Freedom 7 | Alan Shepard Launch - May 5, 1961

On May 5, 1961, Shepard piloted the Freedom 7 mission and became the second person, and the first American, to travel into space. He was launched by a Redstone rocket, and unlike Gagarin's one-hour orbital flight, Shepard stayed on a ballistic trajectory suborbital flight—a flight which carried him to an altitude of 116 statute miles and to a landing point 302 statute miles down the Atlantic Missile Range.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• NASA
• Project
• Mercury
• Astronaut
• Alan
• Shepard
• Freedom
• Redstone
• Rocket
• Space
• Race
• Yuri
• Gagarin
• Sub
• Orbital
• Apollo
• 15

[AlexDeLarge90]

@AtlantisSaturn

You're a complete wacko.

Therefore you are going to get flagged.

Get a life!!

[samanosuken]

Alan Shepard, braveheart !!

[irish89055]

@ChrisPenta "God speed, John Glenn...." fifty years ago tomorrow morning..

[un4g1v3n1]

@malamagr Do yourself a favor, and watch the full launch of Shepard calling out the specifics while hitting upward of 4G's in a rocket, without moving an inch, or any indication of vibration or G force in his speech. Ridiculous, and the reason they took the cameras off the idiots during launch. Too easy to spot the fraud!

[MrGchiasson]

I watched this flight in the 1st grade.. Back then we thought we could do anything. We were going into space.We were Americans who had the adventure, courage and confidence to try anything. Now we hitch a ride w/ the Russians. We took a wrong turn..and need to get back on track.. Anyway... that was an exciting week, way back in the 1st grade...

[malamagr]

For everyone saying Gagarin's flight was staged, Shepard's could have been staged too. How do you know anyone was on the rocket, and they could have dropped a capsule on parachutes with no-one in it, then switched TV to another similar ship and picked up a capsule from the water that they dropped off the ship a few minutes ago. In fact your girlfriend's looks and background are more likely to be fake than the space flights history. We know all that money was spent, where did it go if not up?

[OhSnapitsMoni]

Thums up if you think shepard is a total hottie (: i absolutly am in LOVE with him.

[bestamerica]

'

i like american JPL / NASA rocket space is better than ussr russia

[ChrisPenta]

50 years ago this morning!

[Orlando2Vegas]

40 year anniversary today 1st American in Space - check out our channel at Kennedy Space Center in Port Canaveral