Washington National Space Agency - The Republic of Washington's Ventures into Outer Space

[Unturned_Fighter]

This story takes place in an alternate timeline. One where the American Civil War never occurred, and the United States Supreme Court never heard Texas v. White in December 1868. This (if I'm correct) makes a state's secession legal. So I've decided to have my home state secede, thus creating an alternate timeline. Then, I had my newly independent state create it's own space agency. This is the imagining of what it might be like. And just to be clear: WASHINGTON STATE, not WASHINGTON, D.C.. I'm not here to argue about the politics of all of this, and I most certainly don't want a moderator involved in it. Questions and comments are open.

Note: The spoilers below contain some important notes that will be of interest to readers. Reading them is not mandatory, though. I have no control over that.

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The Washington Air National Guard is the aerial service branch of the Republic of Washington’s military. It is, along with the Washington Army National Guard and the Washington Naval Militia, a component of the Washington National Guard. It was formed on August 6, 1924 as a state militia, becoming a dual state-federal reserve force in 1933 until 1937. As of 1951, they are headquartered at Camp Murray near Tacoma in the State of Pierce.

The Washington National Space Agency is an independent agency of the Washington federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research. It was established by the Washington National Space Agency Act 1950 in the Washington Legislature. As of 1951, they are headquartered in Olympia in the State of Thurston with primary operations out of McChord Air National Guard Station in Tacoma, in the State of Pierce.

Some notes should be read before anyone starts reading or following the series. Some of them are lengthier than others. It is not required to read the notes, just heavily suggested.

Spoiler

Note #1: At the end of each post, there will be a series of SIX news headlines that will affect the policies, missions, and characteristics of the Washington Air National Guard and the Washington National Space Agency in future posts. Two will be for the Air Guard, two will be for WNSA, and two will be generalized goings-on around the Republic. The first headline of the first two categories will be critical, and the second headline of the first two categories will be supportive. The third category is "neutral", for lack of a better word.

Note #2: The story will be told mostly as mission reports, but any "background events" that severely influence the actions of WNSA or the Air National Guard will be dialogue-driven storylines. This includes discussions between the Joint Chiefs of Staff at Camp Murray, phone calls between the WNSA Administrator and the President, board meetings, Legislature hearings, and the like. These will not be too incredibly frequent, though, especially the more bureaucratic ones.

Note #2: The Washington Air National Guard will have less significant roles in most storylines, but will occasionally have its own storyline or play a major part in one. I am also aware it should more probably be called the “Washington Air Force” on the assumption Washington is now independent, but I think the “Washington Air National Guard” sounds cooler and it means essentially the same thing anyway, as far as operations are concerned.

Note #3: Background events are told with dialogue-driven stories, but launches and missions are not. These include discussions with the Joint Chiefs of Staff at Camp Murray, phone calls between the Administrator of the Washington National Space Agency and the President of Washington, and the Standing Committee on Aeronautics (later the Standing Committee on Air and Space) in the Washington House of Representatives.

Note #4: I understand that there are metric users on these forums, especially since Kerbal Space Program by default uses the International System of Units. I grew up and live in the United States, so I am most familiar with the United States customary units. During the main part of each post, I will be using the United States customary units when referring to size, length, distance, weight, mass, etc., but I will be kind and leave a footnote/appendix at the end of each post to translate all of that into the International System of Units, better known as the metric system or SI. Numbers that need to be translated in the text have a superscript after them that looks like this: ¹. To find a number that needs to be translated, refer to the superscript number in the main body of the text and compare it with the number next to the superscript number in the appendix.

The chapter begins here.

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PRESIDENT OF WASHINGTON: Arthur B. Langlie (R)

CHIEF OF STAFF, WASHINGTON AIR NATIONAL GUARD: General George S. Payne

ADMINISTRATOR, WASHINGTON NATIONAL SPACE AGENCY: Richard Simons

AIR NATIONAL GUARD LIAISON, WASHINGTON NATIONAL SPACE AGENCY: Major General Wallace Seaver

DIRECTOR, MANNED SPACEFLIGHT CENTER: David Heath

DIRECTOR, MCCHORD LAUNCH STATION: Alexander “Alex” Turner

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Spoiler

Table of Contents

• Prologue (this post)
• Chapter 1: Ad Astra (this post)
• Chapter 2: The Air Guard's Missiles
• Chapter 3: The Kármán Line
• Chapter 4: The M-2b

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Prologue

 

Washington Capitol, Olympia, November 14th, 1950

Richard Simons strolled into the conference room and set down his briefcase on a vacant chair at the head of the table, and had his aide hand out the materials to the collective of Senators and Representatives sitting in the room, facing him expectantly. Outside the grand windows, it was raining persistently. Rain was extremely common in this part of North America during the non-summer months. Rather depressingly so. But summers were getting hotter and hotter, and wildfires more and more frequent and more and more severe.

“Well, Senators. Representatives. My name is Richard Simons, and I have an exciting proposal for you all: a space program!”

Everyone in the room promptly scoffed. Space programs? They had more important things to deal with, like national defense, and the economy. They had just seceded from one of the world's largest superpowers, after all, nevermind that it’s been thirteen years. Space wasn’t exactly on their minds. Two Senators straight up left the room.

“Gentlemen, the Soviets and the Americans have been playing around with suborbital flights for several years now. Ever since the end of the War, the United States has sent up not one, not two, and no, not three, but four rockets! None of them ever stayed up there, of course, but that doesn’t matter at the moment. We don’t even have the technology to put natural satellites in orbit yet, but it’s something we’re discussing.” Senator Michaels spoke up.

“You’re damn right we don’t, mister. We should be focusing on more important issues, Mr. Simons. National defense. The economy. Public utilities.”

“Please, Senator, we’ve gotten that taken care of. It’s been thirteen years.” Mr. Simons was, of course, referring to Washington’s secession from the United States on November 11, 1937.

“And three days. But these issues are still important to the public. They won’t like it if we waste funds that could better be spent elsewhere on a space program.”

“Do you even have a proposed launch center?” This time, it was Representative Russell MacDougal.

“We’ve narrowed it down to two possible locations: Camp Murray, and Camp Harmony.”

“Camp Harmony? That’s in Puyallup, Mr. Simons. Puyallup’s a town of ten thousand people in my district. People who want nothing to do with your waste of resources.”

“I know. When the Japanese were held at Camp Harmony during the War, it supported a population of 7,390 Americans of Japanese descent from across Western Washington and Alaska starting in May 1942. We’ll have barracks, with 50 square feet of space per individual and one small window, a single electrical socket, and a wood stove. These can support our staffers and astronauts. Several mess halls, laundry facilities, and latrines are also present at the Camp Harmony facility. A one-hundred-bed hospital was built in Area D, as well, and existing facilities from before Camp Harmony was established were used by the Army as administration offices and community centers. The place is chock full of workshops.”

“And what if something happens? An explosion, say?”

“That’s the tricky part. See, all the buildings at Camp Harmony are made of wood. It’s a fairgrounds and a concentration camp, both of which are temporary and meant to be taken down, so what better material to use than wood for that, am I right, gentlemen?”

“That doesn’t answer my question, Mr. Simons.”

“Ah, yes, I was getting to that. We’ll need one launchpad—”

“Launchpad?!”

“Yes, launchpad. Don’t worry, only a small one. For now. We won’t be able to do much beyond sounding rockets. Tiny little things. But as I was saying, we’d need a launchpad located fairly far away from the wooden buildings, at least until they are renovated, because any explosion would mean bad news.” Representative MacDougal grunted in dissatisfaction at the thought.

“Mmm… I don’t sense anything good coming of an explosion at Camp Harmony. But you said something about astronauts earlier, Mr. Simons, did you not?”

“Yes, I did. I must admit that’s more of a pipe dream at the moment, but those astronauts will need somewhere to sleep before missions, and Camp Harmony still has its buildings from the war.”

“Why not use Camp Murray? You know, the National Guard—”

“—I know what Camp Murray is, Representative. I mean, yes, it will provide essentially ‘free’ security because it’s already a National Guard station and it has sentries. But the truth is, Camp Murray is near an area too densely populated for our tastes.”

“What about the McChord Air National Guard Station? Puyallup can’t be the only option… Can it?”

“McChord does have a railroad line, that is an advantage, I must admit. McChord would also have this ‘free’ security given to us. But rockets would be flying over 12 miles of populated area. Rockets launched from Puyallup would only fly over 7 miles of populated area, and wouldn’t encounter any settlements beyond farming towns of 100 people at most, thinly spread, until Spokane, at which point it would be well high enough to not pose a significant danger. Not to Spokane, at least.7”

Representative MacDougal considered this a moment, then started quietly discussing with his peers.

“We’ll give you McChord. It has the railroad so you can order and ship supplies in. Besides, looking at this folder here,” MacDougal said, flipping through it to the AVIATION PROGRAM page, “you look like you want to deal with airplanes, too. McChord has a runway, Camp Harmony doesn’t.”

There was a long pause. Nobody said anything. Nobody moved.

“Take it or leave it, son. Final offer.”

“That’s true, Camp Harmony doesn’t have a runway...”

Another pause.

“McChord it is, then, Representative,” Simons said as he closed his folder.

Administrator Simons and Representative MacDougal stood up and each leaned over the table, giving each other a thorough handshake. The deal was done.

 

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Chapter 1: Ad Astra

McChord Air National Guard Station, Tacoma, September 6th, 1951 | Program: Tiny Delta | Program Launches: 3 | Total Launches: 3

By February 9th, 1951, Launch Complex 1 had been completed at the Washington Air National Guard’s McChord Air National Guard Station, formerly belonging to the United States Army Air Corps before Washington’s 1937 secession. Launch Complex 1 was built only to support a rocket 16 feet1 in diameter and 32 feet2 in height.

The Tiny Delta was the first ever sounding rocket designed and developed in Washington, being an offshoot of the Delta program that was started by a partnership between the 10th Civil Support Team of the Washington Army National Guard and the University of Washington up in Seattle. The ultimate goal of the program was to develop a military ballistic missile, but the Military Department had permitted the Washington National Space Agency to use 10 Tiny Delta rockets per year, just as long as the Army Guard got to keep an extra 20 for their own use. The Washington National Space Agency agreed to this arrangement. It was not ideal, but it was better than nothing.

It was composed of two stages: a kick stage, composed of the Tiny Sergeant booster to get it up in the air, and the Tiny Delta missile itself was powered by a leftover Aerobee engine. As there weren’t many in Washington, and since neither the United States nor the Aerojet Corporation was going to provide them to Washington’s space program, the University of Washington was working on a similar engine to replace the Aerobee when the supply ran out, and it would. Fairly quickly, too.

The Tiny Delta booster lifted off from the pad with the Tiny Tim booster doing most of the work. Unfortunately, the Aerobee engine failed to ignite, causing it to reach less than 3,900 feet3 in altitude, crashing back down after just a 32-second flight.

Another Tiny Delta booster lifted off from the pad on January 23rd, 1952, and was much more successful. The Tiny Tim engine and the Aerobee engine ignited at the same time, and clean separation occurred at T+00:00:03. The Tiny Delta upper stage went on to achieve an altitude of about 20,500 feet4 before it started arcing back towards the southeast. Engine shutoff occurred at T+00:01:05, and power ran out at T+00:01:22.

Another Tiny Delta booster arrived at McChord by steam train on June 3rd, 1952. Liftoff occurred at 12:29:23 p.m. local time with the rocket tilted in a southerly direction.

After a roughly 1 minute, 30-second flight, the second Tiny Delta crashed into a patchy forest, sparking a blaze. East Pierce Fire and Rescue were called to the scene and swiftly put out the fire after eight hours of hard work. Nobody was injured in the crash and only an abandoned cabin was threatened by the fire, but was ultimately saved.

The Tiny Delta program was closed after lots of hard work by the engineers involved. Administrator Richard Simons announced that the agency would instead be focusing on the M-1 missile, and publicly announced the goal of reaching the upper atmosphere by 1956, and outer space by 1958. Administrator Simons also announced that the agency would begin working on aviation no later than 1959.

Chapter 1 Appendix

1 16 meters (rounded)

2 10 meters (rounded)

3 1,050 meters (rounded)

⁴ 6,250 meters (rounded)

Edited February 10 by Unturned_Fighter
Updated chapters

[Unturned_Fighter]

PRESIDENT OF WASHINGTON: Arthur B. Langlie (R)

CHIEF OF STAFF, WASHINGTON AIR NATIONAL GUARD: General George S. Payne

ADMINISTRATOR, WASHINGTON NATIONAL SPACE AGENCY: Richard Simons

AIR NATIONAL GUARD LIAISON, WASHINGTON NATIONAL SPACE AGENCY: Major General Wallace Seaver

DIRECTOR, MANNED SPACEFLIGHT CENTER: David Heath

DIRECTOR, MCCHORD LAUNCH STATION: Alexander “Alex” Turner

 

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Chapter 2: The Air Guard's Missiles

McChord Air National Guard Station, Tacoma, May 16th, 1956 | Program: M | Program Launches: 1 | Total Launches: 4

As promised by Administrator Richard Simons, the agency would now be focusing on the M-1 missile, and they already had an interested client: the Air National Guard.

While now adapted for scientific use, eventually the M-1 would be the first Washingtonian ballistic missile. A short-range ballistic missile, specifically.

The M-1 was a direct descendant of the German V-2 rocket, a few of which the University of Washington had managed to acquire for study. The design used an engine from Boeing that allowed the missile to carry the W1A warhead with its reentry vehicle to a range of about 160 miles. M-1’s prime contractor was Boeing.

The M-1 was designed as a surface-to-surface missile for the Air Guard. Its name is a codename: ‘M’ for ‘Missile’, and ‘1’ as it is the first in its series.

The first M-1 was rolled to Launch Complex 2-A by April 14th, 1955, a newly constructed complex built to handle the M-1 series specifically, as Launch Complex 1 could only support the much smaller Tiny Delta sounding rocket.

At 7:26:35 a.m. local time, the M-1 took off bound for outer space. Or, it tried to. Unfortunately, due to an engineering error, fuel was not fed to the M-1’s engine and it was unable to take off. It was rolled back to the pad by July 20th, 1955, for engineers to take a look at what was going wrong. Engineers determined it was an avionics issue — the rocket could not be controlled with the avionics equipment it had installed. So engineers swapped out the Flight Guidance Computer (FDC), the Trajectory Computer (TC), and the Engine System Management Computer (ESMC). The modifications were completed by July 23rd, 1955, and it was rolled back to Launch Complex 2-A on October 22nd, 1955.

Then, at 7:15:17 a.m. local time, another error was discovered: fuel was not getting to the launch vehicle’s engine. So the M-1 was rolled back to the Vehicle Assembly Building, where work would not be completed until the new year.

After 34 days of round-the-clock modification, the M-1 was fixed and rolled out to the pad on May 16th, 1956.

At 7:17:59 a.m. local time, the engines ignited on the M-1 missile, and it decoupled from the ground clamps at 7:18:03 a.m. Twenty seconds later at 7:18:23 a.m., it broke the uncrewed speed record of 1,970¹ feet per second. At 7:19:20 a.m., the M-1 reached its maximum altitude of 100,203² feet, or 19² miles above the surface, before it began its descent. Range safety termination was ordered at 96,564³ feet, or 18 miles³ above the surface.

WNSA FACES SETBACKS WITH M-1 MISSILE, CHALLENGES IN REACHING UPPER ATMOSPHERE RAISE CONCERNS

ROSSELINI AND ANDERSON COMPETE FOR PRESIDENT: WASHINGTON GEARS UP FOR PIVOTAL ELECTION

CONTROVERSY ERUPTS AS WNSA UNVEILS M-2 MISSILE: DUAL-PURPOSE MISSION RAISES QUESTIONS ON PRIORITIES

AIR GUARD FACES SCRUTINY OVER MISSILE REPLACEMENT PLANS

AIR GUARD SEARCHES FOR MISSILE UPGRADES: STRATEGIC MODERNIZATION INITIATIVES BOLSTER NATIONAL SECURITY

WASHINGTON'S AVIATION PIONEER HAROLD ANDERSON HONORED IN SEATTLE CEREMONY

HANFORD SITE EXPANSION BOOSTS LOCAL ECONOMY

Chapter 2 Appendix

¹ 600 m/s

² Both numbers equal 30,541 meters (miles are rounded to the nearest 1)

³ Both numbers equal 29,432 meters (miles are rounded to the nearest 1)

Edited February 7 by Unturned_Fighter
Forgot metric conversions. Sorry.

[Unturned_Fighter]

PRESIDENT OF WASHINGTON: Albert D. Rosellini (D)

CHIEF OF STAFF, WASHINGTON AIR NATIONAL GUARD: General Henry Sinclair

ADMINISTRATOR, WASHINGTON NATIONAL SPACE AGENCY: Michael John Malone

AIR NATIONAL GUARD LIAISON, WASHINGTON NATIONAL SPACE AGENCY: Brigadier General Thomas Baldwin

DIRECTOR, MANNED SPACEFLIGHT CENTER: David Heath

DIRECTOR, MCCHORD LAUNCH STATION: Alexander “Alex” Turner

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Chapter 3: The Kármán Line

McChord Air National Guard Station, Tacoma, January 17th, 1957 | Program: M | Program Launches: 4 | Total Launches: 8

In his first two weeks in office, newly elected President Albert Dean Rosellini, an Italian-Washingtonian, made several new changes to the Washington Air National Guard and the Washington National Space Agency. On the former point, he replaced General George S. Payne with General Henry Sinclair as the Chief of Staff, and appointed Brigadier General Thomas Baldwin as the Air Guard liaison to WNSA. He also pulled Richard Simons from office and appointed Irish immigrant Michael John Malone in his place. Malone was confirmed by a voice vote of the Senate on January 17th, 1957.

The first M-2 missile was rolled out to the pad on Malone’s first day in office as Administrator, January 17th, 1957.

At 9:17:25 a.m. (T+00:01:12), the M-2 missile had broken the speed record of 2,952¹ feet per second. The engine unfortunately failed with an apogee just short of the Karman line at 99 kilometers, with atmospheric drag reducing it to 98.57 kilometers after just a few short seconds. The missile fell back down to the ground, achieving a maximum ballistic speed of 3,730² feet per second before exploding at 78,937³ feet. The entire mission lasted 5 minutes and 22 seconds from engine ignition to explosion.

The second M-2 was completed on November 26th, 1957, almost two months after the launch of Sputnik 1, and less than one after the launch of Sputnik 2 and Laika. Nevertheless, the M-2 was completed on time and rolled out to the pad on December 20th, 1957. This M-2 would be the last to fly the RD-100, with the third M-2 missile flying the upgraded RD-101. Liftoff occurred at 9:20:16 a.m. local time. This time, after a 2-minute ascent, at c. 9:22 a.m., the rocket crossed the Kármán line.

Onboard instruments detected an apogee of 427,319.6⁴ feet, just 31,998⁵ feet short of reaching space “proper”. The M-2 also broke the previous speed record of 3,730⁶ feet per second: it reached 4,399.6⁷ feet per second on its ballistic descent before the rocket partially broke up at T+00:06:12, with the avionics core enduring a punishing 21.9 g. Launch control ordered flight safety termination at T+00:06:30, or 9:26:48 a.m. local time, at an altitude of 49,937⁸ feet.

Unfortunately for the nearby city of Tacoma, the debris from the flight safety termination started raining down near Downtown and sparked a seven-alarm fire — nine-alarm if you count the National Guard and McChord’s fire department — that took almost twelve full days to put out. National Guard troops had to be pulled from training duty at the large, remote Yakima Firing Center to assist the civil authorities. It was only through a mixture of pure, dumb luck and the assistance of the National Guard that the fire was put out. This event would come to be known as the Great Tacoma Fire. The fire also severely hampered the Union Pacific rail line from the Port of Tacoma to McChord Air National Guard Station, which the Washington National Space Agency relies on for the delivery of rocket supplies and fuel. During the fire, a fuel tanker filled with rocket fuel for the M-2, still connected to Union Pacific Big Boy engine 4000 while standing at the yard, had actually exploded, making the fire just that much worse. Engine 4000 would be written off as completely irreparable by Union Pacific. In its place, WNSA would come to rely on trucks and planes delivering supplies and the fuel for missiles until the branch line was repaired. A total of five people were killed and seventeen injured, mostly due to smoke inhalation.

The third M-2 missile, M-2-3, was completed on September 18th, 1958, and was rolled out to the pad by October 12th. The M-2-3 was equipped with a new automatic range safety termination system, and would automatically switch on its instruments once it reached outer space. The upgraded RD-101 engine ignited at 2:10:07 p.m. local time, October 12th, 1958.

Liftoff was achieved at 2:10:11 p.m. During the ascent, the rocket broke the speed record yet again by reaching 4,921.26⁹ feet per second. The rocket achieved an apogee of 131¹⁰ miles, officially advancing the Republic of Washington into the Space Race. During it’s descent, the M-2-3 continued monitoring temperature and pressure and transmitted telemetry until the Range Safety Officer ordered flight safety termination at T+00:07:23, just 155,590¹⁰ feet above the Tacoma metropolitan area. This time, debris rained down on a patchy forest and sparked a small forest fire that was quickly brought under control. No person on the ground was injured, but General Henry Sinclair was ready to pull the plug due to the repeated damage and injury on the ground.

Unfortunately, due to an administrative error, the contract to cross the Karman Line was not completed, and the next M-2, the M-2-4, would have to be launched instead of being shipped to Fairchild Air National Guard Station near Spokane as was originally intended. The M-2-4 was ordered and it would be completed on July 3rd, 1959 and rolled out on the 27th.

The M-2-4 suffered from loss of thrust 21 seconds after liftoff, but would still perform almost as well as the M-2-3, achieving an apogee of 107 miles, or 173 kilometers. Flight safety termination would be ordered much higher up this time, at 385,164¹¹ feet or nearly 73¹¹ miles above the surface of the Earth. No debris, damage, or fires were reported as a result of this latest mission. General Sinclair, ultimately, did not end up pulling the plug on Project M.

Administrator Malone would make a bold proposition to his department heads: put a guinea pig in space and return it alive. While Malone originally did not intend on using an actual guinea pig, a young 6-month-old pup would be purchased by the Agency. The guinea pig was popularly nicknamed “The Little Colonel”, but a nationwide student naming competition would be created to formally name the little, furry creature. The winning name was “Colonel Jack”, submitted by students of a junior high school in the State of Pierce town of Bonney Lake. Colonel Jack was honorarily commissioned in the Washington Air National Guard as a Colonel, due in part to his name.

AIR NATIONAL GUARD’S M-2 MISSILE BREAKS KARMAN LINE THREE TIMES

BOLD VISION FOR GUINEA PIG IN SPACE: WNSA ADMINISTRATOR SETS AMBITIOUS GOAL

TACOMA’S GREAT FIRE TESTS WNSA’S RESOLVE: ROCKET FUEL BLAZE SPARKS EMERGENCY RESPONSE

SAFETY OVERSIGHT QUESTIONED: PUBLIC OUTCRY AS ARMY GUARD RESOURCES STRETCHED THIN

SAFETY CONCERNS ARISE: CRITICS QUESTION THE RISKS OF REPEATED HIGH-ALTITUDE MISSILE FLIGHTS

Chapter 3 Appendix

¹ 900 meters per second

² 122 meters per second

³ 24,060 meters on the dot

⁴ 129,941.9 meters

⁵ 9,753.99 meters

⁶ 1,136.9 meters per second

⁷ 1,341 meters per second

⁸ 15,220.8 meters

⁹ 1,500 meters per second

¹⁰ More or less 210,824 meters, exact value not recorded

¹¹ 117,398 meters

This will be the third-to-last post to use the United States customary units/imperial measurements. It would have been the last, had I not already written up the next few chapters with imperial measurements while simultaneously making the boneheaded move of not saving the metric measurements. Oh well.

Edited February 7 by Unturned_Fighter

[Unturned_Fighter]

PRESIDENT OF WASHINGTON: Albert D. Rosellini (D)

CHIEF OF STAFF, WASHINGTON AIR NATIONAL GUARD: General Henry Sinclair

ADMINISTRATOR, WASHINGTON NATIONAL SPACE AGENCY: Michael John Malone

AIR NATIONAL GUARD LIAISON, WASHINGTON NATIONAL SPACE AGENCY: Brigadier General Thomas Baldwin

DIRECTOR, MANNED SPACEFLIGHT CENTER: David Heath

DIRECTOR, MCCHORD LAUNCH STATION: Alexander “Alex” Turner

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Chapter 4: The M-2b

McChord Air National Guard Station, Tacoma, December 24th, 1960 | Program: M | Program Launches: 5 | Total Launches: 9

The first M-2b, fitted with a payload bay, was completed on Christmas Eve 1960 and finished being rolled out to Launch Complex 2-B on January 12th in the new year, 1961, at just after 10:41 p.m. local time. Due to low light conditions, the decision was made to launch at daybreak instead of launching immediately. As a result, the M-2b sat on the pad for almost 12 hours.

The ignition sequence started at 10:03:51 a.m. local time, and the launch vehicle rocketed into the sky at 10:03:54 a.m. on its way to the cosmos.

At T+00:01:18, after main engine cutoff, the rocket started tumbling. The Range Safety Officer determined that flight termination was not necessary at the time.

The M-2b achieved an altitude of 670,128 feet, pegged at 126.9 miles (or 204,255 meters). Range safety was ordered at 423,448¹ feet, 80² miles above the surface of the Earth, as the rocket was tumbling and would come down on the Tacoma metropolitan area if nothing had been done. Thankfully, catastrophe was again averted.

This time, the Army National Guard had a new task for WNSA: develop a two-stage ballistic missile. If successful, the Army Guard’s 10th Civil Support Team (WMD) would adopt it as the latest in a series of missiles designed to bolster Washington’s national security. The missile would not nearly have the range to act in an ordered preemptive or first strike against the Soviets, but it was still better than nothing.

The Wings Over Washington Exposition was also coming up. The exposition had been going on annually for just over ten years now, and every time, it had been held at McChord Air National Guard Station. Air Guard pilots would perform dazzling aerial displays and hold recruitment drives every year to boost their numbers; but WNSA had yet to participate. Finally, WNSA had acquired an old Beechcraft Bonanza, and could now participate in the expo — but the only problem was, they kind of couldn’t. You see, to participate, you need to meet two requirements: have a plane, and have a pilot. The Agency only met one of those requirements: they had a plane, but no pilot. So the Agency put out an ad for pilots:

Of all the twelve people who signed up, only one was selected: civilian pilot Wanda Adams. She was the most experienced astronaut candidate (ASCAN), having flown for over 800 hours already, over 620 of them in a Beechcraft Bonanza — not only had Washington gotten its first astronaut, but Washington had gotten its first female astronaut, straight up unheard of for the time. The plane that ASCAN Adams would fly would arrive straight from Beechcraft on February 18th, 1961, well in advance of the Wings Over Washington Exposition in July. The plane was specially modified to have a low-resolution, black-and-white camera on its belly for observation of the ground directly below the plane from the Mission Control Center, useful for search and rescue operations.

WASHINGTON AIR NATIONAL GUARD’S M-2 MISSILE BREAKS KARMAN LINE THREE TIMES

BOLD VISION FOR GUINEA PIG IN SPACE: WNSA ADMINISTRATOR SETS AMBITIOUS GOAL

TACOMA’S GREAT FIRE TESTS WNSA’S RESOLVE: ROCKET FUEL BLAZE SPARKS EMERGENCY RESPONSE

SAFETY OVERSIGHT QUESTIONED: PUBLIC OUTCRY AS ARMY GUARD RESOURCES STRETCHED THIN

SAFETY CONCERNS ARISE: CRITICS QUESTION THE RISKS OF REPEATED HIGH-ALTITUDE MISSILE FLIGHTS

Chapter 4 Appendix

¹ 129,067 meters

² 128,747.5 meters