Astronauts Succeed

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31118, 22 July 1966, Page 11

Astronauts Succeed

(N.Z. Press Association —Copyright)

GAPE KENNEDY, July 21.

The astronauts John Young and Michael Collins streak back to earth today with new space records to their credit—and a black mark for lost equipment.

Collins capped the three-day flight with a jetgun trip across the hazardous space bridge between their Gemini X spacecraft and the Agena VIII target rocket which has been orbiting the

earth since March 16. He became the first man to lay hands on another orbiting satellite by taking off a scientific panel to be brought back for analysis. “Mike went right over there

and picked up that panel,” radioed Young to Gemini control. “He plucked it right off the Agena.” Rut the 35-year-old Air Force major dropped a Swedish camera in the process, and later, with the spacewalk cut short by dwindling fuel supplies, the astronauts said they also appeared to have accidentally jettisoned another scientific panel containing British, Israeli and West German experiments, as

they threw out unwanted equipment. “We had the panel in the cabin and now we can’t find it,” Collins reported ruefully. “Either we stowed it away in some magic place or it floated out.”

Today's planned splashdown 550 miles east of Florida (about 9 a.m. New Zealand time. Friday) ends an otherwise highly successful flight brought off in the teeth of unsolved problems. Fuel virtually exhausted after two days of complex manoeuvres in orbit, the astronauts have only routine scientific experiments today before the fiery and always dangerous return from space. Young piloted Gemini X to within a few feet of Agena IVIII, which is circling the i earth without electrical power 'or radar.

Hours after they had sped down and away from Agena VIII even mission control could not say exactly how close Young took Gemini X. Pressed for an answer, he finally replied casually: “A few inches.” Also still unannounced was the precise length of Collins’s excursion—originally scheduled for 55 minutes. The best official estimate was 38 minutes between opening and closing of the hatch. Own Power The astronauts began Wednesday still docked with Agena X—their first target rocket—as they raced to the rendezvous with Agena VIII. They saved every possible ounce of Gemini’s fuel by using Agena X’s engines to achieve proper orbit. Then Agena X was discarded and Gemini X flew the last critical 60 miles under its own power. When Young arrived at rendezvous he was congratulated by mission control and exclaimed in reply: “I can hardly believe it myself.”

Collins on his space-walk later said: “Everything outside is about as we expected except everything takes longer. Body positioning seems to be the problem.”

Cemetery Desecrated.—Vandals desecrated a 250-year-old cemetery at Newport on Tuesday night, breaking into two burial vaults and propping a skeleton in a mausoleum window. They also [strewed ashes from a burial [urn over the floor.—New I York, July 21.