Preliminary Gemini 4 Crew Debriefing, Part II, 1965

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McDivitt
225
Cet-«:IDE~~TIAL~
limitations on hitting the side of the spacecraft
and trying to make a sighting and losing the
object out of the upper window as you cranked
the periscope down to bring the star down to
the horizon.
In trying to accomplish the Air Force portion
of the experiment, we found ourselves completely
unable to do the daylight star-horizon measurement.
So, to get some insight into the operational use
of the sextant, we took a great number of star
to horizon measurements at night. They are in
the book in quite a bit of detail. As we mentioned
earlier, the helmet was an impediment to use with
the sextant, so on occasion we had to take the
helmet off.
The greatest angle that we ca~ld
normally get was about 25 degrees between the
horizon and the stars, but on occasion we got up
to 30 degrees. This meant a certain alinement
of the spacecraft was necessary so that you
could get the largest piece of glass between
the star and the horizon and still get the