ORLANDO, Fla. — While SpaceX launches and recovers its rocket boosters on a regular basis, it has taken nearly 60 years for NASA’s first-ever rocket stage to be recovered to make its way back to Florida.
A portion of the first-stage booster used during the Gemini-Titan 5 mission that launched astronauts Pete Conrad and Gordon Cooper into space on Aug. 21, 1965, was recovered at sea after it was found floating off the coast of Bermuda in the Atlantic Ocean.
The 27-foot-long fuselage, the upper part of the first stage that was jettisoned was part of the rocket that took off from what was at the time Cape Kennedy’s Launch Complex 19. After its recovery it was put on display in Huntsville, Alabama, popular for its Space Camp, at the U.S. Space and Rocket Center.
