Malcolm Scott Carpenter (born May 1, 1925 in
Boulder, ColoradoBoulder is a Home Rule Municipality that is the county seat and most populous city of Boulder County, Colorado, in the United States. Boulder is the 11th most populous city in the state of Colorado. The United States Census Bureau estimates that in 2008 the population of the city of Boulder was...
) is an
engineerEngineers are concerned with developing economical and safe solutions to practical problems, by applying mathematics and scientific knowledge while considering technical constraints. The term is derived from the Latin root "ingenium," meaning "cleverness"...
, former
test pilotA test pilot is an aviator who flies new and modified aircraft in specific maneuvers, allowing the results to be measured and the design to be evaluated.Test pilots may work for military organizations or private, companies...
,
astronautAn astronaut or cosmonaut is a person trained by a human spaceflight program to command, pilot, or serve as a crew member of a spacecraft....
, and
aquanautAn Aquanaut is any individual who remains underwater, exposed to the ambient pressure, long enough to come into equilibrium with his or her breathing media. Usually this is done in an underwater habitat on the seafloor for a period equal to or greater than 24 continuous hours without returning to...
. He is best known as one of the
original sevenThe Mercury Seven was the group of seven Mercury astronauts picked by NASA on April 9, 1959. They are also referred to as the Original Seven and Astronaut Group 1...
astronauts selected for NASA's
Project MercuryProject Mercury was the first human spaceflight program of the United States. It ran from 1959 through 1963 with the goal of putting a human in orbit around the Earth...
in April 1959.
Scott Carpenter was the second American to orbit the Earth and the fourth American in space, following
Alan ShepardAlan Bartlett Shepard, Jr. was the second person and the first American in space. He later commanded the Apollo 14 mission, and was the fifth person to walk on the moon....
,
Gus GrissomVirgil Ivan Grissom, more widely known as Gus Grissom, was one of the original NASA Project Mercury astronauts and a United States Air Force pilot. He was the second American to fly in space...
, and
John GlennJohn Herschel Glenn Jr. is a retired United States Marine Corps pilot, a former astronaut and United States Senator who was the first American and third person to orbit the Earth. Glenn was a Marine Corps fighter pilot before joining NASA's Mercury program, NASA's original astronaut group. He...
. Carpenter and Glenn are the last living members of the Mercury Seven.
Early life
Born in
BoulderBoulder is a Home Rule Municipality that is the county seat and most populous city of Boulder County, Colorado, in the United States. Boulder is the 11th most populous city in the state of Colorado. The United States Census Bureau estimates that in 2008 the population of the city of Boulder was...
, Carpenter moved to
New York CityNew York is the most populous city in the United States, and the center of the New York metropolitan area, which is among the most populous urban areas in the world. A leading global city, New York exerts a powerful influence over worldwide commerce, finance, culture, fashion and entertainment...
with his parents (Marion Scott Carpenter and Florence [
née Noxon] Carpenter) for the first two years of his life. (His father had been awarded a postdoctoral research post at
Columbia UniversityColumbia University in the City of New York is a private university in the United States and a member of the Ivy League. Columbia's main campus lies in the Morningside Heights neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan, in New York City...
.) In the summer of 1927, young Carpenter returned to Boulder with his mother, then ill with
tuberculosisTuberculosis is a common and often deadly infectious disease caused by mycobacteria...
. He was raised by his maternal grandparents in the family home at the corner of Aurora Avenue and Seventh Street, until his graduation from
Boulder High School-History:Boulder High School was founded in 1875 as part of the University of Colorado as a preparatory school for the university, making it the first high school in Colorado, hence the slogan, "Still the First." The school is located adjacent to the University of Colorado in downtown Boulder,...
in 1943.
Naval aviator
Upon graduation, he was accepted into the
V-12 Navy College Training ProgramThe V-12 Navy College Training Program was designed to supplement the force of commissioned officers in the United States Navy during World War II...
as an aviation cadet (V-12a), where he trained until the end of
World War IIWorld War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a majority of the world's nations, including all great powers, organized into two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
. He returned to Boulder in November 1945 to study aeronautical engineering at the
University of Colorado at BoulderThe University of Colorado at Boulder is a public research university located in Boulder, Colorado. It is the flagship university of the University of Colorado system and was founded five months before Colorado was admitted to the union in 1876...
(CU). At the end of his senior year, he missed the final examination in
heat transferHeat transfer is the transition of thermal energy from a hotter object to a cooler object...
, leaving him one requirement short of a degree. After his single Mercury flight, the University granted him the degree on grounds that, "His subsequent training as an Astronaut has more than made up for the deficiency in the subject of heat transfer."
On the eve of the
Korean WarThe Korean War is a war that started between North Korea and South Korea on 25 June 1950 and paused with an armistice signed 27 July, 1953...
, Carpenter was recruited by the
USNThe United States Navy is the sea branch of the U.S. Armed Forces. It is one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. As of 31 December 2008, the U.S. Navy had about 331,682 personnel on active duty and 124,000 in the Navy Reserve. It operates 283 ships in active service and more than...
's Direct Procurement Program (DPP), and reported to
NAS PensacolaNaval Air Station Pensacola or NAS Pensacola , "The Cradle of Naval Aviation", is a United States Navy base located in Warrington, Florida, a community southwest of the Pensacola city limits...
in the fall of 1949 for pre-flight and primary flight training. He earned his wings on April 19, 1951, in
Corpus Christi, TexasCorpus Christi is a coastal city in the South Texas region of the U.S. state of Texas. The county seat of Nueces County, it also extends into Aransas, Kleberg, and San Patricio counties.MSA population in 2008 is 416, 376. The population was 277,454 at the 2000 census; in 2006 the US Census...
. During his first tour of duty, on his first deployment, Carpenter flew
Lockheed P2V NeptunesThe Lockheed P-2 Neptune was a Maritime patrol and ASW aircraft. It was developed for the United States Navy by Lockheed to replace the PV-1 Ventura and PV-2 Harpoon, and being replaced in turn with the P-3 Orion...
for Patrol Squadron SIX (VP-6) on reconnaissance and ASW (anti-submarine warfare) missions during the
Korean WarThe Korean War is a war that started between North Korea and South Korea on 25 June 1950 and paused with an armistice signed 27 July, 1953...
. Forward-based in
AdakAdak , formerly Adak Station, is a city in the Aleutians West Census Area, Alaska, United States. At the 2000 census the population was 316. It is the westernmost municipality in the United States and the southernmost city in Alaska. There are no radio stations in Adak and no stations even away...
, Carpenter then flew surveillance missions along the Soviet and
ChineseChina is a cultural region, an ancient civilization, and, depending on perspective, a national or multinational entity extending over a large area in East Asia....
coasts during his second deployment; designated as PPC (patrol plane commander) for his third deployment, LTJG Carpenter was based with his squadron in
GuamGuam is an island in the western Pacific Ocean and is an organized, unincorporated territory of the United States. It is one of five U.S. territories with an established civilian government. The island's capital is Hagåtña...
.
Scott Carpenter was then appointed to the
United States Naval Test Pilot SchoolThe United States Naval Test Pilot School , located at Naval Air Station Patuxent River in Patuxent River, Maryland, provides instruction to experienced United States Navy, Marine Corps, Army, and Air Force pilots, flight officers, and engineers in the processes and techniques of aircraft and...
, class 13, at
NAS Patuxent River"Pax River" redirects here. For the river, see Patuxent River.Naval Air Station Patuxent River , also known as NAS Pax River, is a United States Naval Air Station located in St. Mary's County on Chesapeake Bay near the mouth of the Patuxent River. It is home to the U.S...
in 1954. He continued at Patuxent until 1957, working as a
test pilotA test pilot is an aviator who flies new and modified aircraft in specific maneuvers, allowing the results to be measured and the design to be evaluated.Test pilots may work for military organizations or private, companies...
in the Electronics Test Division; his next tour of duty was spent in
Monterey, CaliforniaThe City of Monterey in Monterey County is located on Monterey Bay along the Pacific coast in Central California. Variants of the city's name are recorded as Monte Rey and Montery. Monterey lies at an elevation of 26 feet above sea level. As of 2005, the city population was 30,641...
, at the Navy Line School. In 1958, Carpenter was named
Air Intelligence OfficerAn air intelligence officer serves to collect information about air operations and assist in the direction of their execution for maximum effect...
for the
USS HornetUSS Hornet is a United States Navy aircraft carrier of the Essex class. Construction started in August 1942; she was originally named , but was renamed in honor of the , which was lost in October 1942, becoming the eighth ship to bear the name.Hornet was commissioned in November 1943, and after...
.
Project Mercury
After being chosen for Project Mercury in 1959, Carpenter served as backup pilot for John Glenn, who flew the first U.S. orbital mission aboard
Friendship 7 in February 1962. When
Deke SlaytonDonald Kent “Deke” Slayton was one of the original NASA Mercury Seven astronauts. After initially being grounded by a heart condition, he served as NASA's Director of Flight Crew Operations, making him responsible for crew assignments at NASA from November 1963 until March 1972...
was withdrawn on medical grounds from Project Mercury's second manned orbital flight (to be titled
Delta 7), Carpenter was assigned to replace him. He flew into space on May 24, 1962, atop the
Mercury-Atlas 7Mercury 7 can mean:* The Mercury Seven, first class of US astronauts, seven, selected for Project Mercury, Astronaut Group 1* Mercury-Atlas 7 mission from Project Mercury** Aurora 7 Mercury capsule used by Scott Carpenter on Mercury-Atlas 7...
rocketA rocket or rocket vehicle is a missile, spacecraft, aircraft or other vehicle which obtains thrust by the reaction of the rocket to the ejection of a jet of fast moving fluid exhaust from a rocket engine. Chemical rockets create their exhaust by the combustion of rocket propellant...
for a three-orbit science mission that lasted nearly five hours. His
Aurora 7 spacecraft attained a maximum altitude of and an orbital velocity of .
Working through five onboard experiments dictated by the flight plan, Carpenter helped among other things to identify the mysterious 'fireflies' (which he renamed 'frostflies,' as they were in reality particles of frozen liquid around the craft), first observed by John Glenn during MA-6. Carpenter was the first American astronaut to eat solid food in space.
Chris Kraft, directing the flight from Florida considered Carpenter's "mission the most successful to date; everything had gone perfectly except for some overexpenditure of fuel"
Unnoticed by ground control or pilot, however, this "overexpenditure of fuel" was caused by an intermittently malfunctioning pitch horizon scanner that would later malfunction at reentry. Still, NASA later reported that Carpenter had:
"exercised his manual controls with ease in a number of [required] spacecraft maneuvers and had made numerous and valuable observations in the interest of space science. . . . By the time he drifted near Hawaii on the third pass, Carpenter had successfully maintained more than 40 percent of his fuel in both the automatic and the manual tanks. According to mission rules, this ought to be quite enough hydrogen peroxide, reckoned Kraft, to thrust the capsule into the retrofire attitude, hold it, and then to reenter the atmosphere using either the automatic or the manual control system."
At the retrofire event, however, the pitch horizon scanner malfunctioned once more, forcing Carpenter to manually control his reentry ("The malfunction of the pitch horizon scanner circuit [a component of the automatic control system] dictated that the pilot manually control the spacecraft attitudes during this event." The PHS malfunction jerked the spacecraft off in yaw by 25 degrees to the right, accounting for of the overshoot; the delay caused by the automatic sequencer required Carpenter to fire the retrorockets manually. This effort took two pushes of the override button and accounted for another 15 to of the overshoot. The loss of thrust in the ripple pattern of the retros added another , producing a overshoot.
Forty minutes after splashdown, Carpenter was located in his life raft, safe and in good health by Major Fred Brown under the command of the
Puerto Rico Air National GuardThe Puerto Rico Air National Guard is a military component that belongs to the United States Air Force but is not part of it. On November 23, 1947, the Puerto Rico Air National Guard came into existence as a result of the efforts led by Colonel Mihiel Gilormini, Colonel Alberto A. Nido and...
, and recovered three hours later by the
USS IntrepidUSS Intrepid is one of 24 s built during World War II for the United States Navy. She is the fourth US Navy ship to bear the name. Commissioned in August 1943, Intrepid participated in several campaigns in the Pacific Theater of Operations, most notably the Battle of Leyte Gulf...
.
Postflight analysis described the PHS malfunction as "mission critical" but noted that the pilot "adequately compensated" for "this anomaly . . . in subsequent inflight procedures.", confirming that backup systems—human pilots—could succeed when automatic systems fail.
http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/SP-4201/ch13-9.htm
Some 21st-century memoirs revived the simmering controversy over who or what, exactly, was to blame for the overshoot, suggesting, for example, that Carpenter was distracted by the science and engineering experiments dictated by the flight plan and by the well-reported fireflies phenomenon. Yet fuel consumption and other aspects of the vehicle operation were, during Project Mercury, as much, if not more, the responsibility of the ground controllers. Moreover, hardware malfunctions went unidentified, while organizational tensions between the astronaut office and the flight controller office — tensions that NASA did not resolve until the later
GeminiProject Gemini was the second human spaceflight program of NASA, the civilian space agency of the United States government. Project Gemini operated between Projects Mercury and Apollo, with 10 manned flights occurring in 1965 and 1966...
and
ApolloNASA's Apollo Program landed the first humans on Earth's moon. US President John F. Kennedy announced his support for a manned moon landing on May 25, 1961, as part of a special address to a joint session of Congress:...
programs — may account for much of the latter-day criticism of Carpenter's performance during his flight.
Carpenter never flew another mission in space. After taking a leave of absence from the astronaut corps in the fall of 1963 to train for and participate in the Navy's Sealab program, Carpenter sustained a medically grounding injury to his left arm in a motorbike accident. After failing to regain mobility in his arm after two surgical interventions (in 1964 and 1967), Carpenter was ruled ineligible for spaceflight. He resigned from NASA in August 1967.
Ocean research
In July 1964 in
BermudaBermuda is a British overseas territory in the North Atlantic Ocean. Located off the east coast of the United States, it is situated around 1,770 kilometres northeast of Miami, Florida, and 1,350 kilometres south of Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada...
, Carpenter sustained a grounding injury from a motorbike accident while on leave from NASA to train for the Navy's
SEALABSEALAB I, II, and III were experimental underwater habitats developed by the United States Navy to prove the viability of saturation diving and humans living in isolation for extended periods of time...
project. In 1965, for Sealab II, he spent 28 days living on the ocean floor off the coast of California. He returned to work at NASA as Executive Assistant to the Director of the
Manned Spaceflight CenterThe Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center is the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's center for human spaceflight activities. The center consists of a complex of 100 buildings constructed on located in the Bay Area of southeast Houston, Texas...
, then returned to the Navy's Deep Submergence Systems Project in 1967, based in
Bethesda, MarylandBethesda is a census designated place in southern Montgomery County, Maryland, USA, just northwest of Washington, D.C. It takes its name from a local church, the Bethesda Meeting House , which in turn took its name from Jerusalem's Pool of Bethesda...
, as a Director of Aquanaut Operations for Sealab III. Carpenter retired from the Navy in 1969, after which he founded Sea Sciences, Inc., a corporation for developing programs for utilizing ocean resources and improving environmental health.
Honors and awards
In 1962, Boulder community leaders dedicated
Scott Carpenter Park in honor of native son turned Mercury astronaut. The Aurora 7 Elementary School, also in Boulder (at 3995 Aurora Ave.), was named for Carpenter's spacecraft.
Scott Carpenter Middle School (originally the Scott Carpenter Elementary School), in
WestminsterWestminster is a Home Rule Municipality in Adams and Jefferson counties in the U.S. state of Colorado. Westminster is a northwest suburb of Denver. The Westminster Municipal Center is located north-northwest of the Colorado State Capitol. The United States Census Bureau estimates that the city...
,
ColoradoColorado is a U.S. state located in the Rocky Mountain region of the United States of America. It may also be considered to be part of the Western and Southwestern regions of the United States. Colorado entered statehood in 1876 and was nicknamed the “Centennial State”...
, was named in his honor.
M. Scott Carpenter Elementary School, in
Old BridgeOld Bridge might refer to:* The Ponte Vecchio in Florence, Italy* The Old Bridge in Bratislava, Slovakia* The Old Bridge, in Svilengrad, Haskovo Province, Bulgaria* The Old Bridge in Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire, England...
,
New JerseyNew Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It is bordered on the north by New York, and to the east by the Hudson River, Upper New York Bay, the Kill Van Kull, Newark Bay, the Arthur Kill, Raritan Bay, Sandy Hook Bay, Westchester County, New York City, Long Island, and...
is also named after him as well.
The
Scott Carpenter Space Analog StationThe Scott Carpenter Space Analog Station was designed by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA as a seafloor research station—or underwater habitat. It was designed by NASA Aquanaut, Dennis Chamberland and Marine Engineer, Joseph M. Bishop and named in honor of the Mercury...
was placed on the ocean floor in 1997 & 1998. It was named in honor of his SEALAB work in the 1960s.
In popular culture
Speaking from the blockhouse at the launch of Friendship 7 (MA-6), Scott Carpenter, Glenn's backup pilot, said "Godspeed, John Glenn," as then-LtCol John H. Glenn, Jr., USMC rose off the launch pad to begin his historic orbital mission on February 20, 1962.
This quote was included in the voiceovers of the teaser trailer for the 2009
Star Trek film, it is also used as a sample in the
Ian BrownIan George Brown is an English musician and former lead singer of the alternative rock band The Stone Roses. He is widely considered to be one of the pioneering members of the Madchester scene....
song My Star.
In the
1983-Events:*February 11 - The Rolling Stones concert film Let's Spend the Night Together opens in New York-Top grossing films :source: http://boxofficemojo.com/yearly/chart/?yr=1983&p=.htm- Awards :Academy Awards:...
film,
The Right Stuff, Carpenter was played by
Charles FrankCharles R. Frank is an American actor noted for playing Bret Maverick's cousin Ben Maverick in the 1978 TV-movie The New Maverick with James Garner and Jack Kelly, and in the short-lived 1979 television series Young Maverick....
. Although his appearance was relatively minor, the film played up Carpenter's friendship with
John GlennJohn Herschel Glenn Jr. is a retired United States Marine Corps pilot, a former astronaut and United States Senator who was the first American and third person to orbit the Earth. Glenn was a Marine Corps fighter pilot before joining NASA's Mercury program, NASA's original astronaut group. He...
, as played by
Ed HarrisEdward Allen "Ed" Harris is an American actor, writer and director, known for his performances in Appaloosa, Creepshow, The Rock, The Right Stuff, Enemy at the Gates, The Abyss, Glengarry Glen Ross, Apollo 13, Pollock, A Beautiful Mind, National Treasure: Book of Secrets, The Hours, Milk Money,...
.
The character of
Scott TracyScott Tracy is a fictional character from Gerry Anderson's Supermarionation television show Thunderbirds and the subsequent films Thunderbirds Are GO and Thunderbird 6. The character also appeared in the live action movie Thunderbirds....
in the
ThunderbirdsThunderbirds is a British mid-1960s television show devised by Gerry and Sylvia Anderson and made by AP Films using a form of marionette puppetry dubbed "Supermarionation". The series followed the adventures of International Rescue, an organisation created to help those in grave danger using...
was named after him.
His recovery is referred to in the
PeanutsPeanuts is a syndicated daily and Sunday comic strip written and illustrated by Charles M. Schulz, which ran from October 2, 1950, to February 13, 2000 , continuing in reruns afterward...
comic stripA comic strip is a sequence of cartoons that tells a story, often humorous, though adventures and soap opera-like dramas are also prevalent. They are written and drawn by a comics artist or cartoonist, and many are published on a recurring basis in newspapers and on the Internet.In the UK and the...
of June 28, 1962 after
Linus'Linus van Pelt is a character in Charles M. Schulz's comic strip Peanuts. The best friend of Charlie Brown, Linus is also the younger brother of Lucy van Pelt and older brother of Rerun van Pelt. He first appeared on September 19, 1952; however, he was not mentioned by name until three days later....
security blanketA security blanket is any familiar object whose presence provides comfort or security to its owner, such as the literal blankets often favoured by small children.The term security blanket was popularized in the Peanuts comic strip created by Charles M...
is rescued under similar circumstances.
Books
- For Spacious Skies: The Uncommon Journey of a Mercury Astronaut, ISBN 0-15-100467-6 or the revised paperback edition ISBN 0-451-21105-7, Carpenter's biography, co-written with his daughter; describes his childhood, his experiences as a naval aviator, a Mercury astronaut, including an account of what went wrong, and right, on the flight of Aurora 7.
- Into That Silent Sea
Into That Silent Sea: Trailblazers of the Space Era 1961-1965 is a 2007 non-fiction book by space historians Francis French and Colin Burgess...
: Trailblazers of the Space Era, 1961-1965, by Francis FrenchFrancis French is a book and magazine author from Manchester, England, specializing in space flight history. He is a former director of events for Sally Ride Science, and a director at the San Diego Air & Space Museum...
and Colin BurgessColin Burgess is an Australian author and historian, specializing in space flight and military history. He is a former customer service manager for Qantas Airways, and a regular contributor to the collectSPACE online community. He lives in New South Wales...
, 2007. A Carpenter-approved account of his life and space flight.
External links