Mercury-Little-Joe 5

Little Joe 5 (LJ-5) was an unmanned atmospheric test flight as part of the Mercury program. The launch took place on November 8, 1960 from Wallops Island in Virginia.

The mission called for a standard Mercury capsule (Mercury spacecraft #3) to be lifted to altitude by the Little Joe rocket. The rescue rocket should then have shot the capsule away from the rocket, whereupon the capsule with parachutes should have splashed into the Atlantic.

However, the rescue rocket and the engines that were supposed to separate the capsule from the rocket ignited after just 16 seconds while the Little Joe rocket was still accelerating, so that the capsule could not separate from the rocket. The rocket flew 16.2 km high and 22.5 km before it crashed into the Atlantic along with the Mercury capsule. Approximately 60% of the rocket and 40% of the capsule were recovered.

Before the flight, it was considered to put a monkey in the capsule. Mainly due to technical difficulties, this plan was not implemented.