Preliminary Gemini 4 Crew Debriefing, Part II, 1965

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.

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McDivitt
White
McDivitt
White
12. 4 Mission Rules
White
McDivitt
White
were going to get these final changes in that were
required for our flight. They sure waited a long
time to put them in.
Yes, two or three days before the flight we still
had a lot of things missing. In fact, when I got
into the spacecraft, about the first thing I
noticed was that the velcro wasn't around the
8- ball. About 30 minutes later, while we were
lying there waiting for the launch, El looked up
and pointed at the 8-ball at the place where the
velcro was not.
Yes, there wasn't velcro in several places where I
had wanted it, and in several places where I had
actually drawn in the lines where I wanted them to
put the strips. Inst~ad, they put them 90 degrees to
where I had the lines . I can ' t believe they would do
something like that. I'm not really complaining.
I think they did a pretty ,good job .
Do you have anything else on spacecraft chan.ges?
No.
I thought this was one of the smoother points .
What? Mission rules?
Mission rules .