Highways Into Space: A first-hand account of the beginnings of the human space program

by Glynn S. Lunney

  The EVA was next on the agenda and all preps were normal and “GOs” were given to depress the spacecraft. The EVA went for a short twenty-three minutes from Hawaii to crossing the States. Ed White found it easy to use the nitrogen gun as propulsion to move himself and control his attitude. The crew had some difficulty with the umbilical hose and the pressurized suits when it came time to close the hatch. This equipment configuration is akin to wrestling a very large snake and capturing all of its body within the confines of a very small cockpit. Two crewmembers already took up quite a bit of the volume even before the umbilical, but the crew got the door closed and latched in due course.

  In retrospect, this experience probably misled us. We did not have any new or unexpected difficulty with EVA as it was conducted. We did not learn how difficult this kind of EVA was until a whole year later during the GT-9 EVA by Gene Cernan. Gordo Cooper and Pete Conrad crewed the Gemini 5 spacecraft on its eight-day mission, August twenty-first to twenty-ninth, 1965. This was a three-shift operation for the MCC including the Flight Dynamics team. Jerry Bostick, Cliff Charlesworth and Ed Pavelka were on the FIDO console – Tom Carter, Dave Massaro and John Llewyllen were on the Retro console. Parker, Fenner, Russell and Bales handled the guidance officer position. This group handled all of the Gemini flights with a few changes. Cliff dropped out of rotation after Gemini 6 and Bostick and Pavelka rotated the prime FIDO role. Stu Davis joined to cover the Agena and Bill Gravett joined the Retros on Gemini 7 and subs. Tom Carter was a new assignee out of John Mayer’s Mission Planning branch.

  After the usual simulation runs, they were all ready for GT-5, the longest mission yet flown in manned space of eight days, with a deployable pod for evaluating the rendezvous radar, and seventeen science experiments. Once on orbit, the new fuel cell system replacing the batteries had a problem with the cryogenic oxygen tank, in that the pressure fell from the range of eight hundred to nine hundred PSI, to seventy PSI and then leveled off. This was a real concern because the cryo tank pressure forced the oxygen into the fuel cell to generate electrical power. This somewhat precarious position resulted in a daily “Go-No-Go” from MCC to continue each next day of the flight. The situation improved each day and the threat to the planned flight duration receded.

  The rendezvous radar evaluation pod was deployed about two hours into the flight and successfully tracked by the Gemini radar. This radar testing was reduced in order to save electrical power but gave good results every time it was tested, including with an L Band transponder, ground based at the Cape. For the rest of the flight, experiments and “living in space” activities dominated, as the crew adapted to this new environment.

  It is worth mentioning some background on this eight-day mission. Before Mercury flew, there were national levels discussions and debates about the capabilities of men to survive in the weightless environment. It was said that they would become disoriented, confused and generally fail at piloting in this environment. These dramatic predictions turned out to be overdone and incorrect. We did find later in Apollo that a noticeable percentage of crew members could become ill if they were not careful to avoid rapid head movements in the first two or three days of space flight. After which, they adapt and are generally fine and even with this condition, the crews have always been able to handle whatever was required. So there was some basis for concern but it was over played and not a showstopper. It did not even manifest itself in Mercury or Gemini, but did in Apollo, where there was a significant volume in the cockpit to move around in and to induce this space sickness condition. Once recognized, this is a manageable situation, by avoiding head motions and not scheduling intensive operational activity until there has been one to two days to adapt.

  We faced the same extremes in some of the other national Apollo debates, where it was claimed that the spacecraft would sink into the lunar surface. This was in contradiction to the experience with the early unmanned landers on the moon, which did not sink.

  During this same period of 1964 to 1965, the Soviets introduced a newly named ship, the Voshkod and flew it three times. We found out later that it was the same one-man ship, Vostok, with barely volume accommodations for three unsuited crewmen and elimination of the ejection seat. Komarov, Feoktistov and Yegorov flew on October 12, 1964, for one day. Apparently seen as upstaging the two-man Gemini, it had to be a nightmare to cram into and stay for a day. The next Voshkod was an unmanned test ship and launched on February 22, 1965. On-orbit OK, the EVA airlock was deployed. However, signals from the ship were soon lost as was the ship. On March 18, 1965, before GT-3, Leonov and Belyayev were in space aboard Voshkod 2. The airlock was deployed and Leonov was outside for ten minutes when he started to ingress the airlock.

  We later learned that the ballooning of the suit prevented him from fitting back into the airlock. He had to depress his suit a slight amount, inch back thru the airlock while the suit was repressurizing and then repeat the depress several times before clearing the airlock. At the time for automatic retrofire sequence, there was no ignition of the rockets. This resulted in a ground decision to delay one rev and reenter manually. It was a real scramble for the crew and retrofire was late and out of attitude. The vehicle landed 1200 miles long in a forest and the craft wedged in some trees. They egressed after the rescue team skied in to their location, and eventually returned after about two days in the forest. The world believed that the Soviets had a real 3-man ship and an EVA capability. And they did, of sorts.

  Bill Tindall

  Bill and Jane Tindall and their family of four first became close to us while still at Langley. TheTindalls were the first family in Virginia to invite us – Marilyn and I – for dinner with their family of three (at the time) kids – Dana, Mark and Amy. At the time, Marilyn was just pregnant with Jenny. I was working in the same organization as Bill at the time. Bill had a love of sailboats manifested in a ‘34 wooden hull sloop, which he was refurbishing in his barn. The Tindall property, from Jane’s side of the family, was multiple acres with all sorts of equipment and out buildings. Bill used it all to get his required chores done so he would have time to work on his sailboat. Maybe it came from his time in the Navy, or maybe from his being raised on the water surrounding the family home on Cape Cod. However, the pace of the space program eventually caught up with Bill and he didn’t even move the sailboat from Virginia to Texas.

  Marilyn, Glynn, Jane and Bill Tindall

  Bill functioned as John Mayer’s deputy and he was really fascinated with all of the new challenges facing the Mission Planning and Flight Dynamics teams. He was full of insight to help us new, younger guys cope with these orbital mechanics subjects and he was very good at both – the subjects and the mentoring. Bill always had a variety of jobs and usually was plugged into the point position on the most difficult subjects. He was the first to focus our attention on the possibility of dramatically simplifying the operations concept for Mercury, with an MCC in Florida and a dozen remote stations around the world with small flight control teams. He promoted the improvements in worldwide communications as being the enabler of a single control facility with all voice data, command and eventually video being routed to the MCC in Houston through the global network of receiving stations. Bill was the NASA lead for the software development by Draper labs and MIT for the Apollo computer. But, most dear to our hearts was his integration of the mission trajectory planners, the flight controllers, and the flight crews.

  This meeting started out as something called “data priority,” since one of the early issues was which source of navigation data to use in which phases and how to decide that choice in real time. At this level, the primary members of the MCC Flight Controller team to engage in these discussions with the mission planners and the Flight dynamics operators. However, this activity quickly evolved into a more comprehensive process gradually including all of the systems flight controllers, flight software providers, the experts from flight crew operations division who devised the check list and the flight plans and then
, most significantly, the flight crews enthusiastically engaged. It was the forum in which we systematically talked through and vehemently argued about every step and decision in the process, precisely defining all of the “flight techniques” necessary to use the best of the spacecraft capabilities to accomplish back-up launch guidance, rendezvous, docking, docked propulsion burns, de-orbit and entry. In later times, the name for this forum did become “flight techniques.”

  Bill was brilliant, enthusiastic, energetic, and he completely engaged all viewpoints in this process. Bill’s approach was to systematically start through all the mission phases and then on to the missions themselves that exercised different rendezvous techniques. This process reduced complexities to easy-to-understand building blocks. He would announce his subjects for upcoming meetings, for example “how much plane change correction to use from the launch vehicle”, “what data source to use for each of the rendezvous burns,” “what it is the most conservative rendezvous phasing sequence for the first mission attempt at rendezvous,” among others. Like a court hearing with many representatives for all points of view, Bill would orchestrate the discussion and arguments surrounding each step along the way. Since these decisions were often sketched out on a blackboard as the subject evolved, this was the root of the preferred method for winning, or at least controlling, the debate – “Let me have the chalk now,” or “He who has the chalk wins.” Vigorous and spirited are the descriptors that begin to capture the rough and tumble arguments of the day as each participant pressed his case. Almost a miracle of competence combined with the sincere search for the “right” answer, this worked for us. Bill would record the result by dictating the same to Patsy Sauer, his secretary, who would then have the draft minutes available for team review within hours. These “Tindallgrams” became mandatory reading, study, and a widely recognized record of the progress of flight techniques.

  Bill’s enthusiasm was infectious. He was a master at blowing off some wild proposal without terribly offending the offerer, changing his mind as he came to accept another viewpoint, or strengthening his original position with new inputs from the team. In this regime of resolving the details of flight operations for all of these mission activities, Bill has to get significant credit for enabling the success of Gemini. Again, as typical of those times, he was unheralded in the larger picture, and that was just fine with him. The hundred plus participants went on to execute these plans and techniques superbly. He truly was one of the MVP’s for Gemini.

  Not only did Bill contribute so much to the success of Gemini and later Apollo, with the same integration planning activity, but he was superb role model for accomplishment and leadership for our young engineers. And they soaked it up. You could see the growth in newcomers, like Ed Pavelka, Phil Shaffer, Dave Reed, Chuck Deiterich, Gran Paules, Steve Bales and others as they lived this education. The FDB-ers who went on to the most success, consistently employed this Tindall model, much more useful than a theoretical course on leadership. They learned to take command, tackle the problems, enlist all the necessary help, test all the options, decide and build support to go forward.

  Debriefing at the HofBrau Garden

  If the preparations and the flights were intense, the traditional but informal debriefings were a raucous release of emotion by a group of men having just accomplished something big, very difficult, important to the country, and loaded with risk. Sometime in the immediate aftermath of the crew returning to Houston, we scheduled our unofficial debriefing at the HofBrau Garden in Dickinson, along I-45 and about ten miles south of Clear Lake. In the back of the property, the Hofbrau had an outside open area, with trellises and vines surrounding picnic tables and benches. The restaurant served German food – sausages, sauerkraut, potato salad, black bread and an unlimited supply of beer kegs. It seemed that we always had the place to ourselves and there were not any outsiders. The people at the HofBrau garden seemed to love having us there for these events, so they probably had closed off at the least the outside areas for us.

  The only protocol was that there was no protocol. And the present concept of political correctness was nowhere in sight. With the first beer, the debriefing centered on any mistakes, slips, and character flaws of each of us. It was common to see our space heroes, standing on the table shouting insults at each other. Llewellyn and McDivitt were especially good at this. And whoever it was at any given moment that was leading the attack was either booed or goaded on to even louder and more extreme expressions of ridicule and insults. It was a great way to celebrate our work together.

  The Clear Lake region was a much different place in those days – a lot fewer people, and much less traffic. Since these sessions ran past 9 p.m., we were the only ones who were out. That made it easier for God to find us and look after us. My brother-in-law, George Kurtz, joined us for one session. Even with being a “people person” and a superb salesman, he was not sure how he would fit into this setting. It didn’t take George long to claim a good niche for himself, as he sprang for the first keg of beer of the evening. From then on, George was an insider. George ran a sales organization with many sales people. He could not get over the dedication (almost obsession) that our people brought to their work. He asked how I managed that and wanted to transfer “it” to his staff. “It” just didn’t travel that way.

  Marilyn’s dad, the first George Kurtz, also loved the HofBrau debriefings. When he and Mom Kurtz visited us, he was always excited to learn that we were having another debriefing. I gathered that Dad Kurtz did not have too much opportunity to float free like that in Cleveland. I used to make a point of telling my mother-in-law, Lillian, that NASA and the astronauts requested his attendance. That was always sure to get us out of the house. Besides the comradeship, George was from Pennsylvania Dutch country and he loved the food and beer at the HofBrau. We were always looked at a little suspiciously when we returned home. Later in life, George and young George always talked about these excursions with fondness and wonder.

  Chapter Ten: Family and The Trench

  During these years, we had many occasions when members of the branch visited our home for food, drink and whatever frivolity was on for the day. Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day were big football days and one of our gathering times. Many of the guys were still bachelors and so it became something of a tradition to gather at our house for these occasions. Not only was January first Marilyn’s birthday, but on one of these New Year’s days Marilyn was also twelve days away from giving birth to our fourth child, Bryan. Marilyn’s description of these days was “the guys come early and leave late.” Sometimes they even needed a little nudge when we got to the late side. I believe Marilyn must have kept watch for shock material that she could use to hasten the exit and to inject a little humility into our outspoken guests. This happened after a day where they all sat around drinking, watching the games, or knocking our little kids over by throwing a football at them so hard no one could catch it.

  Jay Greene somehow became Marilyn’s target on one of these January first holidays, just before Bryan’s birth; maybe it was the long day of cooking, serving, and hostessing into the late side of the day. But she started to quote Redbook, which was a woman’s magazine with presumably very accurate woman’s viewpoint articles. And, so she confronted Mr. Greene, “Jay, I have been reading recent research which shows that plumbers are better lovers than engineers.” I don’t know if Jay had been bragging or just talking to bring down this indictment on his ego. But, his jury of peers obviously thought that he had and they piled on with glee. (They seemed to forget that they were engineers too.) Eventually, Jay surrendered the debate. We have revisited this story many times since with Jay and his supportive buddies.

  I had hired Jay when he was working in the wire room at Downey, California, the home plant of the CSM. This recently graduated engineer from Brooklyn had moved to California to cut various types of wire in various lengths, and put them in a plastic bag for the manufacturing floor. To his credit, he did not see
this job as the high point of his career and he joined the FDB. But that was the only time that Jay needed rescuing. Once here, he excelled at all of it.

  At one point, Phil Shaffer brought live lobsters back from one of his trips to Boston on a visit to MIT Draper Labs of flight software fame. Everybody wagered various numbers of the house beers on the lobster races. I believe our kids enjoyed the races most and were unhappy when their favorite racer had to go in the boiling pot. I don’t think they really cared for lobster eating at their age.

  On football days, our boys took the most punishment. Football on television provokes the amateur observers to see how hard and far they can throw a football, especially at small moving targets. Our little boys enjoyed football and went out to innocently play with these men only to be blasted by their hard throws.

  On a very hot humid day in the first days of July, our family was driving on NASA Road 1 in front of the Center. Walking along the side of the road was a young man wearing heavy corduroy pants and a long sleeved wool shirt. I told Marilyn, “This could be the kid I just hired from Wyoming. It looks like he doesn’t know how to dress for Houston but we better pick him up before he melts.”

  Allegedly, Bill Stoval had a fiancée back in Wyoming. But it took so long for Ruth to show up in Houston that we began to suspect that this was just another Stoval story. But, there really was a Ruth and she was the complete antidote to Bill, delightful and charming. Later when we had the twins from Montana and Wyoming, Reed and Stoval, at the gatherings, we were able to send two each of our kids home with each couple for one night. Stoval found fruit loops in his beloved Corvette for a couple of weeks afterwards. Stoval always went out of his way to give his gracious hostess grief about over populating our corner of the world. (He and Ruth went on to contribute three of their own to our world once Bill caught on.) Although Bill left Houston in eight years to return home and take over the family business after his Dad died, our family had grown close to Bill during his short stay. Bill came as a bachelor and joined the regular gatherings. He was full of it and our kids – “rugrats” to him – loved to rally with him at the house. They liked Bill so much that he was their special target as they grew a little older for water balloons when he visited in his shiny Corvette. One day he showed up in brilliant yellow slacks and they did manage to get a couple of direct hits with eggs and water balloons on his slacks. He was not pleased, but he was thirsty and hungry so he stayed.