by Gene Kranz
Responsibility for the Gemini spacecraft’s systems was split between two engineers. One was accountable for the guidance, navigation, control, and propulsion systems; he was assigned the communications call sign GNC. Guidance systems provide the computations or corrective actions to achieve a set of orbital conditions, or to reach a target. Navigation systems determine the position, velocity, and orientation of the spacecraft. Control systems use guidance information to compute and provide pointing, steering, and engine start and stop commands. The second engineer was given the electrical, environmental, and communications systems, call sign EECOM. With longer and more complicated missions, we established support staff rooms to assist the front-room controllers. Midway in the Gemini program, we further expanded the team to accommodate the Lockheed Agena rocket that would be used as the rendezvous target.
January 1965
Gemini 2 was the first mission requiring controller support. (Gemini 1 was an unmanned Gemini launch on a Titan II rocket on April 8, 1964. The Cape MCC flight support was limited to an informal evaluation of the Titan rocket systems and launch trajectory support by the booster and trajectory controllers. The dummy spacecraft was not recovered.) The game plan for Gemini 2 took Kraft and me to the Cape for what we hoped would be penultimate Cape deployment. The construction and much of the testing of the Houston Mission Control Center (MCC-H) was completed. John Hodge headed the checkout team in Houston that would monitor Gemini 2 from the new Mission Control Center. After two successful missions in a monitoring mode the mission control functions would be transferred from the Cape to Houston.
Kraft and I were sharing a two-bedroom efficiency apartment to stretch the per diem. The arrangement was convenient, since the living area provided enough room for us to spread out all the material we had to work on to study the endless details involved in a launch. This mission was to be a simple lob shot, much like Alan Shepard’s, but without a pilot. The goal in Gemini 2 was to check out the Titan’s propulsion and guidance system, and its ability to steer along the planned launch trajectory. This would place the Gemini on a path to test the heat shield on reentry. An automatic sequencer controlled the entire mission. The only role of the control team was to issue backup commands if the sequencer failed. Two ships were deployed downrange to monitor the eighteen-minute flight.
Ed Fendell was a rookie flight controller assigned to lead one of the ship’s teams. In Gander, Newfoundland, he was the voice on the radio guiding pilots to safe landings in blizzards and later, at the Cape, he worked in range control. A hard-driving perfectionist, Ed was perfect for Gemini, and he inherited responsibility for a computer-driven remote site system that was marginally ready to do its assigned job.
To prepare for my role as a flight director, I essentially became Kraft’s understudy. The pre-mission responsibilities were vast. The flight director developed the mission game plan; ascertained that each test objective was scheduled; verified the network readiness; made sure that his control team was fully trained—and came up with a contingency plan in case things went wrong.
Throughout the pre-mission period, the flight director oversaw the mission control, network, and team readiness, and provided the flight operations Go NoGo at the reviews preceding the start of the launch countdown.
Each evening, Chris and I would meet in the apartment, and I would listen to him run through the long list of open items for the first unmanned launch. As troubles mushroomed in the thruster and seat tests, he became obsessed with ensuring that the control team was capable of detecting and responding to any problems in flight. Kraft gave me the authority to do anything needed to get on top of our job. I told him I had been marching my controllers in this direction for a long time. This was my first experience in the Go NoGo world in which Kraft lived.
At launch minus six days, Kraft got sicker than hell. He couldn’t even leave the apartment. I knew it was bad when he told me to cover the final simulation, pad tests, and pre-launch briefings. I wondered what he would do if he did not recover for the launch. Each day as I returned, I waited for his word, half expecting him to tell me to step into his seat. While I prayed for his swift recovery, I have to admit that I also liked the idea of filling his shoes for the first time. Kraft told me to go ahead with the briefings. Nervous as a cat in a rocking chair factory, I conducted the final readiness reviews. It finally dawned on me that I might actually have to do the launch, and I looked around for a security blanket, a way to mentally power down when I needed. A copy of Sports Illustrated, with a cover photo of an awesomely attractive young woman in a one-piece black-and-red swimsuit, was on the table. I cut out the photo and slipped it inside the plastic cover sheet of my mission book. Whatever happened, I would have her image with me at the console.
Kraft recovered through sheer willpower. As I watched him get dressed for launch day, impeccable in a crisply starched shirt and tie, I was relieved. With Chris firmly ensconced in the flight director’s seat, my job on Gemini 2 was simply to make sure the control teams were go, and the data flow met the pre-launch requirements. During the brief test flight the mission controllers would send ground commands to back up the automatic sequencer in the Gemini. These commands would separate the Gemini from the Titan rocket, fire the separation rockets, initiate the turnaround maneuver for reentry, etc. I used two stopwatches; one started at liftoff, and another started at Titan rocket shutdown to cue the controllers to send their commands. On my call, the controllers issued the commands to back up the onboard sequencer.
The press was allowed inside the control room. Launch coverage was provided by fixed cameras and lights on both sides of the room, with a roving camera coupled by an umbilical to a recorder. We weren’t going live with this one but we would be live on later launches. It seemed excessive coverage for a simple lob shot, but it was a launch that kicked off the next round in the race to the Moon.
As the countdown progressed through the last few seconds before launch, the lights turned on, the room momentarily bathed in brilliant white, while the cameras whirred. I had a fleeting urge to call out, “Lights, camera, action!” Then everything in Mission Control turned black as the Titan lifted off. It was so dark I could not read my stop-watches. We had been plunged into a power failure because of the overload caused by the TV lighting. The only illumination in the room came from the small buttons on the Western Electric intercom sets, which were provided with a battery backup.
Working blind, I listened to the reports from the launch pad. Unable to do anything, the controllers in the dark monitored reports coming in from the ships downrange. When Hodge didn’t hear my backup command calls, he reported mission status to Kraft from his console at the new control center in Houston. The teams were prepared for anything—except a total blackout.
Gemini 2 was in reentry and the mission virtually over before we were able to restore electrical power. The Titan rocket and Gemini spacecraft performed flawlessly and Hodge’s team in Houston tracked the entire mission. Kraft’s debriefing was short and curt. “Find out what happened,” he barked, “and fix it so it never happens again.” We soon determined that when the press powered up their lights and cameras the surge momentarily overloaded the circuit breakers and cut the power to the entire control center at the Cape. Houston made sure there would be no such snafus in the future. Critical systems were reassigned between two separate electrical circuits powered by three different electrical sources. And the press was required to provide its own power.
The mission was declared a success and the team returned to Houston, enduring the cheerful put-downs of the Houston controllers who had participated in the mission. In debriefing, Hodge jokingly told Kraft he should carry a flashlight with him for Gemini 3, the final mission to be controlled from the Cape. Kraft didn’t laugh.
March 1965
Almost overnight, it seemed we were back at the Cape in the final days of preparation for the first manned Gemini mission. This three-orbit flight test involved a large number of maneuvers to chec
k out the propulsion and guidance systems and the new onboard computer, the first ever used in space. Gus Grissom had been selected as the pilot of America’s first two-man spacecraft with John Young as his co-pilot. Bright and exuberant, Young was a Navy pilot from the second class of nine astronauts. We now had three astronaut groups, including a new breed of scientist-astronaut, competing for a handful of flights.
Since the spacecraft would do three orbits, the sites at Carnarvon, Australia, and Hawaii were critical to the preparation for deorbit and entry. Dan Hunter, who was leading my operations section, anchored the team at Carnarvon. During the final week of testing, the network achieved readiness and I gave the Go to Kraft for the remote site teams.
Many of the early astronauts, in particular Slayton and Shepard, doubted that CapComs who weren’t astronauts could stand up to the pressure of time-critical decisions and communications. They believed that only an astronaut should get the job as the remote site CapCom. I disagreed. My remote site teams had matured. In my view, astronauts assigned to remote sites were observers given the job of assisting the controllers if that became necessary. In any event, five days before the launch Slayton deployed astronauts Charles (Pete) Conrad and Neil Armstrong to Carnarvon and Hawaii, respectively, continuing the tradition of stationing astronauts at critical positions on the ground track. Hunter and Conrad were both men of strong conviction. But given orders, they would salute their leader and then execute with few questions asked.
Three days before launch, the mission readiness review was concluded, and the time had arrived to begin the countdown. After a great meal at Ramon’s Supper Club, Kraft and I returned to the apartment we were still sharing. We went over the next day’s schedule and then retired for the night. It seemed like we had barely dropped off to sleep when I heard a loud pounding on the door in the hall. Someone shouted, “Chris, we got a problem!” It sounded like Slayton. I rapidly pulled on a shirt and pants, wondering what the hell had happened. By the time I emerged, Kraft and Slayton were in a heated argument. Deke was exclaiming, “Dammit, Chris, get your guy under control!” Kraft then went nose-to-nose with Slayton. I felt that within seconds the dispute would escalate beyond shouting. Then, magically, both realized it was time to deescalate but not back down. Like two junkyard dogs, they circled. Slowly, I realized that Hunter and Conrad had tangled at Carnarvon over who was in charge of the site during the mission.
Conrad had quoted Hunter as saying, “Kranz put me in charge, and if you give me any more trouble, I want your ass out of the control room.” Conrad, a Navy carrier pilot and new astronaut, was not about to take that from anyone. Besides, Slayton had told Conrad that he was in charge. Kraft finally got Slayton calmed down. It was around 3:00 A.M. by then. Chris agreed he would write out some guidance for the teams at Carnarvon and Hawaii in the morning.
In preparation for a mission, the tracking stations worked on the same schedule as the controllers, so Hunter was on site when I called on the conference loop the next morning. I briefly mentioned Deke’s outburst and asked him what the devil was going on out there. Hunter said, “Conrad arrived and proceeded to take over. Then the maintenance and operations staff and the site manager came to me and wanted to know who to take their orders from. I told them Conrad wouldn’t know an acquisition aid if it fell on him. If Carnarvon wants to support the mission, they damned well better take their orders from me.” (The acquisition aid is a piece of equipment used to lock on the capsule signals and point the site antennas.)
“The site staff,” he concluded, “is still not sure who is in charge and they want a Teletype directive to cover their ass.” I told Hunter I would get on it, terminated the voice conference, turned and briefed Kraft on Hunter’s side of the story. With two days until launch, Kraft was not about to get into a hassle with Slayton over roles and responsibilities. Conrad was an unknown quantity to me and I thought we could paper over the differences until after the mission, then resolve it properly. This turned out to be a serious mistake. Working with Kraft, I drafted a message that clearly reiterated the job description of the remote site CapCom job, assigning Hunter the overall site responsibility. When Slayton arrived, Kraft handed him the report and the argument in the apartment started all over again, only this time before a large audience in Mission Control.
“Dammit, Chris,” Deke snapped, “if we are not going to put my astronauts in charge, it was a waste to send them.” Kraft cut him off: “Deke, I don’t have time to argue. We will put Hunter in charge of the site operations and Conrad in charge during real time.”
The deal was cut. Kraft marked up the changes and I had the instructions Teletyped to the Carnarvon and Hawaii CapComs. The next day, launch minus one, the entire network was called up for a final review of the mission rules and procedures. At the end of the call, Kraft began polling the sites for any open issues. When Hunter came on the line, he said, “I’ve got Conrad here and I’d like to understand the Teletype you sent yesterday.” I passed Kraft the message and he briefly summarized the content. The whole world, at least our part of it, was listening as Hunter continued. “This message does not resolve anything. When I get back, I am going to frame it and hang it on the wall in my crapper.” Controllers around the world listened, stunned. Kraft was speechless, and Hunter knew he had said too much. At the limits of his patience, a furious Chris snarled, “You’ve got your orders, young man!”
Following the launch-minus-one-day briefing with the tracking stations, we adjourned to the beach house that had been provided for the astronauts by Life magazine, who had exclusive rights to publish their personal stories, approved reluctantly by NASA. Grissom and Young, totally unaware of the Carnarvon flap, had invited Kraft, the controllers, and astronauts Cooper, Shepard, and Gene Cernan for a brief get-together prior to launch. I was preoccupied with how I was going to save Hunter’s career when he returned to Houston. Since Slayton was not in the MCC for the L-1 briefing, he was unaware of the friction he had helped unleash. Now he walked in and greeted Kraft with a cheery “How’s it going, Chris?”
Kraft, still fuming from his discussion with Hunter, didn’t respond. Instead, he made it clear he had no interest in talking to Slayton and walked over to Grissom. The customary mixing between the astronauts and controllers was missing. Controllers were in a group on one side of the room, the astronauts on the other, hovering around Grissom and Young. It was like a wedding in which the bride’s side and the groom’s side were strangers to one another. You could almost hear the usher: “Friend of the bride? Friend of the groom?”
Approaching nightfall, the controllers, especially John Llewellyn, had had enough to drink, and, as we were getting ready to leave, their feelings surfaced. Llewellyn responded to some remark from Shepard. By the time I got there, the two were going at it, Llewellyn yelling, “You better hope that Hunter covers Conrad’s ass. If he doesn’t, you can kiss Carnarvon goodbye for this mission.”
I grabbed John, moving him toward the door with Shepard on our heels. Llewellyn, forever the Marine, then commented on Shepard’s Navy background and again, to his face, said, “I got more Purple Hearts than you’ll ever see in your lifetime, you SOB.” I corralled Llewellyn again and hustled him outside, where a very concerned Mission Control team jammed him into a car and drove him back to the motel. This was no way to run a mission, and I hoped and prayed that cooler heads would prevail the next morning when we prepared to launch. We needed Llewellyn, and we needed a united team—controllers and astronauts—at every site, in the control center, and in the spacecraft.
Living as we did in an environment that combined the temperament of a football training camp and the confinement of a submarine, with ego and pride all around, as well as relentless pressure, I sometimes wondered why an occasional bloody brawl didn’t break out.
March 23, 1965, Gemini-Titan 3
The first manned flight in a program evokes many emotions in me. Seated at the console next to Kraft, I was about to enter a new age, not unlike the leap fro
m the Wright brothers’ Flyer to the fighter aircraft of the 1930s, bypassing two decades of normal development. With Gemini, we were stepping directly into the future. The incident involving Hunter and Conrad was far from my mind as the countdown progressed smoothly to liftoff. A brief hold just before launch was the only glitch and then the Molly Brown was on its way. Just as every fighter pilot gets to name his aircraft, Grissom and Young assigned that name to their capsule. (Since Grissom had lost his first spacecraft, Liberty Bell 7, when the hatch blew off at splashdown, Molly Brown, the “unsinkable” heroine of a Broadway musical who survived the Titanic disaster, seemed a logical choice of name for his second spacecraft.)
This astronaut combination proved to be a splendid one. Both had only the single desire to fly and were pure joy to work with. A three-orbit mission has to go by the numbers. There is limited time to experiment, troubleshoot, or innovate. Grissom and Young’s first orbit was devoted to abbreviated checks of the spacecraft, and the second included a brief series of experiments. In the third orbit, the propulsion and control systems were tested, gradually lowering the orbit so the deorbit maneuver could be completed with the reaction control jets, if the retro rockets failed. Fortunately, the deorbit was normal.