Page 35 - Curriculum Visions Dynamic Book

 Astronaut Walter M. Schirra, Jr., in Mercury pressure suit with a model of the Mercury capsule behind him.
Although his flight was less spectacular than the Vostok orbit, there was an important difference. Shepard was able to help control his capsule and thus land in it
on the sea. As a result, although superficially it was not yet apparent, the race was becoming more even.
The Redstone rocket got the program under way, but it was not powerful enough for an orbital launch. The succeeding launches used the more powerful Atlas rockets.
When John Glenn piloted the Mercury 6 capsule Friendship 7 on February 20, 1962, he made three orbits. Although still 14 orbits behind the Soviet cosmonauts’ record at
that stage, Glenn’s mission was an American landmark, and he became a national hero.
NASA then began a series of further orbiting runs, with Wally Schirra doing nine orbits in Sigma 7 and Gordon Cooper, Jr., performing 22 orbits on May 15, 1963, with a space duration of 34 hours and 20 minutes.
Not to be put in the shade, in June 1963 the Soviets launched Valentina Tereshkova— the first woman into space. While in orbit, she passed another cosmonaut, Valeri Bykovsky, who in his 5-day journey was performing the longest solo spaceflight in history so far.
 Three women cosmonauts prior
to the launch of Vostok 6, June
1963. Left to right are Valentina Ponomareva, backup Irina Solovyeva, and Valentina Tereshkova—the first woman in space. Tereshkova spent
3 days aboard Vostok 6.
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