Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 5 (LC-5) was a

launch site A spaceport or cosmodrome is a site for launching or receiving spacecraft, by analogy to a seaport for ships or an airport for aircraft. The word ''spaceport'', and even more so ''cosmodrome'', has traditionally been used for sites capable ...

Cape Canaveral Space Force Station Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (CCSFS) is an installation of the United States Space Force's Space Launch Delta 45, located on Cape Canaveral in Brevard County, Florida. Headquartered at the nearby Patrick Space Force Base, the stat ...

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, a ...

used for various Redstone and

Jupiter Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a mass more than two and a half times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined, but slightly less than one-thousandt ...

launches. It is most well known as the launch site for

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research. NASA was established in 1958, succeedi ...

's 1961 suborbital

Mercury-Redstone 3 Mercury-Redstone 3, or ''Freedom 7'', was the first United States human spaceflight, on May 5, 1961, piloted by astronaut Alan Shepard. It was the first crewed flight of Project Mercury. The project had the ultimate objective of putting an ast ...

flight, which made

Alan Shepard Alan Bartlett Shepard Jr. (November 18, 1923 – July 21, 1998) was an American astronaut, United States naval aviator, naval aviator, test pilot, and businessman. In 1961, he became the second person and the first American to travel int ...

the first American in space. It was also the launch site of

Gus Grissom Virgil Ivan "Gus" Grissom (April 3, 1926 – January 27, 1967) was an American engineer, pilot in the United States Air Force, and member of the Mercury Seven selected by National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) as Project Merc ...

's July, 1961,

Mercury-Redstone 4 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 ''L ...

flight. The

Mercury-Redstone 1 Mercury-Redstone 1 (MR-1) was the first Mercury-Redstone uncrewed flight test in Project Mercury and the first attempt to launch a Mercury spacecraft with the Mercury-Redstone Launch Vehicle. Intended to be an uncrewed sub-orbital spaceflight, it ...

pad abort,

Mercury-Redstone 1A Mercury- Redstone 1A (MR-1A) was launched on December 19, 1960 from LC-5 at Cape Canaveral, Florida. The mission objectives of this uncrewed suborbital flight were to qualify the spacecraft for space flight and qualify the system for an upcoming ...

, and the January, 1961,

Mercury-Redstone 2 Mercury-Redstone 2 (MR-2) was the test flight of the Mercury-Redstone Launch Vehicle just prior to the first crewed American space mission in Project Mercury. Carrying a chimpanzee named Ham on a suborbital flight, Mercury spacecraft Number 5 ...

with a chimpanzee,

Ham Ham is pork from a leg cut that has been preserved by wet or dry curing, with or without smoking."Bacon: Bacon and Ham Curing" in ''Chambers's Encyclopædia''. London: George Newnes, 1961, Vol. 2, p. 39. As a processed meat, the term "ham ...

, aboard, also used LC-5. A total of 23 launches were conducted from LC-5: one

Jupiter-A The Redstone family of rockets consisted of a number of American ballistic missiles, sounding rockets and expendable launch vehicles operational during the 1950s and 1960s. The first member of the Redstone family was the PGM-11 Redstone missile, ...

, six

Jupiter IRBM The PGM-19 Jupiter was the first nuclear weapon, nuclear armed, medium-range ballistic missile (MRBM) of the United States Air Force (USAF). It was a liquid-propellant rocket using RP-1 fuel and Liquid oxygen, LOX oxidizer, with a single Rocketd ...

s, one

Jupiter-C The Jupiter-C was an American research and development vehicle developed from the Jupiter-A. Jupiter-C was used for three unmanned sub-orbital spaceflights in 1956 and 1957 to test re-entry nosecones that were later to be deployed on the more ...

, four

Juno I The Juno I was a four-stage American space launch vehicle, used to launch lightweight payloads into low Earth orbit. The launch vehicle was used between January 1958 to December 1959. The launch vehicle was a member of the Redstone launch v ...

s, four

Juno II Juno II was an American space launch vehicle used during the late 1950s and early 1960s. It was derived from the Jupiter missile, which was used as the first stage. Development Solid rocket motors derived from the MGM-29 Sergeant were used ...

s and seven Redstones. The first launch from the complex was a Jupiter-A on July 19, 1956 and the final launch was Gus Grissom's ''

Liberty Bell 7 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 '' ...

'' capsule on July 21, 1961. LC-5 is located next to the

Air Force Space and Missile Museum The Air Force Space and Missile Museum is located at Launch Complex 26 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida. It includes artifacts from the early American space program and includes an outdoor area displaying rockets, missiles, and spa ...

which is located at

LC-26 Blockhouse of LC-26 Launch Complex 26 (LC-26) is a deactivated launch site at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida. LC-26 consisted of two pads, ''A'' and ''B''. Pad A was used for the Jupiter-C and Juno I rockets, and was the launch site ...

. The original launch consoles and computers are on display in the LC-5 blockhouse. a tour of the museum can be arranged through the

Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex The Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex is the visitor center at NASA's Kennedy Space Center on Merritt Island, Florida. It features exhibits and displays, historic spacecraft and memorabilia, shows, two IMAX theaters, and a range of bus tour ...

's "Cape Canaveral: Early Space Tour". One tour is offered daily, so the number of visitors is limited by the size of the tour.

Launch chronology

*July 19, 1956: Jupiter-A CC-13 *September 20, 1956: Jupiter-C RS-27 *March 1, 1957: Jupiter IRBM AM-1A *April 26, 1957: Jupiter IRBM AM-1B *May 31, 1957: Jupiter IRBM AM-1 *March 26, 1958: Juno I RS-24 (

Explorer 3 Explorer 3 (Harvard designation 1958 Gamma) was an American artificial satellite launched into medium Earth orbit in 1958. It was the second successful launch in the Explorer program, and was nearly identical to the first U.S. satellite Explo ...

) *May 17, 1958: Redstone RS-1002 *July 26, 1958: Juno I RS/CC-44 (

Explorer 4 Explorer 4 was an American satellite launched on 26 July 1958. It was instrumented by Dr. James van Allen's group. The Department of Defense's Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) had initially planned two satellites for the purposes of stu ...

) *August 24, 1958: Juno I RS/CC-47 (

Explorer 5 Explorer 5 was a United States satellite with a mass of . It was the last of the original series of Explorer satellites built, designed, and operated by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Background Explorer 5 was similar in all respects to Ex ...

) *October 23, 1958: Juno I RS/CC-49 (Beacon 1) *December 6, 1958: Juno II AM-11 (

Pioneer 3 Pioneer 3 was a spin-stabilized spacecraft launched at 05:45:12 GMT on 6 December 1958 by the U.S. Army Ballistic Missile Agency in conjunction with the NASA, using a Juno II rocket. This spacecraft was intended as a lunar probe, but failed to g ...

) *January 22, 1959: Jupiter IRBM CM-21 *March 3, 1959: Juno II AM-14 (

Pioneer 4 Pioneer 4 was an American spin-stabilized uncrewed spacecraft launched as part of the Pioneer program on a lunar flyby trajectory and into a heliocentric orbit making it the first probe of the United States to escape from the Earth's gravity. ...

) *May 14, 1959: Jupiter IRBM AM-17 *July 16, 1959: Juno II AM-16 (Explorer S-1, failed) *August 27, 1959: Jupiter IRBM AM-19 *October 13, 1959: Juno II AM-19A (

Explorer 7 Explorer 7 was a NASA satellite launched on 13 October 1959, at 15:30:04 GMT, by a Juno II launch vehicle from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (CCAFS) to an orbit of and inclination of 50.27°. It was designed to measure solar X-ray and L ...

) *November 21, 1960: Redstone MRLV-1 ( MR-1) *December 19, 1960: Redstone MRLV-3 ( MR-1A) *January 31, 1961: Redstone MRLV-2 ( MR-2) *March 24, 1961: Redstone MRLV-5 ( MR-BD) *May 5, 1961: Redstone MRLV-7 ( MR-3) *July 21, 1961: Redstone MRLV-8 ( MR-4)

Gallery

File:PGM-11 Redstone RS-1002.jpg, Preparations on May 16, 1958 for the first

PGM-11 Redstone The PGM-11 Redstone was the first large American ballistic missile. A short-range ballistic missile (SRBM), it was in active service with the United States Army in West Germany from June 1958 to June 1964 as part of NATO's Cold War defense of ...

launch on May 17 conducted by US Army troops File:Mercury-Redstone 4 Launch MSFC-6414824.jpg, Launch of ''

'' (MR-4) File:LC-5 blockhouse.jpg, Blockhouse (2010) File:LC-5 firing button.jpg, Firing button (2010) File:LC-5 pad in 2010.jpg, LC-5 with display Redstone (2010) File:Cape Canaveral LC5&6 blockhouse.jpg, LC 5&6 blockhouse (now museum)

References

External links

*https://web.archive.org/web/20090414180519/http://www.astronautix.com/sites/capallc5.htm {{NASA space program Cape Canaveral Space Force Station Project Mercury

Launch chronology

Gallery

See also

References

External links