Gemini 7 Technical Debriefing, 1965

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Lovell
Yes.
Borman
During the later part of it I started out in PULSE Mode and
:rolled over the 55 degrees in PULSE Mode, and. then when we
eot Guidance Initiate I went to DIRECT.
I was finding that
in order to keep the cros11 range zeroed, and we had been
told that Wally
had trouble with his cross range, I was
banking back and forth quite frequently maneuvering the
spacecraft around the full lift point, from one side to the
other and I was overshooting a little bit in DIRECT.
I was
also starting to pick up some pitch and yaw oscillations, so
then I went to single ring RATE COMMAND.
And boy, this was
really a great control mode, it "'8.S steady as a :rock. You
could put it right where you wanted and it st~ed there.
But pretty soon we eot dow a:round, I guess it was when the
g's were coming off, after 3.9 g•s. I started losing it in
single ring RATE COMMAND so I threw two rings on and it held
it like a rock. :But they were sure firing.
Lovell
Oh, yes.
Borman
Boh, those thrusters were really firing. And we started
getting abla.tion off the heat shield. It was coming back in­
and hitting the nose of the spacecraft, and that was pretty