Project Manhigh, National Museum of USAF

Project Manhigh was a pre-

Space Age The Space Age is a period encompassing the activities related to the Space Race, space exploration, space technology, and the cultural developments influenced by these events, beginning with the Sputnik_1#Launch_and_mission, launch of Sputnik 1 ...

military project that took men in

balloons A balloon is a flexible bag that can be inflated with a gas, such as helium, hydrogen, nitrous oxide, oxygen Oxygen is the chemical element with the symbol O and atomic number 8. It is a member of the chalcogen group in the per ...

to the middle layers of the

stratosphere The stratosphere () is the second layer of the atmosphere of the Earth, located above the troposphere and below the mesosphere. The stratosphere is an atmospheric layer composed of stratified temperature layers, with the warm layers of air ...

, funded as an aero-medical research program, though seen by its designers as a stepping stone to space. It was conducted by the

United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal ...

between 1955 and 1958.

History

The project started in December 1955 to study the effects of

cosmic rays Cosmic rays are high-energy particles or clusters of particles (primarily represented by protons or atomic nuclei) that move through space at nearly the speed of light. They originate from the Sun, from outside of the Solar System in our own ...

on humans. Three balloon flights to the

were made during the program: * Manhigh I to , by

Captain Captain is a title, an appellative for the commanding officer of a military unit; the supreme leader of a navy ship, merchant ship, aeroplane, spacecraft, or other vessel; or the commander of a port, fire or police department, election precinct, e ...

Joseph W. Kittinger on June 2, 1957. The balloon was launched from South St. Paul Airport and the flight was cut short due to one of the capsule's valves being installed backwards which vented the oxygen supply outside, but not before reaching a record altitude of 96,784 feet. * Manhigh II to , by

Major Major (commandant in certain jurisdictions) is a military rank of commissioned officer status, with corresponding ranks existing in many military forces throughout the world. When used unhyphenated and in conjunction with no other indicators ...

David G. Simons David Goodman Simons (June 7, 1922 – April 5, 2010) was an American physician turned U.S. Air Force lieutenant colonel who, as part of Project Manhigh, set a high-altitude balloon flight record in 1957 at above the Earth in an aluminum capsule s ...

on August 19–20, 1957, launched from Portsmouth Mine in Crosby, Minnesota, for a 32-hour flight that included a set of 25 experiments and observations, and earned Simons a ''Life'' magazine cover spot. With the pilot and the scientific payload, the Manhigh II gondola had a total mass of . At maximum altitude, the balloon expanded to a diameter of with a volume of over . * Manhigh III to , by

Lieutenant A lieutenant ( , ; abbreviated Lt., Lt, LT, Lieut and similar) is a commissioned officer rank in the armed forces of many nations. The meaning of lieutenant differs in different militaries (see comparative military ranks), but it is often sub ...

Clifton M. McClure Clifton may refer to: People *Clifton (surname) *Clifton (given name) Places Australia *Clifton, Queensland, a town **Shire of Clifton *Clifton, New South Wales, a suburb of Wollongong *Clifton, Western Australia Canada *Clifton, Nova Scotia, ...

on October 8, 1958Clifton McClure; Rode Balloon to Edge of Space
/ref> Candidates for the Manhigh project were put through a series of physical and psychological tests that became the standard for qualifying astronauts for the

Project Mercury Project Mercury was the first human spaceflight program of the United States, running from 1958 through 1963. An early highlight of the Space Race, its goal was to put a man into Earth orbit and return him safely, ideally before the Soviet Un ...

, America's first manned orbital space program. Similar projects in which men in a gondola reached near-space altitudes were performed by Swiss physicist

Auguste Piccard Auguste Antoine Piccard (28 January 1884 – 24 March 1962) was a Switzerland, Swiss physicist, inventor and explorer known for his record-breaking Gas balloon, hydrogen balloon flights, with which he studied the Earth's upper atmosphere. Picca ...

and Paul Kipfer, reaching in 1931,

USSR-1 ''USSR-1'' (russian: СССР-1) was a record-setting, hydrogen-filled Soviet Air Forces high-altitude balloon designed to seat a crew of three and perform scientific studies of the Earth's stratosphere. On September 30, 1933, ''USSR-1'' under G ...

piloted by

Georgy Prokofiev Georgy (Yegor) Alekseyevich Prokofiev (born August 17, 1902, in Teleshovo, Vyazma District – died April 23, 1939, in Moscow) was a Soviet Air Forces balloonist who coordinated a military stratospheric balloon program in 1931–1939. On Septe ...

reaching in 1933, and

Osoaviakhim-1 Osoaviakhim-1 was a Highest manned balloon flight, record-setting, hydrogen-filled Soviet Union, Soviet high-altitude balloon, high-altitude Balloon (aircraft), balloon designed to seat a crew of three and perform scientific studies of the Earth's ...

reaching in 1934.

References

Bibliography

* Kane, Joseph Nathan (1997), ''Famous First Facts: A Record of First Happenings, Discoveries, and Inventions in American History'' (Fifth Edition), The H.W. Wilson Company,

External links

* Details o
Manhigh I
an

at stratocat.com.ar
Space Men
(''

American Experience ''American Experience'' is a television program airing on the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) in the United States. The program airs documentaries, many of which have won awards, about important or interesting events and people in American his ...

'' episode) Ballooning Space research Human subject research in the United States Military projects of the United States

History

See also

References

Bibliography

Further reading

External links