Documents / Official release
This is a preliminary transcript of Part II of the Gemini 4 (GT-4) flight crew debriefing, prepared by NASA's Spacecraft Operations Branch, Flight Crew Support Division, and dated June 18, 1965. The debriefing began aboard the recovery ship USS Wasp and ended at the Manned Spacecraft Center. In it, astronauts McDivitt and White discuss how the spacecraft systems performed, including the platform, OAMS, RCS and control modes. They also cover operational checks, visual sightings, experiments, mission planning and training, and give recommendations for future crews.
From the source:Release of 2026-06-12 Incident: 6/9/65, North Atlantic Ocean. This document is a preliminary transcript (Part II) derived from voice recordings of the Gemini 4 flight crew debriefing taken aboard the recovery ship, USS Wasp, on June 9, 1965. Part II of this document contains the “Visual Sightings” section of the debriefing (pages 196-224), where astronauts James McDivitt and Edward White describe their observations while aboard the spacecraft.
“Red River”2 pages
149 But later on we f ound that these same t wo types of information- -the world map and the small WAC Char t --were a.dequo.t e for other types of targets. The WAC Chart showed of course the range of mountains just west of El Paso and the White Sands and the Rio Grande River . We came across Southern California, and I could see the Salton Sea. I didn ' t track them , but I looked out the front and I could see the mountains of New Mexico and Arizona. .And I saw a bunch of white places down below us , any o~e of which co~ld iave been the White Sands . I f I could have really picked out the White Sands by themselves. and unf ortunately they were off the WAC Chart · that I had , I think the contact would have been good enough for me too pick up El Paso . As it was , the only features I had that would have been of great importance were the river , which was the Rio Grande River-:--'3.rld at that point was not very noteworthy-- and the mountain range , ._ which from the al titude of arou..~d 90 miles or more couldn ' t be picked up . I think that this type of a topographical or geographical feature , like a valley or a mountain ,,is not adequate
Official release, from the pursue collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 290 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.