to make it safe for an astronaut. Von Braun wanted to make it more reliable with improved guidance and control and to design an abort system that would enable a man to be thrown clear of danger at any time between launch and the upper atmosphere. He had to make the Redstone’s engines more reliable to prevent overacceleration; high acceleration could cause the pilots to black out, to pass out completely. There was also the problem of reducing the rocket’s vibration, which might harm the human body and reduce concentration and alertness. He wanted 100 per cent reliability – no astronaut was to die in one of his rockets.

  On 21 October 1959, Eisenhower at last announced plans to transfer von Braun’s Huntsville team to NASA. To von Braun’s great delight, he himself would become director of an entire NASA centre, as Huntsville was to be grandly renamed the Marshall Space Flight Center. More than four thousand of his army staff were also to become part of NASA, including the few remaining loyal members of the original team from Peenemünde. At last, after fifteen years, von Braun and his men were no longer in the army but part of the glamorous space industry, identified now with astronauts, not sergeant majors. It augured well, and that same month official approval was given for the Saturn project, which aimed to develop a booster rocket with enough power to reach the moon. But the first step was to beat the Soviets with a man in space. Everything would now depend on an old army missile – the Redstone.

  In Moscow, Korolev had seen the many detailed press reports on the US astronauts. With Nina’s help, he learned the names of the clean-cut American heroes and marvelled both at the coverage they received and the adulation showered on them. Since NASA had been formed and the American astronauts had pirouetted on to the world stage, he had received increasing support for a Soviet manned programme. During the spring of 1959, a number of meetings had been held between the Academy of Sciences, OKB-1, the Institute of Aviation Medicine and military officials to discuss recruitment of the volunteers. Korolev was quite clear about what he wanted: ‘I think the candidate’s age should be about 30, height below 67 inches and weight less than 150 pounds,’ he declared cheerfully. ‘Above all, he should be a man with a smile. They must be brave!’

  In contrast to the great fanfare in America, in the Soviet Union the hunt for a spaceman was undertaken with cloak and dagger secrecy. During the summer, ‘recruiting’ teams began to arrive at air force bases across the Soviet Union – although exactly what position they were recruiting for was not something they felt obliged to reveal. Interviews were carried out with teams of pilots but no mention was made of space travel or space ships; bureaucracy was careful to make the quest obscure. Any query was dismissed with the minimal explanation that they were being given the opportunity for ‘special flights’. Details of three thousand jet fighter pilots were scrutinized for candidates – and when almost all of them were rejected, they had no understanding of why, or from what, they were being dismissed.

  Two hundred candidates were eventually chosen to go to Moscow to take part in a more rigorous elimination process under a programme enigmatically labelled ‘Theme No. 6’. At the Scientific Research Aviation Hospital they faced similarly anarchic medics apparently bent on destruction of the mind and body, just as the American astronauts had. Although the centre was under the control of the air force, the doctors held sway. Dressed in hospital regulation khaki pyjamas, candidates had to endure tests that were designed to push physical and mental health to the limits and assess strength of character. Many dropped out as they met their nemesis in the low-pressure barometric chamber or the inhuman centrifuge for manipulating gravity. Just twenty candidates made the grade, in time becoming known as the first Soviet ‘Star Squad’.

  While this recruitment was underway, that September Khrushchev visited Eisenhower, in the midst of a paper chase of comment from the world’s press. Before he left, Krushchev made it clear to Korolev that it would be to his advantage if he could pull off one of his clever stunts, enabling Khrushchev to put Eisenhower on the back foot with delicious insouciance. Korolev was in fact preparing another Luna launch and timed it for Khrushchev’s visit to the United States. He badly needed a success; another probe to the moon in June had failed. Launched on 12 September 1959, Luna 2 impacted as planned on the moon’s surface in the Mare Imbrium – the Sea of Serenity – three days later. The Jodrell Bank Radio Telescope in England tracked the progress of Luna 2 and confirmed this Soviet triumph. Another breathtaking first was marked up for the Soviets who for the first time had planted a man-made object on the moon and made it theirs.

  When the world woke up to the news, Khrushchev was in Hollywood, visiting the set of a musical, making his disapproval of the scantily clad dancers clear. He was insufferable, so bloated with success as he lectured the press on the virtues of the Soviet socialist system that Eisenhower found it easy to refuse him a visit to Disneyland, arguing that security would be imp
ossible. Yet again, America could only look on in awe now that, for the first time in history, a craft had visited another celestial body. All American attempts to send a probe to the moon had failed. The closest they had come was 37,000 miles with Pioneer 4. While NASA politely congratulated the Soviet Union on ‘a truly great engineering achievement’, Khrushchev, thrilled at his newfound political cachet, proudly presented the American President with a copy of Luna 2’s ensign. Von Braun was dismayed that Soviet propulsion power appeared to be far in advance of America’s; they had evidently used a multistage rocket of enormous power. In fact, the first stage alone had a thrust of 500,000 pounds.

  What America didn’t know was that Korolev was poised to produce his showstopper. Barely three weeks after Luna 2, in time for the second anniversary of Sputnik 1, Luna 3 soared towards the moon on a quest to see its hidden face: the side of the moon no human being had ever seen. The earth and the moon are locked in synchronous rotation. With an exquisite precision, the two bodies, each with their unique rhythm – the moon turning slowly on its axis once every twenty-eight days, the earth once every twenty-four hours – perform what can best be described as a celestial pavane, which in its timeless routine allows the moon only to show one face; the other is always concealed from view.

  Launched on 4 October, Luna 3 contained radio equipment, a television system with a film-processing unit, solar cells to provide power and a covered opening for cameras in the upper part of the craft. To prevent it falling into orbit around the sun, it had a slower speed than Luna 1 and took three days to reach the moon. It entered a trajectory that prevented the craft from being held by the moon’s gravity and passed within 3800 miles of the moon’s south pole as it made its way beyond to the far side. On 7 October, bathed in the light of the sun, the probe photographed 70 per cent of the moon’s secret face. With the film carefully shielded from radiation to prevent fogging, the photographs were processed on the craft ready to be radioed to the control centre on the ground as it returned towards the earth.