Documents / Official release

Preliminary Gemini 4 Crew Debriefing, Part I, 1965

National Aeronautics and Space Administration · 1965-06-09 · 340 pages · text from the file's own layer

This is a preliminary transcript of Part I of the Gemini 4 (GT-4) flight crew debriefing. The Spacecraft Operations Branch of NASA's Flight Crew Support Division prepared it on June 16, 1965, from recordings of the debriefing held aboard the USS Wasp on June 9, 1965. In it, astronauts McDivitt and White describe the mission from an operational viewpoint, covering countdown, powered flight, insertion, orbital operations, reentry, landing and recovery. According to the preface, visual sightings were left for a later part.

From the source:Release of 2026-06-12 Incident: 6/9/65, North Atlantic Ocean. This document is a preliminary transcript (Part I) derived from voice recordings of the Gemini 4 flight crew debriefing taken aboard the recovery ship, USS Wasp, on June 9, 1965. Astronaut Ed White recounts seeing “sparkles” during the flight.

Open the PDF at page 117 Original source ↗

“Harder”5 pages

  • p. 149 …I did notice that the suit was a little harder. I felt this type of suit…
  • p. 150 …You mean with the harder suit I was stiffer? Harder . And your. arms were stiffe:::- a…
  • p. 186 178 €0NflDENitM White McDivitt White McDivitt any harder . No . I think that shouli be t he…
  • p. 318 …We hit ten times harder than I expected to hit . The altimeter was set at the…
  • p. 320 …We really seemed to hit hard, harder than I thought EO~ ◄ Flt,Et~TI.A"L
109
of the spacecraft . I knew right away as soon as
I got u~I felt even before - - that the technique
of holding on to the bar in the spacecraft and
sticking a finger in the RCS thruster wasn ' t
going to wor k . I mentioned that to Jim before -
that I didn ' t think I would be able to do it .
McDivitt I think that you and I both knew how you were
going to do, and ever-sbody else was planning for
us how we were going to do it , but without any
real experience in it. People. who didn I t know
a lot about it were planning this sequence a~d
it wasn ' t the way it should have been .
White I couldn ' t have done that . I didn ' t have three
hands . I couldn ' t hold the gun and put a
finger in the RCS nozzle , and hold the handle
at the same t.ime . I thought it would be more
d~sira.bl:'; anyhow to actually depart the space
craft with no ·.relocity, other than that imparted
by the gun. This is exactly what I did . I
thought t hat I was free of the spacecraft , and
I fired the gun. I real'i.zed that my legs were
still dragging a little bit on the side of the
seat , so I pulled myself out until I could
see that my feet 1vere actual l'•' on!; 0f the

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Official release, from the pursue collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is under it. 340 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.