Project Mercury Wallpapers

Project Mercury - photo wallpapers; Megawallpapers.org : [br] [br] [br] [br] [br]Project Mercury was the United States' first manned spaceflight program. It ran from 1959 through 1963 with the goal of putting a man in orbit around the Earth. Early planning and research was carried out by NACA, while the program was officially carried out by the newly created NASA. The name comes from Mercury, a Roman mythological god who is often seen as a symbol of speed. Mercury is also the name of the innermost planet of the solar system, [br]which revolves around the sun faster than any other, hence the image of [br]speed, although Project Mercury had no other connection to that planet. The Mercury program cost $1.5 billion. It was said that the Mercury spacecraft were not ridden, they were [br]worn, because of their extremely small size - at 1.7 cubic metres in [br]volume, the capsule was just large enough for the single crew member. [br]Inside were 120 controls: 55 electrical switches, 30 fuses and 35 [br]mechanical levers. The spacecraft was designed by Max Faget and NASA's Space Task Group.[br]During the launch phase of the mission, the Mercury spacecraft and astronaut were protected from launch vehicle failures by the Launch Escape System. The LES consisted of a solid fuel, 52,000 lbf (231 kN) [br]thrust rocket mounted on a tower above the spacecraft. In the event of [br]a launch abort, the LES fired for 1 second, pulling the Mercury [br]spacecraft away from a defective launch vehicle. The spacecraft would [br]then descend on its parachute recovery system. After booster engine [br]cutoff (BECO), the LES was no longer needed and was separated from the [br]spacecraft by a solid fuel, 800 lbf (3.6 kN) thrust jettison rocket [br]that fired for 1.5 seconds. To separate the Mercury spacecraft from the launch vehicle, the [br]spacecraft fired three small solid-fuel, 400 lbf (1.8 kN) thrust [br]rockets for 1 second. These rockets are called the Posigrade rockets. The spacecraft was only equipped with attitude control [br]thrusters - after orbit insertion and before retrofire they could not [br]change their orbit. There were three sets of high and low powered [br]automatic control jets and separate manual jets - one for each axis (yaw, pitch, and roll), [br]supplied from two separate fuel tanks - one automatic and one manual. [br]The pilot could use any one of the three thruster systems and fuel them [br]from either of the two fuel tanks to provide spacecraft attitude [br]control. The Mercury spacecraft were designed to be totally controllable from [br]the ground in the event that the space environment impaired the pilot's [br]ability to function. [br][br]

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Project Mercury Wallpapers @ Mega Wallpapers (08 Edition)
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