Mercury-Atlas 2 (MA-2) was an unmanned test flight of the

Mercury program 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 ...

using the

Atlas An atlas is a collection of maps; it is typically a bundle of maps of Earth or of a region of Earth. Atlases have traditionally been bound into book form, but today many atlases are in multimedia formats. In addition to presenting geograp ...

rocket. It launched on February 21, 1961, at 14:10 UTC, from Launch Complex 14 at Cape Canaveral,

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

. Test objectives for this flight were concerned with the ability of the spacecraft to withstand reentry under the temperature-critical abort conditions and with the capability of the Atlas to meet the proper injection conditions. Convair had promised to deliver thicker-skinned Atlas vehicles for subsequent flights, however Missile 67D was the last of the thin-skinned model and so it had to be modified for the Mercury mission, incorporating a stainless steel reinforcing band installed around the vehicle between stations 502 and 510. A thin sheet of asbestos was installed between the reinforcing band and the tank skin. This modification was installed as a precaution against the type of failure which had occurred on the previous MA-1 flight. The booster's flight path was also modified somewhat from Mercury-Atlas 1, being placed on a more shallow trajectory so as to reduce aerodynamic loads. The Atlas lifted into a clear blue February sky quite different from the cloudy, foggy weather of the MA-1 flight. Everyone in the blockhouse waited nervously for the vehicle to pass through the critical max q zone. When it did so successfully, there was "enormous jubilation" from the launch team. MA-2 flew a successful suborbital mission that lasted 17 minutes 56 seconds. Altitude reached was , speed, . All test objectives were fully met, the only problems being a bit of propellant slosh. The capsule was recovered downrange. Peak acceleration was 15.9 ''g'' (156 m/s²). Mass 1,154 kg. Mercury spacecraft #6 and Atlas #67-D were used in the Mercury-Atlas 2 mission. The Mercury capsule is currently displayed at the

Houston Museum of Natural Science The Houston Museum of Natural Science (abbreviated as HMNS) is a natural history museum located on the northern border of Hermann Park in Houston, Texas, United States. The museum was established in 1909 by the Houston Museum and Scientific Soc ...

, Houston, TX.

References

This New Ocean: A History of Project Mercury - NASA SP-4201
{{Project Mercury Project Mercury 1961 in spaceflight Spacecraft launched by Atlas rockets

See also

References