Glenn’s Geriatric Flight Divides Those With ‘The Right Stuff’

Wally Schirra couldn’t wait to try out his new three-liner on his old buddy John Glenn when the two got together a few weeks ago.

Back in the spotlight because of Glenn’s fall space shuttle ride, Schirra--the only astronaut to fly in Mercury, Gemini and Apollo--needed a quick, witty response to The Question: Wish it were you?

“One, I’m not that old. Two, I don’t need the flight time. And three, I, too, would do anything to get out of that U.S. Senate,” the 75-year-old Schirra says, laughing.

“I told those to John,” he adds, laughing harder.

Schirra also passed on an acquaintance’s observation.

“I said to John, ‘One of our local club members came up to me and said, ‘If they want to send an old guy, why don’t they send up Strom Thurmond?’ John laughed like mad and said, ‘That’s not as funny as you might think.’ He said the very next day after the announcement, Strom Thurmond had a note on John’s desk: ‘I’ll be your backup or replace you if required.’ John’s already framed it.”

The way NASA’s old-time astronauts see it, the 95-year-old Thurmond would have a better shot at a space shuttle flight than they would.

Thurmond, after all, is a U.S. senator just like the 77-year-old Glenn, an Ohio Democrat who’s retiring from politics in January.

Without his political punch--not to mention his name and fame--Glenn wouldn’t be returning to orbit, many retired astronauts contend. But most are quick to add an attaboy.

Glenn, after all, came up with the ingenious idea two years ago of launching a senior citizen to better understand the disorders shared by the elderly on Earth as well as astronauts in space: flabby muscles, brittle bones, weakened immune systems, dizzy spells, fitful sleep.

“If I can pass a physical,” Glenn figured, “why not me?”

After months of stewing over Glenn’s proposal, NASA finally agreed, setting the stage for one of the most eagerly anticipated launches since the Apollo moon shots.

America’s first man in orbit will become the oldest man in orbit when space shuttle Discovery lifts off Oct. 29 atop a blaze of publicity, 36 1/2 years after his first rocket ride.

Mercury astronauts Schirra, Gordon Cooper and Scott Carpenter will be among the tens of thousands jamming Kennedy Space Center for Glenn’s send-off, providing color commentary for network TV.

Alan Shepard, the first of the original Mercury seven to fly, hoped to join them, but died July 21 after a battle with leukemia. Deke Slayton died of a brain tumor in 1993. Gus Grissom perished in the Apollo 1 fire in 1967.

The survivors, drawn closer because of their dwindling numbers, wouldn’t miss this late-in-life hurrah for anything.

“I’m glad to see him getting a chance,” says Cooper, who at age 71 is the pup of the Mercury bunch.

Carpenter, 73, who followed Glenn into orbit in 1962, says he has already informed Glenn, “I’d be glad to be his backup again, but this time I’d sabotage him for sure.”

Seriously, though, says Carpenter: “I’m four years younger and I don’t have a senator’s clout. Sure, that means something. That was helpful, certainly helpful, and being the first to fly, the first orbiting American. Everything helps.”

Apollo 15 astronaut Al Worden isn’t as subtle, or charitable.

“Geriatric study, give me a break!” Worden, 66, grumbles, roaring with laughter. “If I had been in the Senate for 24 years and had the political clout that John Glenn had, I’d probably be bugging NASA to go too.”

Grissom’s widow sees Glenn’s flight as a political reward and publicity stunt, nothing more.

“He’s getting payback for whatever it is, the Senate campaign, whatever it is,” fumes Betty Grissom. “He’s just going to go. He likes the press to follow him around and he likes to separate himself.”

“They’re spending taxpayers’ money, and I think they should be more frugal with it,” she adds. “I just can’t see it at all.”

NASA Administrator Daniel Goldin says the medical tests to be conducted on Glenn during the nine-day shuttle flight will benefit both astronauts and the aged.

Designated a payload specialist--a bottom-of-the-totem-pole shuttle passenger specializing in science--Glenn will collect urine, blood and saliva in orbit. He’ll also have his heart rate, breathing and other body functions monitored by the doctors on the seven-person crew.

What makes Glenn so valuable as a test subject, NASA says, is that his entire medical history is on file, dating all the way back to his days as a Marine combat pilot during World War II.

Goldin and Glenn insist the White House had nothing to do with the decision, nor did Glenn’s prominence in Washington.

“The fact that I’m a senator didn’t have anything to do with pushing him [Goldin] into it,” Glenn says. “It was done on a scientific basis, and I passed the physical.”

Adds Glenn: “We’re up there to learn new things. That’s the purpose of the whole NASA program is to learn the new.”

Despite such assertions, many of Glenn’s space peers question the scientific relevance of a single test subject. Indeed, NASA says it has no intention of flying more seniors in the foreseeable future.

The scientific bonanza will be slim at best, Schirra says--”not of the magnitude that we’d expect.” He notes that Glenn’s Feb. 20, 1962, flight lasted a mere five hours, offering little in the way of comparison.

Six-time space shuttle flier Story Musgrave, a doctor who became the world’s oldest spaceman in 1996 at age 61, would be a better choice, says Schirra.

“Now, there’s a man you’d want to check on for osteoporosis,” Schirra says. “He’s a real good data bank.”

Musgrave quit the astronaut corps last year after NASA told him he’d never fly again. The reason? Too old.

NASA also has reams of medical data on the nine men who flew on Skylab in the early 1970s. Their space station missions lasted between one and three months and emphasized medical research. But they weren’t asked to go up again either.

Skylab astronaut Ed Gibson will be watching Glenn’s aging studies “real close.” That’s because when he grows up, he’d like to go back into space too.

It will be awhile. He’s only 61.