Free "Live From Cape Canaveral": Covering the Space Race, From Sputnik to Today by Jay Barbree Page A

”
    “Okay,” came the grunt.
    “Okay…” They noticed the change in his voice. Lower pitch. The g-loads were fading.
    “Okay…this is Seven , okay. Forty-five thousand feet. Uh, now forty thousand feet.”
    Shepard was through the gauntlet. He had handled the punishing g-forces, the eye-popping deceleration, and 1,230 degrees of blazing reentry heat. He felt just dandy because during the scorching dive, his cabin temperature hit a peak of only 102 degrees while inside his suit the temperature rose to only 85. Just nice and toasty, he thought.
    His altimeter showed 31,000 feet when Slayton’s voice reached him again. “ Seven , your impact will be right on the button.”
    Great news. Flight computations were perfect. So were the performances of the Redstone and the spacecraft. Freedom Seven was heading directly for the bull’s-eye on the Atlantic recovery-area target.
    “This is Seven ,” Shepard called. “Switching to recovery frequency.”
    “Roger, Seven , read you switching to GBI.”
    Slayton was eager to cut the hell out of Dodge as fast as he could. Shepard laughed aloud. He knew Gus would be right there with Deke, and the two would be burning sky, blazing their way to Grand Bahama Island so they could be on the ground when he arrived.
    “Seven , do you read?” came a new voice on the GBI line.
    “I read,” Shepard called back.
    He was aware the flight wasn’t quite over. He still had to reach water in good shape. That meant the parachute system had to work.
    Perfectly.
    Above him, panel covers snapped away in the wind.
    “The drogue is green at twenty-one, and the periscope is out.”
    Down went Freedom Seven and Alan Shepard. The altimeter unwound and aimed for ten thousand feet where the main chute was to open. If it failed, well, he already had a finger on the “pull like hell ring” that would release the reserve.
    “Standing by for main.”
    Freedom Seven continued like the champ it had proven to be. “Through the periscope,” Shepard would later say, “I saw the most beautiful sight of the mission. That big orange-and-white monster blossomed above me so beautifully. It told me I was safe, all was well, I had done it, all of us had done it. I was home free.”
    “Main on green,” he reported. “Main chute is reefed and it looks good.”
    Freedom Seven swayed back and forth as it dropped lower. Compared to moments in his immediate past, Shepard was tiptoeing gently toward the ocean instead of crash landing a jet fighter on a carrier deck.
    He opened his helmet’s faceplate. Quickly he disconnected all hoses and snaps. He wanted nothing to impede a hasty exit just in case the water landing went haywire.
    He braced himself for–
    SPLASHDOWN!
    “Into the water we went with a good pop!” Shepard said, laughing over a drink with me later. “Abrupt, but not bad. No worse than the kick in the butt when I’m catapulted off a carrier deck.”
    The spacecraft tipped on its side, bringing water over the right porthole. He smacked the switch to release the reserve parachute that kept the capsule top-heavy. He was thinking about the chimp’s near disappearance beneath the ocean. He began checking the cabin for leaks. He was ready to punch out at the first sight of the wet stuff pouring in.
    The water didn’t come, and he stayed dry. Shifting the center of gravity worked, and the capsule came back upright.
    Planes roared overhead. “Cardfile Two Three,” he called. “This is Freedom Seven , would you please relay all is okay?”
    “This is Two Three; roger that.”
    “This is Seven. Dye marker is out. Everything is okay. Ready for recovery.”
    Green dye spread brilliantly across the ocean surface from Freedom Seven.
    “ Seven , this is Two Three. Rescue One will be at your location momentarily.”
    It went like another practice run. Rescue One was overhead. Shepard opened the hatch, grabbed a harness dropped from the helicopter, and was winched aboard.
    Rescue One turned for the prime