                        Astronomy Picture of the Day

    Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
      fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
                    written by a professional astronomer.

                                 2021 May 7

                          Mercury-Redstone 3 Launch
                             Image Credit: NASA

   Explanation: Sixty years ago, near the dawn of the space age, NASA
   controllers "lit the candle" and sent Mercury astronaut Alan Shepard
   arcing into space atop a Redstone rocket. His cramped space capsule was
   dubbed Freedom 7. Broadcast live to a global television audience, the
   historic Mercury-Redstone 3 (MR-3) spacecraft was launched from Cape
   Canaveral Florida at 9:34 a.m. Eastern Time on May 5, 1961. The flight
   of Freedom 7, the first space flight by an American, followed less than
   a month after the first human venture into space by Soviet Cosmonaut
   Yuri Gagarin. The 15 minute sub-orbital flight achieved an altitude of
   116 miles and a maximum speed of 5,134 miles per hour. As Shepard
   looked back near the peak of Freedom 7's trajectory, he could see the
   outlines of the west coast of Florida, Lake Okeechobe in central
   Florida, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Bahamas. Shepard would later view
   planet Earth from a more distant perspective and walk on the Moon as
   commander of the Apollo 14 mission.

                      Tomorrow's picture: light-weekend
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       Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
            NASA Official: Phillip Newman Specific rights apply.
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                      A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC
                             & Michigan Tech. U.

