Mercury Atlas 9 Audio Excerpt, May 15, 1963
NASA-UAP-D011 · NASA · May 15, 1963 · audio · 8:14 · Release 2
What the war.gov catalog says
During the final and longest flight of Project Mercury, Mercury-Atlas 9 mission (MA-9) Faith 7 Pilot L. Gordon Cooper Jr. describes the brilliant blue of sunrise beneath the haze layer of the Earth’s atmosphere. As he approaches sunrise, he describes small, luminous, brilliant white particles drifting away from the spacecraft. Cooper describes observing “fireflies” after deploying beacons, which are spherical mission-related equipment with xenon strobe lights.
Transcript
pilotAnd I'm beginning to get the brilliant blue of sun rising in the east.
pilotBright blue band underneath all this haze layer.
pilotI can see the haze layer.
pilotAnd the bright band of light demarcation coming underneath it.
pilotQuite distinctive.
00:23static
silence 00:24-00:36
pilotThere's a faint haze into it.
pilotAs where there are uh clouds uh apparently.
mission controlRoger, Hawaii, Faith 7 reading you loud and clear.
00:50static
silence 00:51-01:00
mission controlRoger, Hawaii, Faith 7 reading you loud and clear.
pilotRoger, understand.
pilotRoger, I'm just uh small end forward, 180 degree yaw, approaching uh sunrise, over.
mission controlRoger.
01:16static
pilotThese small luminescent particles drift away from you, small end forward.
pilotAnd they slide there, very uh brilliant white, without any yellow in them.
pilotThey appear to move on out, ever around back towards the uh flight path.
pilotBut down here, I don't think.
mission controlRoger, yeah, have you seen the beacon at this time?
pilotNegative, I still haven't seen the beacon.
mission controlRoger.
01:49static
pilotThere was considerable noise, though, as if something were departing.
mission controlSay again, 7?
pilotI say there was considerable noise of a little door, sounded like a little door blowing open, so I assume the beacon has departed.
mission controlOh, Roger, understand.
02:08static
mission controlTM looks real good on the ground.
pilotOh, Roger.
02:18static
silence 02:19-02:46
mission controlFaith 7, confirm uh TV control switch to off.
pilotRoger, TV control is off.
02:53static
silence 02:54-03:04
mission controlUh, we had a slight uh decrease in the fuel links on uh DC current. Uh, would you give us a readout?
pilotOh, Roger. DC current?
pilotRoger, main bus is 24.
pilotIsolated, 28 and a half.
mission controlRoger.
03:24static
silence 03:25-03:44
mission controlGordon.
mission controlOh, Gordon, this is Hawaii. Did you have anything to eat?
pilotUh, negative, not yet.
pilotI'm planning to shortly here, though.
mission controlOh, Roger. For your information, systems' last computations on fuel at Hawaii gave you 88 auto, 98 manual, which is somewhat better than you're indicating on board.
pilotOh, Roger. On board, I'm indicating 96 and 102.
04:18static
silence 04:19-04:33
pilotOh, boy, what a beautiful shot of Florida.
mission controlRoger, looks good from here once in a while, too.
pilotOh, Roger, the whole state is clear. I can I can see uh just about all of it.
pilotThere's been a beautiful view coming over Florida.
04:52static
silence 04:53-06:56
pilotNow on 180 yaw.
pilotI got here manual proportional control.
pilotI'm at uh last daylight going into dark. Have been looking for the flashing beacons.
pilot5 05 1 8 now.
pilot28, I'm sorry, not 18.
pilotThis light in sight, it is below me.
pilotIt's quite a brownish, reddish-brown band.
pilotConsiderable altitude above the ground.
pilotWhen I fire a uh pitch down thruster, I get a shower of these little fireflies.
pilotIt is flashing now. It is the light.
pilotQuite bright, quite discernible.
pilot1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 rate.
pilotAppears to be about, appears to be about 10 to 12 miles away.
pilotI'm keeping it directly in the window.
08:03static
pilotOf the order of a second magnitude star now.
08:09static
Audio quality is fair with typical space-to-ground static and background noise.
Written by AI from the files. It can be wrong; check the originals.