Gemini 4 booster sightings and tracking
June 1965 · Earth orbit
Summary
Gemini 4 launched on June 3, 1965, with astronauts Jim McDivitt and Ed White aboard, according to a 1976 article by James Oberg reproduced in a 1998 correspondence package. The crew debriefing aboard the USS Wasp, preliminary Part I, records what they saw after separating from the second stage.
McDivitt said that the spacecraft was in a mass of debris after separation and that it looked like a snow storm. White said he saw little sparkles everywhere that looked like an artificial starlit sky, and then realized he was looking at the fire flies everybody had seen, made by fuel vaporizing from the booster. The crew estimated the booster at about 400 feet, and White at 200 to 250 feet. McDivitt described a booster tumbling at 40 to 50 degrees per second, with fuel squirting from the roll nozzle. He tracked two flashing lights on the booster while thrusting at it for several orbits.
McDivitt said the chase failed. He told Guaymas the booster was pulling away and recommended giving up. Ground control confirmed the order to leave the booster. On later passes the crew called out the booster at sundown. McDivitt said they finally figured out this was a planet, and White thought it was Venus. McDivitt added that he doubted they had seen the booster on that second pass, while White said he was convinced the first sighting or two were not of the planet. He also described a satellite near Hawaii that the sun glare hid from view.
The Oberg article describes a separate report at about thirty hours, when McDivitt saw a cylindrical object with an arm sticking out. NASA asked NORAD for nearby objects, and NASA announced Pegasus-2 as the identification. Oberg argued the NORAD list omitted the Gemini 4 booster and that McDivitt had been seeing his own Titan booster stage. He quoted a NASA official on July 1, 1965 who believed it was a rocket tank or spent second stage. Oberg reported that NASA and McDivitt agreed a photograph showed sunlight reflecting off a bolt on the window.
What the files say
“As we were turning around it looked like we were going through a snow storm.”
Page 46 →“About the same time I realized I was looking out at the fire flies everybody had seen”
Page 66 →“we'd call out the booster a couple of more times before we finally figured out that this was not the booster, but a planet.”
Page 197 →“"We believe it to be a rocket tank or spent second stage of a rocket," wrote a high space official on July 1, 1965.”
Page 11 →
Explanations in the record
What the documents themselves say the event was, as recorded. Not our assessment.
- White attributed the sparkles to fuel from the booster and the spacecraft vaporizing into many particles, which the sun lit like small magnifying glasses. — Gemini 4 crew debriefing Part I, North Atlantic (1965), page 66
- McDivitt said some sundown sightings called out as the booster were a flickering planet, which White thought was Venus. — Gemini 4 crew debriefing Part I, North Atlantic (1965), page 198
- Oberg concluded the object seen at about thirty hours was the Gemini 4 Titan booster, missing from the NORAD list because NASA had not asked about it. — NASA congressional letters on UFO inquiries (1998), page 11
- NASA initially announced that the object matched the Pegasus-2 satellite. — NASA congressional letters on UFO inquiries (1998), page 7
- Oberg reported that the photograph blob was sunlight reflecting off a bolt against the dirty window glass, per NASA and McDivitt. — NASA congressional letters on UFO inquiries (1998), page 8