Manned Space Flight, USA, Mercury/Gemini Gemini 6 astronauts Walter Schirra and Thomas Stafford, 1965

Manned Space Flight, USA, Mercury/Gemini Gemini 6 astronauts Walter Schirra and Thomas Stafford, 1965. Both astronauts are in casual clothes and are examining a lunar globe at the Manned Spacecraft Centre (now the Johnson Space Centre), Houston, Texas. The Gemini programme, which commenced in 1962, was NASAÕs second manned spaceflight initiative. It aimed to build on the existing Mercury programme by developing a spacecraft with a two-man crew. Gemini 6, with astronauts Stafford and Walter Schirra on board, was launched on 15th December 1965. It was the fifth mission in the programme and achieved the first successful rendezvous with another orbiting spacecraft, Gemini 7, manoeuvring to within two metres of the other craft. ©SSPL/NASA