- Date
- 3–7 June 1965
- Mission
- Gemini 4
emini 4 mělo dohnat sovětský náskok ve výstupech do volného prostoru, který o tři měsíce dřív předvedl Alexej Leonov. Ed White se stal prvním Američanem mimo loď — na přibližně 7,6 metru dlouhém spojovacím vedení, s ručním manévrovacím dělem v ruce.
Crew
COMMAND PILOTJames McDivittA U.S. Air Force pilot, Gemini 4 was his first spaceflight. He later commanded Apollo 9, where he first tested the lunar module in Earth orbit.
PILOTEd WhiteA U.S. Air Force pilot, the first American to walk in space. Gemini 4 was his only flight — he died in 1967 in the Apollo 1 launch-pad fire.
White si let mimo loď užíval natolik, že prodloužil plánovaný čas — velitel McDivitt ho musel k návratu opakovaně vyzývat. Návrat do kabiny navíc zkomplikovala vzpříčená západka poklopu, kterou posádka vyřešila jen s vypětím sil. White po přistání řekl, že to byl nejsmutnější okamžik jeho života.
Mission timeline
Select a phase to read what happened. Every chapter has its own detailed page.
The failed rendezvous with the discarded Titan stage
Gemini 4 launched on June 3, 1965, at 15:15:59 UTC from Launch Complex 19 atop a Titan II GLV. The crew was Command Pilot James McDivitt (his first flight) and Pilot Ed White (his only flight).
Read the chapterThe first American spacewalk
Ed White became the first American to leave his spacecraft in space. Tethered on a 4.6-metre (15 ft) line, he maneuvered using a hand-held oxygen-jet "zip gun" — the walk was meant to be shorter but stretched to roughly 23 minutes.
Read the chapter
Four days in orbit and a manual landing
Gemini 4 spent 4 days, 1 hour, 56 minutes and 12 seconds in orbit — the longest American flight to date, an important step toward multi-day Apollo missions. The spacecraft completed 62 revolutions (66 by an alternate count relative to Cape Kennedy).
Read the chapterMission in numbers
- Crew
- 2
- Launch
- 3. 6. 1965, 15:15:59 UTC
- Duration
- 4 dny 1 h 56 min
- Flight type
- orbitální, 62 obletů
- Launch vehicle
- Titan II GLV
- Spacewalk duration
- ~23 min
- Splashdown
- ~80 km od cíle
- Recovery ship
- USS Wasp
Follow us
Follow us on social media
New plates, trivia and behind-the-scenes updates as soon as they are ready.
Facts
- Ed White became the first American to walk in open space — the spacewalk lasted about 23 minutes.
- The attempt to approach the discarded Titan stage failed due to a lack of understanding of orbital mechanics — thrusting toward the target actually moved the orbit farther away.
- White was reluctant to return to the cabin and, on the order "Get back in!", replied: "It's the saddest moment of my life."
- Reclosing the hatch after the spacewalk took about twenty minutes and was a potentially fatal situation.
- A guidance-computer failure on the 48th revolution forced the crew to switch to a manual, Mercury-style reentry.
- The four-day mission duration was an American record in 1965 and an important step toward multi-day Apollo flights.
Related articles
Gallery
Article on the timeline
Sources & further reading
- NASA: Gemini IV Mission Report, 1965 — the primary source of mission data.
- Hacker, Grimwood: On the Shoulders of Titans: A History of Project Gemini, NASA, 1977.
- NASA Image and Video Library (images.nasa.gov) — mission photographs, public domain.
- Wikipedia: Gemini 4 — the starting structure of the article, CC-BY-SA 4.0.
- NSSDCA Master Catalog (NASA) — technical parameters of the mission (COSPAR ID 1965-043A).
Spaceflightpedia. (n.d.). Gemini 4. Retrieved 9 October 2026, from https://spaceflightpedia.com/article/gemini-4
article text — CC-BY-SA · ◉ NASA photography — public domain · ✦ AI illustration — marked, generated from sources
