The Season of Crisis: 1961

THE 6-MONTH PERIOD prior to the first manned suborbital flight in May 1961 was fraught with changes at the national level which saw NASA reach its lowest point and catapult again to an even more significant role than it had previously enjoyed. In the early weeks of 1961, the future of the American space flight program beyond Project Mercury hung in precarious balance. It was a momentous period of NASA’s history, and its highlights help set the stage for the related Mercury events herein recounted.

Three and one-half years earlier the Nation had rallied enthusiastically to the challenge of the Soviet Sputnik. The National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958 had been signed into law and created a new agency, NASA. The national objective of the exploration of space for peaceful purposes had crystallized the decision at the Presidential level which led to the establishment of Project Mercury as the pioneering step in manned space flight. Its mission was to launch a man into space, orbit him around the earth, and recover him safely. In national priority, Project Mercury ranked second only to the national defense effort after 1958.

Now, in the message accompanying his Federal Budget for Fiscal Year 1962, President Eisenhower said:

President Eisenhower, mindful of the economic impact of the 1959-60 recession, thus stated in his final budget to Congress that an evaluation was underway to determine whether manned space flight would be continued beyond Project Mercury. This decision, by implication, would be the responsibility of his successor as well as a product of the success of manned flight in the Mercury program itself.

It is of importance to the history of space medicine that in the weeks just prior to his inauguration, President-elect Kennedy was in the process of reviewing the space program, among other areas of concern. On January 12, 1961, the President-elect released a report prepared by an advisory committee under the chairmanship of Dr. Jerome Wiesner, a member of the President’s Scientific Advisory Committee under President Eisenhower, and later President Kennedy’s own scientific adviser.[1] The Wiesner report initiated a chain reaction vitally affecting Project Mercury, particularly the medical aspects. It was highly critical of NASA organization and management, and recommended to the President-elect that there be a sweeping reorganization of the national space program, involving effective use of the National Aeronautics and Space Council, single direction within DOD of military space efforts, stronger technical management in NASA, and closer government partnership with industry. The Wiesner report was also critical of the Atlas launch vehicle which was to orbit the Mercury astronaut in space, stating that it was "marginal." Indeed, it was concluded that because the U.S.S.R. possessed larger launch vehicles, the United States would not be the first to orbit a man in space. The report stated:

Mr. Kennedy had, in the weeks prior to his inauguration, turned over to Vice-President-elect Johnson the responsibility of recommending a NASA Administrator. He had found that those who advocated a strong civilian space program were opposed both by influential scientists who wanted to curtail manned space exploration and by spokesmen of the military-industrial complex who favored turning over the major role in the space program to the U.S. Air Force.[2] James E. Webb, whose name was submitted by Senator Robert S. Kerr of Oklahoma (who had succeeded the Vice-President-elect as chairman of the Senate Aeronautical and Space Sciences Committee), was approached and persuaded to accept the position of Administrator. A businessman and lawyer dedicated to public service, he was to infuse new life almost immediately into the NASA structure.

Mr. Webb endorsed an accelerated space program based on in-house NASA planning, to include consideration of a landing on the moon by 1969-70 instead of "after 1970," as had been projected by NASA under the previous administration. He asked the Bureau of the Budget for an additional $308 million to supplement the Eisenhower budget of $1.1 billion, to be applied mostly to the development of large launch vehicles.

MERCURY BIOMEDICAL CAPABILITY QUESTIONED

During the period of transition from one administration to the other, the Operations Staff of Project Mercury had continued their efforts toward manned space flight. As yet, no known orbital manned flight had been made by any country. A U.S. suborbital animal flight was scheduled for late January 1961, however, and would be followed shortly by a manned suborbital flight.

In the wake of the Wiesner report, the objectives of Project Mercury were critically reviewed by the President’s Scientific Advisory Committee. This included a close look at the management of biomedical support for manned space flight.

Since the fall of 1958, when Project Mercury was announced as the first U.S. manned space-flight program, this moment of crisis had been slowly building in the life-sciences community both inside and out of government circles, although it took the impact of the Wiesner report released on January 12, 1961, to bring it to the point of explosion. A key medical spokesman for Project Mercury later summed it up in these words:

The conflict was mainly between the laboratory scientist, who wished to take a conservative course and carry out extensive animal experimentation prior to exposing a human being—perhaps tragically—to manned space flight, and the operations engineer. The latter relied to a great extent upon the extension and application of existing biotechnology and biomedical experience that had supported the X-15 and other comparable programs. It was believed that the hazards of manned space flight were no greater than those experienced by the X-15 test pilot.

The assessment of the Mercury biomedical program which was to take place in March 1961 would be formalized in a report of the President in April. By that time significant progress had been made in Project Mercury, including the first successful suborbital flight by chimpanzee Ham.

THE LESSONS OF ANIMAL EXPERIMENTATION

Already the Russians had demonstrated that animals could survive in space. Between 1949 and 1952 they had carried out six experiments with dogs, reaching a maximum altitude of 55 nautical miles. By 1956 another nine flights, to a maximum altitude of 115 nautical miles, had been achieved.

Following Sputnik I, the Soviets had orbited a small dog, Laika, in Sputnik II (which weighed over 1,100 pounds). Laika had been equipped with a comprehensive array of telemetry sensors which gave continuous physiological information to tracking stations. The cabin conditioning system maintained sea-level atmospheric pressure within the cabin, and Laika survived 6 days before depletion of the oxygen stores caused asphyxiation. The Laika flight demonstrated that space flight was tolerable to animals. It indicated, too, that Soviet interests extended to the use of manned satellites. According to Fryer, who has summed up the situation very well indeed:

Through the next 3 years, the Russians had pursued a systematic and progressive research and development program that would ultimately lead to the first manned orbital space flight in history.

In the United States, meanwhile, on January 31, 1961, Mercury-Redstone 2 was fired carrying Ham, a 37-pound chimpanzee. He had received 219 hours of training in behavioral task performance over a 15-month period. Prior to flight, he had been subjected to Redstone launch profiles on the centrifuge at the U.S. Air Force Medical Laboratory, Dayton, Ohio.[5] The spacecraft reached an altitude of 155 statute miles, landed 420 statute miles down-range, and was recovered. By the time it was recovered it was nearly filled with water because some small holes had been punctured in the lower pressure bulkhead at landing. Ham was rescued before the spacecraft had taken on too much water.[6] From the engineering and operations point of view, the flight was a success except for the leaking spacecraft. The flight had demonstrated the validity of the Mercury spacecraft. (See picture of chimpanzee Ham upon recovery)

Life scientists, however, raise immediate questions about the advisability of proceeding with the first suborbital manned flight because of the biological information telemetered back to tracking stations during the flight. As previously noted, both inside and outside NASA there had been those who, from the very beginning, had questioned the advisability of early manned space flight prior to extensive animal experimentation. As early as January 1959, when the Joint AF-NRC Committee on Bioastronautics had visited the Space Task Group at Langley, there had been a lively discussion about the need for such experimentation, not merely to test the life-support system of the spacecraft, but to determine the effects of combined stresses upon man. According to the resume of the briefing given by STG:

The basic reasoning behind this idea was the fact that little was known about the effects of combinations of high stresses such as would occur in the Project Mercury missions.

At this briefing, representatives of the Space Task Group had pointed out that animal flights were involved in the program, but that the flights were "oriented directly at the Mercury objectives," that is, testing the system itself. The visiting AF-NRC Committee, it was reported, "felt that this approach was satisfactory," but "emphasized that our animal program should be pursued aggressively in that large lead times are involved." The resume of the briefing concluded: "A rather definite impression was obtained that this group felt we should be utilizing animal validations to a greater extent than the briefing indicated."[8]

During the following months planning had proceeded as outlined by the Space Task Group to provide a limited number of animal flights prior to each progression in manned flight leading from suborbital to orbital flight. Prior to the establishment of the formal Mercury animal program, however, NASA was to make available a limited amount of space for the Air Force to carry out bio-pack testing in the Little Joe series. This may have resulted from the previous urging of the AF-NRC Committee on Bioastronautics. In any event, the animal program for Project Mercury was to consist of two phases: Flights of small primates in the Little Joe spacecraft, and flights of medium-size primates in Mercury spacecraft launched by Redstone and Atlas vehicles.[9]

These have already been discussed in connection with the sequence of testing carried out by NASA prior to manned flight. In the first phase, space had been made available to the USAF School of Aviation Medicine, Brooks AFB, Tex., for bio-packs containing American-born rhesus monkeys weighing 6 to 7 pounds. Although not an essential part of the Mercury program, these tests were to provide important data. Specifically, there was a biomedical evaluation of the accelerations expected during the abort of a Mercury flight at liftoff and shortly after liftoff. This test phase was successfully completed with the Little Joe flights on December 4, 1959, and in January 1960.

Following the initiation of the Little Joe bio-pack program, representatives of NASA and the McDonnell Aircraft Corp., together with Navy, Army, and Air Force biomedical specialists, planned a further series of flight tests with animals to provide (1) animal verification of the feasibility of a manned flight, (2) data on the level of mental and physical activity that could be expected during a flight, and (3) a dynamic test of countdown procedures and training of support personnel in handling the biological aspects of manned flight. Briefly, it was agreed that existing Mercury spacecraft life-support, environmental-control, and instrumentation systems should be used without modification.

Responsibility for training the animals, preparing them for flight, and handling them after recovery was assigned to the 6571^st Aeromedical Research Laboratory at Holloman Air Force Base. A NASA representative would serve as coordinator to integrate the animal flights into the total flight program. Two Air Force physicians were to be closely identified with the program. Lt. Col. James P. Henry, who served as NASA representative, had long enjoyed an international reputation in aviation medical research. His work had included high-altitude research in the late 1940’s and the 1950’s, including research to support the Air Force BOSS concept. Now, in 1959, he was a member of Dr. White’s aeromedical team at STG. Dr. Hessberg, the second Air Force physician, directed the animal program at the 6571^st Aeromedical Research Laboratory at Holloman AFB.

The decision to use chimpanzees rather than other primates for the Mercury animal program was aimed at providing the highest level of performance short of human. As described later by Henry and Mosely,[10] restraint would be minimal so as to make possible the performance of psychomotor tests. The electrocardiograms, body temperature, and respiratory movement would be recorded by the techniques planned for use with human astronauts. If possible, arterial pressure would be recorded. Urine would be saved for a study of steroid output and there would be photography of the subject.[11]

Although the Aeromedical Research Laboratory at Holloman possessed animals, veterinarians, and space physiologists, it lacked facilities to obtain behavioral measurements of the animals. Accordingly, arrangements were made to train several chimpanzees under contract with the Wenner-Gren Aeronautical Research Laboratory, University of Kentucky. Subsequently, Air Force personnel were transferred from the Unusual Environments Section of the Aerospace Medical Laboratory, Aerospace Systems Division, Wright-Patterson AFB. Also, arrangements were made with the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research to aid in the establishment of a comparative psychology branch at AMRL. Training of eight chimpanzees began with the use of standard operator conditioning equipment and special restraint chairs.

As training progressed, the Veterinary Services Branch of AMRL was collecting normal baseline data on an entire colony of immature chimpanzees.[12] Study was also begun by specialists in ecology to determine the temperature and humidity tolerances of the chimpanzees. Concurrently AMRL personnel were designing and fabricating methods of restraint. A series of simulated flights was made on the centrifuge at the laboratory to determine the effects of acceleration and vibration on the chimpanzee, and also to evaluate the complete chimpanzee couch system. Medical recovery plans—described in the previous chapter—were being formulated by the Manned Spacecraft Center (formerly STG) at Langley, the Office of the Staff Surgeon, Patrick Air Force Base, and the Aeromedical Research Laboratory. A total of 35 veterinary technicians and 10 Veterinary officers were trained. Lt. Col. Walter E. Brewer, USAF (VC), as previously noted, headed the program at Cape Canaveral.

This, then, had been prelude to the MR-2 flight on January 31, 1961. Now, in the weeks following the animal suborbital flight which had tested the spacecraft system, STG prepared for the first manned suborbital flight.

TOWARD COUNTDOWN

Events were to move swiftly toward the climax—the actual flight of the first U.S. man in space. All bore an interrelationship not only with science and technology, but also with the reassessment of U.S. goals in space exploration.

In the weeks following the suborbital flight of chimpanzee Ham on January 31, 1961, the life-sciences community began with renewed vigor to assess the biomedical program and to weigh the implications of early manned space flight without further animal experimentation. Secondhand sources, for example, have indicated to the author that highly placed officials suggested facetiously that centrifuges be transported to Africa where chimpanzees would be readily available for further testing prior to actual manned flight. Be that apocryphal or not, it would seem to indicate the trepidation felt by certain members of the life-sciences group who felt that, at best, the Atlas launch vehicle was marginal and that perhaps manned space flight should proceed at a slower and more conservative pace rather than take what seemed an unwarranted risk with human life.[13]

In Contrast to the scientists who desired further extensive animal testing prior to manned flight, the operations staff of STG had moved forward with confidence toward the first U.S. suborbital flight. Since 1958 their total effort had been to bend the potential of technology to overcome the hazards of space travel. The STG aeromedical team, having witnessed the application of technology to the problems of human survival in flight, was now satisfied that extension of the principles and practice of aviation medicine would suffice to sustain the astronaut for a short mission in space. Extended space flight would pose biological problems not yet under-stood; but the short-range Mercury flights must be undertaken as a logical step in the orderly progression of steps necessary to solve these problems.[*]

So intent was the Space Task Group upon the forthcoming Shepard flight-and the realization of a 3-year dream-that they may have given little thought to other developments. At NASA Headquarters, for example, the long-range life-sciences program was getting underway, having been established the previous March in accordance with the recommendations of the Kety committee. At the national level, a new administration had just come into office, and Dr. Glennan, the NASA Administrator, had been succeeded by James E. Webb. But at the STG level, there had been no concomitant change in the mission-oriented staff. Dr. Gilruth remained Director of Project Mercury; W. C. Williams was Operations Director; and the aeromedical team remained relatively unchanged. Dr. White continued to direct Medical Operations, and Dr. Douglas continued to be personal physician to the astronauts.

Apparently one point of continuing concern to life scientists outside NASA had been the lack of a program to measure blood pressure. Indeed, as early as the period of the Stever committee, the Lovelace ad hoe committee had recommended that this measurement be taken. Now, in April 1961, the Director of Life Sciences, NASA Headquarters, was to contract with Webb Associates, Yellow Springs, Ohio, to survey current capabilities in blood pressure measurement, state of the art, and suitability for use in space vehicles.

More than a dozen laboratories in Government and industry across the country were visited during May 1961 by Webb Associates. Four different instruments were found from which a choice could be made by NASA. This information, together with the results of an extensive literature search, was made available to Dr. Henry at the Space Task Group.[14] In addition, a preliminary review of previous related experiences in laboratory stress situations was undertaken. This included such stresses as acceleration, heat and cold, hypoxia and hyperoxia, hypocapnia and hypercapnia, vestibular stimulation, and vibration.

The results of this study were to have impact in later flights, but not in April 1961 as the Space Task Group (STG) concentrated upon the immediate problem at hand—the MR-3 flight.

By April the crescendo of activities had begun to mount at an unprecedented pace as the days drew near for countdown and launch.

All plans for the Shepard flight had been made.

The eyes of the world were focused on one geographical spot—Cape Canaveral. Terms such as "gantry" and "cherry picker" were becoming part of the world language. (See picture of provisions for safe recovery)

Soon there would be countdown. . . .

The author can remember in vivid detail the tension and great sense of dedication reflected by every team member at the Cape, each grateful for his own small part in this unprecedented event. On April 12, she was one of the group from the Office of the Surgeon General, USAF, which was visiting Cape Canaveral for a Mercury briefing and a staff visit to Grand Bahama Island, where the prefabricated surgical hospital and debriefing unit had been recently built. This briefing had been arranged by Col. George M. Knauf, the DOD Assistant for Bioastronautics, Project Mercury.

Each person living then would remember his own reaction to that historic day, April 12, 1961, and tell his children and his children’s children; but that visiting group would remember it with particular intensity.

There had been the ride by military bus from Patrick Air Force Base to the Cape Canaveral complex, and the strict security guard at the gate.

Then the ride along the stark flat land with the gantries in the distance rising orange-red into the sky. And finally, the briefing room.

It was during the briefing by General Flickinger, Assistant for Bioastronautics to General Schriever, Commander of the Air Force Systems Command, that he was handed a note. He read it, then quietly announced to the group: "They’ve got a man in orbit." "They" meant the Soviet Union.

Disappointment, yes, that the United States had not been first—that was the immediate reaction. Following close, then, the sense of pride in what man, with his scientific knowledge, had been able to accomplish. And then, the new girding of will and dedication to the U.S. effort . . . this was the emotional pattern that day. Or so it seemed to the writer.

On this day, April 12, 1961, the Russians had successfully orbited the first man in space.

Six weeks later, on May 25, 1961, President Kennedy would announce as a national objective an accelerated space program to accomplish a landing on the moon in the 1969-70 period instead of sometime after 1970 as projected by the previous administration.

Success obviously breeds success, and now that technology had validated the fact that man could be provided with the necessary life-support systems for short-term space flight, there would be the orderly progression to overcome the biological hazards of extended space flight. As a first step, the United States would carry out the Shepard suborbital flight as planned. For, although Gagarin had demonstrated that man could survive space travel, the United States had yet to test its own spacecraft and life-support system.

During the 3 weeks after the Gagarin flight the pace of activities at Cape Canaveral, the command post, intensified. Waiting—checking the last-minute details—tense to the point of explosion—the aeromedical team had gathered together from the corners of the earth to focus upon one lone man who, atop a rocket, would shortly plunge into the unknown.

There was the waiting period for the astronaut as he went into retreat, accompanied only by his fellow astronauts and by the aeromedical team.

Finally, in the very early hours of the morning he would arise, partake of a hearty low-residue breakfast, be dressed in his pressure suit, enter the waiting van with Dr. Douglas, his personal physician, and start through the morning darkness toward the gantry and the unknown.

Astronaut Shepard was ready.

NOTES TO CHAPTER 8

[1] "Report to the President-elect of the Ad Hoc Committee on Space," for release to the press, radio, and television on Jan. 12, 1961. Other members of the Ad Hoc Committee were Kenneth B. Belieu, Staff Director, Senate Committee on Aeronautical and Space Sciences; Trevor Gardner, President, Hycon Manufacturing Co. (and former Asst. Secretary of the Air Force); Donald F. Hornig, Chairman, Dept. of Chemistry, Princeton Univ.; Edwin H. Land, President, Polaroid Corp.; Max Lehrer, Asst. Staff Director, Senate Committee on Aeronautical and Space Sciences; Edward M. Purcell, Prof. of Physics, Harvard Univ.; Bruno B. Rossi, Prof. of Physics, MIT; and Harry J. Watters, Assistant to the President, Polaroid Corp. Released report was an unclassified version of a more detailed classified document.

[2] Jay Holmes, American on the Moon (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott Co., 1962), p. 189. Mr. Holmes is currently in the Office of Manned Space Flight, NASA. This brief summary is based on his readable and interesting account. Much of the documentation for this important period is being collected and collated for the John F. Kennedy Library by the NASA historical staff.

[3] Stanley C. White, "Biomedical Data Collection for Space Program," presented to First International Manned Space Flight Symposium, Unesco House, Paris, Oct. 3, 1962.

[4] D. I. Fryer, "The Medical Sciences and Space Flight," R.A.E. News, Feb. 1964. See also Y. I. Gazdovsky, "Biological Experiments on Rockets and Artificial Earth Satellites," a paper presented at the Rocket and Satellite Symposium during the Fifth Revision of the Comite Speciale, Annee Geophysique Internationale, Moscow, July 30-August 9, 1958; Washington, D.C., National Academy of Sciences-National Research Council. See also A. G. Kousnetzov, "Some Results of Biological Experiments in Rockets and Sputnik II," J. Aviation Med., vol. 29, no. 11, Nov. 1958, pp. 781-784. See also N. M. Sisakyan, ed., Problems of Space Biology, Vol. 1, NASA TT F-174, 1963.

[5] Frederick H. Rohles, Jr., Marvin E. Grunzke, and Richard E. Belleville. "Performance Aspects of the MR-2 Flight," ch. 5 in Results of the Project Mercury Ballistic and Orbital Chimpanzee Flights, NASA SP-39, 1963. Mercury-Redstone 1, the first unmanned Redstone booster flight, had been fired Nov. 21, 1960. A premature engine cutoff activated the emergency escape system, but the spacecraft was recovered for reuse. The shot was repeated successfully on Dec. 19, 1960.

[6] Walter C. Williams, Kenneth S. Kleinknecht, William M. Bland, Jr., and James E. Bost, "Project Review," in Mercury Project Summary Including Results of the Fourth Manned Orbital Flight, May 15 and 16, 1963, NASA SP-45, 1963.

[7] Charles W. Mathews, Aeronautical Res. Engineer, Memo for Director of Project Mercury, Feb. 10, 1959.

[8] Ibid

[9] Information is based on (1) Paul E. Purser, Spec. Asst. to Director, Project Mercury, Memo for File, Subj.: Additional Background Material on Project Mercury, Mar. 23, 1959; (2) James P. Henry, "Project Mercury—Status of the Animal Test Program," NASA Project Mercury Working Paper No. 158, Oct. 20, 1960.

[10] James P. Henry and John D. Mosely, "Antecedents and Planning Aspects of the MR-2 Flight," ch. 2 in Results of the Project Mercury Ballistic and Orbital Chimpanzee Flights, NASA SP-39, 1963.

[11] It was also decided that various types of performance would be required of the subjects to simulate the tasks of the human operator. These, Henry and Mosely reported further, involved simple movements of the arms and hands, discrimination of visual signals, and acts requiring judgment. In the longer orbital flights the difficulty of the task would be raised to a level "that would approximate the man’s task as closely as possible within the animals’ capability."

[12] This program, carried out for the Air Force at the Univ. of Texas, represented one of the truly unique scientific resources of the nation. NASA was to continue its dependence on this resource as the space program progressed.

[13] It was not possible to document this statement from official sources, but the author has discussed the problem with officials closely associated with the Mercury program.

[14] "A Survey and Evaluation of Methods of Measuring Blood Pressure for Immediate Space Flight Programs," prepared under contract NASr-51 for the Office of Life Science Programs, NASA, by Webb Associates, June 30, 1961. Also, personal conversations by the author with Dr. Paul Webb, principal Investigator, Webb Associates, in the spring of 1964. This problem is discussed in detail in The Measurement of Blood Pressure in the Human Body, NASA SP-5006, 1964, pp. 17 ff.

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