Lieutenant Colonel Virgil Ivan "Gus" Grissom was one of the seven original National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Project Mercury astronauts, and the first of the Mercury Seven to die. He was also a Project Gemini and an Apollo program astronaut. Grissom was the second American to fly in space, and the first member of the NASA Astronaut Corps to fly in space twice. In addition, Grissom was a World War II and Korean War veteran, U.S. Air Force test pilot, and a mechanical engineer. He was a recipient of the Distinguished Flying Cross, and the Air Medal with an oak leaf cluster, a two-time recipient of the NASA Distinguished Service Medal, and, posthumously, the Congressional Space Medal of Honor.

Redstone MRLV | Mercury-Redstone 4

Chrysler | United States of America
Cape Canaveral, FL, USA
July 21, 1961, 12:20 p.m.

Status: Success

Mission:

Mercury-Redstone 4 was the second United States human spaceflight, on July 21, 1961. The suborbital Project Mercury flight was launched with a Mercury-Redstone Launch Vehicle, MRLV-8. The spacecraft, Mercury capsule #11, was nicknamed the Liberty Bell 7, and it was piloted by the astronaut Virgil "Gus" Grissom.

Suborbital

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Titan II GLV | Gemini III

National Aeronautics and Space Administration | United States of America
Cape Canaveral, FL, USA
March 23, 1965, 2:24 p.m.

Status: Success

Mission:

Gemini 3 was the first crewed mission of the Gemini program. Mission Command Pilot Gus Grissom and PilotJohn Young flew 3 orbits in a flight that was the last one to be operated from the Cape Kennedy Air Force Station. The mission was considered a success and was the first flight to perform an orbital maneuver. Gemini 3 fired its engines for 1 minute and 14 seconds changing its orbit. The mission lasted 4 hours and 52 minutes.

Low Earth Orbit

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Saturn IB | Apollo 1 (Failure before launch)

National Aeronautics and Space Administration | United States of America
Cape Canaveral, FL, USA
Jan. 27, 1967, 11:31 p.m.

Status: Failure

Mission:

Apollo 1, initially designated AS-204, was the first crewed mission of the United States Apollo program, the undertaking to land the first man on the Moon. It was planned to launch on February 21, 1967, as the first low Earth orbital test of the Apollo command and service module. The mission never flew; a cabin fire during a launch rehearsal test at Cape Kennedy Air Force Station Launch Complex 34 on January 27 killed all three crew members—Command Pilot Gus Grissom, Senior Pilot Ed White, and Pilot Roger B. Chaffee—and destroyed the command module (CM). The name Apollo 1, chosen by the crew, was made official by NASA in their honor after the fire.

Low Earth Orbit

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