测试美国首个载人运载火箭——水星-红石号

A Mercury-Redstone launch vehicle awaits test-firing in the Redstone Test Stand at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, in this photo from the late 1950s. Between 1953 and 1960, the rocket team at Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville performed hundreds of test firings on the Redstone rocket – over 200 on the Mercury-Redstone vehicle configuration alone.

Through Project Mercury, the United States’ first human-in-space program, Mercury-Redstone provided NASA with an opportunity to understand performance aspects of the Mercury spacecraft, the effect of a weightless environment on astronauts, and launch and recovery operations at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Image Credit: NASA

在这张20世纪50年代末的照片中，一架水星-红石运载火箭正在阿拉巴马州亨茨维尔的NASA马歇尔航天飞行中心的红石测试台上等待试射。1953年至1960年间，位于亨茨维尔的红石兵工厂的火箭团队对红石火箭进行了数百次试射——仅水星-红石运载火箭配置就超过200次。

通过美国首个载人太空计划“水星计划”，水星-红石号为NASA提供了一个机会，了解水星飞船的性能、失重环境对宇航员的影响，以及佛罗里达州NASA肯尼迪航天中心的发射和回收操作。

影像来源：NASA