Here is my Vintage 'Project Gemini-MANNED SPACECRAFT CENTER-FLORIDA OPERATIONS-SPACECRAFT PRELAUNCH TEST PROCEDURE' Manual dated October 23, 1965. Although obviously used at the time, the graphics are still awesome as seen on the below cover. This manual was prepared for the Gemini 6 Mission flown by Astronauts Wally Schirra and Tom Stafford. Gemini 6 was initially supposed to dock with the Agena Target Vehicle. This manual is basically a projected timeline of pre launch events.
The original Gemini 6 mission had been scheduled for launch on October 25, 1965 at 12:41 pm EDT. The mission was to include four dockings with the Agena Target Vehicle. Original mission plans also included the first live television coverage of the recovery of a U.S. spacecraft at sea by the recovery ship, the USS Wasp. The Wasp was fitted with ground station equipment by ITT to relay live television, via the Intelsat I (nicknamed the "Early Bird") satellite.
Fifteen minutes after Schirra and Stafford boarded their Gemini 6 spacecraft in preparation for launch, the unmanned Agena Target Vehicle was launched. After a successful burn of the Atlas booster, the Agenas' secondary engines fired to separate it from the Atlas. But immediately after the Agenas' primary engine fired at the six minute mark into its' flight, telemetry was lost. A catastrophic failure apparently caused the vehicle to explode. Five separate radar targets were tracked over the Atlantic Ocean after the telemetry was lost. The Gemini 6 launch was subsequently canceled.
The rendezvous/docking objective was so critical to our incremental march to the moon that NASA subsequently decided to launch Gemini 6 while Gemini 7 was in earth orbit, using Gemini 7 as the rendezvous target. Gemini 7, manned by Commander Frank Borman and Pilot Jim Lovell, launched on December 4, 1965 and Gemini 6, manned by Schirra and Stafford, launched on December 15, 1965. As a result, Gemini 6 performed the first manned spacecraft rendezvous using Gemini 7 as the target instead of the Agena Target Vehicle, even though the two spacecraft could not actually dock.
COVER
TITLE PAGE
PURPOSE
TOC
ABBREVIATIONS AND SYMBOLS KEY
PAGE 1
PAGE 8
Note entry 'Primary Flight Crew Begin Suit-Up' at T-165 00.
PAGE 10
Note entry 'Flight Crew Ingress' at T-115 00.
PAGE 11
Note entry's 'Atlas Ignition' at T-095 04, and
'GAATV Release and Liftoff' at
T-095 00.
PAGE 13
Note entry 'Ejection Seat O Rings Unstowed' at T-030 00.
PAGE 14
Note entry 'Liftoff' at T-000 00.
GEMINI 6 AND 7 RENDEZVOUS
Gemini 7 in orbit, as photographed by Stafford from Gemini 6.
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