Preliminary Gemini 4 Crew Debriefing, Part I, 1965

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157
McDivitt
White
McDivitt
Whit e
have with that hatch. If it failed we'd know
exactly what it was.
That ' s right.
I personally had disassembled
this cylinder and piston and spring combination
up at McDonald prior to the altitude chamber, so
I knew exactly what it was made of.
I am sure
the problem was t hat the dry lubrication coag­
ulated, or whatever a dry lube does, and was
causing the piston to stick. I knew how we could
do this thing.
Carl Stone and I
had dismantled
it and put it back together, cleaned it out, put
it back together, relubricated it , put it back
toget her, and i t operated fine.
I figured out
how to make the t hing work with it not working
properly by using your finger as the spring.
That ' s the exact technique we had used.
I f we hadn't had the training together that we
had , and had not encountered all these problems
before, I know darn well I would have decided
not to open the hatch.
Maybe we wound overdramatic about the effort we
made getting me back i n, and I 'll honest ly say
it ' s one of the biggest efforts I ever made in
my life, but I don't think we were all done then.
CONFIE>ENTIAL