12 March

Wally Schirra

Wally Schirra

Wally Schirra, Jr. (March 12, 1923 – May 3, 2007), (Capt, USN), was an American naval officer and aviator, aeronautical engineer, test pilot, and one of the original seven astronauts chosen for Project Mercury. He flew the six-orbit, nine-hour Mercury-Atlas 8 mission on October 3, 1962, becoming the fifth American, and the ninth human, to ride a rocket into space. In the two-man Gemini program, he achieved the first space rendezvous. In October 1968, he commanded Apollo 7, a test of the three-man Apollo Command/Service Module. He was the first person to go into space three times, and the only person to have flown in Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo, logging a total of 295 hours and 15 minutes in space. Born Walter Marty Schirra Jr in Hackensack, New Jersey. (d. 2007)

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