Mercury Astronaut Scott Carpenter Dies At 88
schwit1 writes "M. Scott Carpenter, whose flight into space in 1962 as the second American to orbit the Earth was marred by technical glitches and ended with the nation waiting anxiously to see if he had survived a landing far from the target site, died on Thursday in Denver. He was 88 and one of the last two surviving astronauts of America's original space program, Project Mercury." NASA has a nice biography of Carpenter, too, and scottcarpenter.com has much more besides.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gg0pMbc7Opk
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The run-on sentence in the summary makes it hard not to read it like he's been missing since 1962 and just now found.
I forget.
Glenn is still alive. Who's the other one?
Your famous landing on Mercury will never be forgotten, Mr. Carpenter.
does it remain there?
God speed Sir. Thank you for your service.
Buzz. Time's up!
I come here for the love
I'm really sad that this great american has died because of this stupid recession. I wonder how old he was when he landed on mercury because the radiation must have really been there all over that place. But maybe he took so long to die because the radiation cured any cancer he was going to have or I bet he ate lots of fruit. My mom always shops at Scotts and they have really good fruit, but I didn't think they had mercury, I thought that was just fish. I wonder if he was ever in the space capsule with Tom Hanks that one time it really wasn't fair that they didn't get to go a second time although. Does anybody else have a hard time remembering that TIL is today I learned?? Public service announcement that is what it means in case you did not know. I wonder if this guy Scott is really dead or if he just went on vacation and didn't tell people. I hope this was helpful to you all!
And now there is only one left. Growing up in the early 60's, every kid wanted to be an astronaut. I just wish I still have my GI-Joe Friendship 7 space capsule, box & record...they are worth a bunch now LOL. God speed Scott Carpenter!
If you have Netflix streaming (or want to go through some hassle), check out When We Left Earth: The NASA Missions. Absolutely fantastic documentary on the space race and the way I recently learned about his landing. For reasons outside my control, I was not alive until many years later.
I totally get the conspiracy theories about a fake moon landing. I know we did it. But looking up at the moon, it's hard to believe it.
I didn't know Mercury had a space program, let alone life. Good for them.
Basically, this guy flew into space in something the size of a VW Beetle.
Think about that.
No guts.
No glory.
He had both.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
It is a sad reminder to me how sands of time remain in my own hour glass. I am entering the stage where it seems everyone I looked up to or work/arts I enjoyed has passed.
I always hope I bought a bolt on the international space station.....but I'm afraid I paid a millionaire agribusiness not to grow food. Sometimes, in and amongst all the nonsense, waste and cynicism, something good happens. Thank you Scott, for showing us what CAN happen.
John Glenn was one of the first, and the post Redstone Mercury team (pre Apollo) lost Alan Shepherd in 1998, Gus Grissom died on the pad in '67, Gordon Cooper in 2004, and Wally Schirra in 2007. Apart from Carpenter (who died today) and Ham and Enos (monkeys who died in '83 and '62), John Glenn is still here (92 years old). One last of the original space pioneers left. And to M. Scott Carpenter and his family: we salute you.
Spam in a can! I had to make that joke. This guy was a serious legend for me - it was one of those names I memorized as a space geeky ten year old in the early seventies. Vale sir.
I think I'm going to go leave flowers there tomorrow.
Glenn's is a better memory, was small enough to watch from my Dad's shoulders. President Kennedy was in the same car with Glenn. My memory of Carpenter is fuzzier (those and hearing the annoucement about Kennedy's assassination over the my school's intercom system are my most vivid memories of those years). Exciting times, even for a 5 year-old. I remember when Carpenter turned to oceanography and participated in Sea Lab. Just as dangerous (check out the history of the Sea Lab series), and just as promising. In both cases the U.S. surged ahead of all rivals but then seemed to lose interest. That's what you get when you rely on the military to drive exploration programs. Unfortunately once the moon landing was accomplished NASA lost most of its special funding to the DoD. Guess we really needed to be able to destroy the entire planet 30x over more than expanding our presence out into the solar system.
Buzz wasn't selected until 1963, as part of the 3rd group of astronauts.
The last survivor of the original 7 is John Glenn...
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Apparently that landing was ultimately fatal to him.