Its a very sobering feeling to be up in space and realize that ones safety factor was determined by the lowest bidder on a government contract. – Alan Shepard
I think all of us certainly believed the statistics which said that probably 88% chance of mission success and maybe 96% chance of survival. And we were willing to take those odds. – Alan Shepard
The pilot looked at his cues of attitude and speed and orientation and so on and responded as he would from the same cues in an airplane, but there was no way it flew the same. The simulators had showed us that. – Alan Shepard
Of course, in our grade school, in those days, there were no organized sports at all. We just went out and ran around the school yard for recess. – Alan Shepard
He was thinking alone, and seriously racking his brain to find a direction for this single force four times multiplied, with which he did not doubt, as with the lever for which Archimedes sought, they should succeed in moving the world, when some one tapped gently at his door. – Alexandre Dumas