He spent the next several years at the Space Center in charge of an experiments test facility that served the Mercury-, Gemini-, and Apollo-manned space programs.
The company was founded on July 16, 1939 by James Smith McDonnell, and was best known for its military fighters, including the F-4 Phantom II, and manned spacecraft including the Mercury capsule and Gemini capsule.
It was used to train United States astronauts for post-splashdown ocean recovery operations and water egress from their command modules during the Gemini and Apollo programs from 1963 to 1972.
The Earth-A Ultiman received his powers after surviving a Project Gemini spacecraft incident.
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The suit is a direct descendant of the U.S. Air Force high-altitude pressure suits worn by the two-man crews of the SR-71 Blackbird, pilots of the U-2 and X-15, and Gemini pilot-astronauts, and the Launch Entry Suits worn by NASA astronauts starting on the STS-26 flight, the first flight after the Challenger disaster.
NASA's Project Mercury and Gemini space flights were launched from Cape Canaveral, as were Apollo flights using the Saturn I and Saturn IB rockets.
An additional four (Elliot See, Charles Bassett, Theodore Freeman, and Clifton Williams) were killed in T-38 plane crashes during training for space flight during the Gemini and Apollo programs.
In July 1966 the Gemini Program joined in a NASA Langley Research Center contract to include an evaluation of Gemini EVA tasks.
Gilruth sent Donnelly to Cape Canaveral, Florida in 1959, where he served as a capsule (spacecraft) test conductor for all Project Mercury and Gemini launches.