Mercury

A computer image of Friendship 7

The **Mercury** capsule is the first crewed spacecraft flown by the United States (NASA), and the second ever in human history under the Mercury Program. It is also the first suborbital manned spacecraft. It flew the first American into space and into orbit, and made the first change of orbital plane of any spacecraft. It's last flight, Mercury-Atlas 9 made 22 orbits, the world record at the time. It was a one man capsule spacecraft with no docking ports, as this technology would not be introduced until Gemini.

Only seven astronauts where chosen for the Mercury Program and became known as the "Mercury Seven".

## The Mercury Seven

**Malcolm Scott Carpenter** made the second orbital Mercury flight onboard *Aurora 7*. He is the only Mercury astronaut to to only fly on his Mercury mission and never again.

**Leroy Gordon "Gordo" Cooper Jr.** was the last Mercury astronaut to fly and the last person to fly into space alone aboard *Faith 7*. He made 22 orbits, the longest flight ever at the time.

**John Herschel Glenn Jr.** became the first American in orbit onboard *Friendship 7*. He was also the most popular among the public and was considered the best speaker of the seven. He became a US Senator and he became the first and only actively serving politician to fly into space on the Space Shuttle. He was also holds the record for oldest person to fly into space and the only Mercury Seven astronaut to fly on a space shuttle.

**Virgil Ivan "Gus" Grissom** was the second mercury astronaut to fly onboard *Liberty Bell 7*, which sank after splashdown and was not recovered until years later. He died during when a fire broke out in a test for Apollo 1. He was the only of the seven not to survive to retirement.

**Walter Marty Schirra Jr.** flew the third orbital flight of the Mercury program onboard *Sigma 7*. He later flew on Gemini 6A and made the first space rendezvous with Gemini 7. He also commanded Apollo 7, the first crewed Apollo mission. He is the only astronaut to fly in all three programs.

**Alan Bartlett Shepard Jr.** became the first American in space onboard *Freedom 7*. He also became the only Mercury astronaut to walk on the moon. He was the Commander of Apollo 14 and the fifth person to walk on the moon.

**Donald "Deke" Kent Slayton** never got to fly his Mercury capsule due to heart issues. Had this not happened, he most likely would have flown on one of the back up spacecraft, which would have been named *Delta 7*. Instead he became the Chief Astronaut and was in charge of spaceflight crew assignments. After the close of the Apollo Program, he began training to fly on the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, which he did. Two Cygnus spacecraft were named after him after his retirement and death.

## Capsule Nomenclature

Each astronaut named his spacecraft with a "7" after the name. The "7" in the name of each capsule was originally chosen by Alan Shepard. He named his spacecraft "Freedom 7", because Freedom was patriotic and it was the seventh capsule produced. This was a complete coincidence that there were also seven mercury astronauts. NASA later decided to honor the seven astronauts and the other spacecraft were named with a "7" after it as well, starting with Gus Grissom's *Liberty Bell 7*. Imagine, John Glenn's spacecraft could have been called *Friendship 13*.

The soviets didn't named their spacecraft besides Vostok 1, Vostok 2, etc. Gemini spacecraft were not named either, they had names like Gemini 6A and Gemini 7. It wasn't until the Apollo Program this tradition got picked up again, with the *Gumdrop* Apollo CSM and *Spider* Lunar Lander.

The missions were named using the spacecraft and rocket with a number, counting how many times that combination had been flown. For example the first mission to fly a Mercury capsule on an Atlas LV-3B rocket was Mercury-Atlas 1. But if the next launch used a Mercury-Redstone rocket it was Mercury-Redstone 1, not Mercury-Redstone 2. Mercury-Scout 1 used a Scout II rocket and was just a test of the tracking system. For some reason, missions using Little Joe or Big Joe rockets didn't add the "Mercury-" prefix and were just Little Joe 1 and Big Joe 1. A letter was added after the number if it was a follow up, used the same capsule or something, such as Mercury-Redstone 1A. Since the capsule was not reusable for flight, they were only ever reused after testing.

## Spacecraft List

A list of all 20 Mercury Spacecraft. These are listed in order of production, not in order of maiden flight or mission, this could cause confusion, as some newer spacecraft were flown before older ones first flight, making them appear to be earlier. An example is Scott Carpenter's flight, which used the eighteenth capsule, even though being flown before Wally Schirra's flight which used the sixteenth capsule.