Mercury Balloon Flight Tests

In January 1959, balloon flights were planned for qualification of the Mercury spacecraft. These would occur from July 1959 to January 1961. Final flights would be manned tests of up to 24 hours duration, with recovery of the capsule at sea. Cancelled May 1959.

These flights would take the capsule to high altitudes at the edge of space, then release it for a test of the recovery systems. This program was sharply cut back in the March 1959 to two balloon flights to qualify the spacecraft at altitudes up to 24 km. On May 22, 1959 the balloon flights were cancelled entirely. The necessary data would be obtained in the altitude wind tunnel at the Lewis Research Center. The Soviets conducted an analogous test series, however, with the Vostok spacecraft. On one such test a (non-cosmonaut) parachutist died when his suit depressurized in a high-altitude jump.