Friendship 7 Splashdown & Recovery Poster

The Mercury-Atlas 6 "Friendship 7" spacecraft is retrieved from the Atlantic Ocean following astronaut John H. Glenn Jr.'s three-orbit space mission. In this view, the capsule is still in the water, with retrieval cable connected to it. Mercury Atlas 6 (MA-6, also designated Friendship 7) was the first orbital flight of an American rocket with a human on board. The pilot was John H. Glenn, Jr. The objectives of MA-6 were to: (1) evaluate the performance of a man-spacecraft system in a three-orbit mission; (2) evaluate the effects of space flight on the astronaut; and, (3) obtain the astronaut's evaluation of the operational suitability of the spacecraft and supporting systems for manned space flight.