Documents / Official release

Preliminary Gemini 4 Crew Debriefing, Part II, 1965

National Aeronautics and Space Administration · 1965-06-09 · 290 pages · text from the file's own layer

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.

Open the PDF at page 96 Original source ↗

“Sea”9 pages

  • p. 155 …We came across Southern California, and I could see the Salton Sea. I didn ' t track…
  • p. 157 …We came across Southern California, and I could see the Salton Sea. I didn ' t track…
  • p. 161 …Th8 Dead Sea was a good l~cation, and actually the city itself was located at…
  • p. 163 …I )icked np the Salton Sea and El Centro , just below the Sal ton Sea, and…
  • p. 164 156 River, which should ::>e a few miles to the east of the Salton Sea. There…
  • p. 167 …The local l andmarks were the Mediterranean on one side , the Red Sea on the other…
  • p. 168 …up the Red Sea, picked up the Suez Canal between the Red Sea and the Mediterranean…
  • p. 202 …Pretty soon I found the Red Sea about 30 degrees below the horizon or maybe a…
  • p. 223 …I could see the sea dye marker in the water. I could see the parachute in…
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McDivitt
White
McDivitt
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McDivitt
properly. We got the computer on and got it
loaded . The DCS updates were going in and they
were gett Lng V fJ dfication on the ground. One time
I remember we didn't g6t the DCS light . As a
matter of fact, they sent the load up again and
we sti.l.l iid.n ' t get the DCS light. They verified
on the ground that it was going in .
Well, the funny thing 'we.S when the computer wasn ' t
on we got a DCS light.
The DCS lights come on when they get set up for
the TX and send out a :r.ealbtime command,too.
Well, mRybe the TX when they sent up-· They
kept telling us that they got a good load in it
and I had no light. I really didn ' t quite bel ieve
them .
Neither did I. As a matter- of fact, we had it
verified at the next station.
Okay.
And that ' s where the onboard computer thing ends .
I might go through what happened to the thing .
We were over the .States and h!;',,d the onboard computer
on for getting a new load in it. I got just about
over Florida . He said, okay, I could turn the

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Official release, from the pursue collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is under it. 290 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.