Newsgroups: sci.astro,alt.sci.planetary,sci.space.history,comp.robotics.misc
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!nntp.club.cc.cmu.edu!eecs-usenet-02.mit.edu!nntprelay.mathworks.com!howland.erols.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!newsfeed.direct.ca!torn!utnut!utzoo!spenford!henry
From: Henry Spencer <henry@zoo.toronto.edu>
Subject: Re: Mars Pathfinder Rover On the Surface Of Mars
Sender: henry%spenford@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer)
Organization: SP Systems, Toronto
Message-ID: <ED7z5t.C2u%spenford@zoo.toronto.edu>
References: <6JUL199706082394@kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov> <33C4AEE8.4FB1@Ellis.dlr.de> <5q5e6c$h45@news.scruz.net> <33C78099.55A4@Ellis.dlr.de>
Date: Sat, 12 Jul 1997 18:53:53 GMT
Lines: 21
Xref: glinda.oz.cs.cmu.edu sci.astro:178494 sci.space.history:7103 comp.robotics.misc:16243

In article <33C78099.55A4@Ellis.dlr.de>,
George Ellis  <George@Ellis.dlr.de> wrote:
>> Now do you think they were putting him in as the first Apollo crew
>> COMMANDER because they doubted his ability or his piloting skills from
>> wartime??? Hmmm???
>
>This was clearly part of a governmaent cover-up, because
>they couldn't allow Grissom's hero status being questioned...

Nonsense; Carpenter was quietly grounded for his own screwup.  You don't
need to publicly keelhaul him, just pat him on the back and assign him to
support roles from now until Doomsday.

The fact that Grissom commanded the first manned Gemini *and* was training
to command the first manned Apollo indicates that he most definitely was
not in disgrace for the loss of his capsule.  (He might have been, actually,
had some determined engineers not established that there were at least two
ways in which the hatch really could have blown without his intervention.)
-- 
Committees do harm merely by existing.             |       Henry Spencer
                           -- Freeman Dyson        |   henry@zoo.toronto.edu
