Mercury-Atlas 6 (Friendship 7)
Mercury-Atlas 6 (Friendship 7)
Launch Date
February 20, 1962
Craft
Mercury
Status
Past
Crew
1
Mercury-Atlas 6 (Friendship 7)
Mercury-Atlas 6 (Friendship 7)
Launch Date
February 20, 1962
Craft
Mercury
Status
Past
Crew
1
Overview
The first U.S. orbital human spaceflight saw John Glenn, Jr. orbit the Earth three times before successfully reentering and splashing down in the North Atlantic Ocean. Glenn flew half the mission manually and most of the reentry manually because of a thruster issue.
Crafts
Mercury
Mercury
The Mercury capsule was the United States' first human spacecraft. Built without onboard computers, all flight calculations had to be determined on the ground and radioed up to each crew member. The spacecraft performed two suborbital and four orbital human missions and proved that people could live in space for multiple days.