marine colonel became the first to go into space. glen hurdled into space inside friendship 7. in just over five hours he circled the planet three times. it flight signalled america s push to catch up with the soviet union in the space race. it s been a long time since we seen each other. we were at the final shuttle launch there. today is a day of celebration, but reflection on what our space program needs to do next. i still have your chair warm f for you down here. thank you. this was out of 166 flights that we ve had, as i had the pleasure of covering them all, this was the most exciting one.
dolan was elevated to cardinal in the roman catholic church this weekend. the 20th american to hold a post as chief adviser to the pope. turning to the parade of papers, daily news, it s been 50 years since john glenn piloted the friendship 7 around the earth, 50 years marking the first american man orbital mission to circle the globe. in full mardi gras, will ferrell tosses trinkets and candy from one of the floats on napoleon avenue in new orleans and mark haleprin was just down there. getting the beads, huh? i was there right before it started. i like pre-math. aftermath is for losers. let s go to mike allen for politico with a look at the morning playbook. hello, mike. another sucker, good morning, willie. another sucker joins the conversation. that makes six of us now.
was a basic one, would john glenn s body survive the flight. could we do this or not. would your are eye balls change shape. that was the concerns and the little miniature eye chart is still on friendship 7 in the smithsonian in washington. would the fluid in the inner ears move randomly and give you vertigo. things that we didn t know the answer to then. the basic questions of survival in space were answered by john glenn s flight so later flights were still able to ex-focus on other ex-pair isn ts. and why he took the risks. he was asked and here is how he and the question. it was important for our country. it was important because of the cold war. it was a new step forward and we were proud to be representing our country there. you made it as safe as you possibly could and what little bit of risk was left was we accepted that. these two surviving mercury
years since glennn was the first astronaut to orbit the earth. where is our space program heading next? reporter: 50 years later you can hear that same excitement in john glenls voice when he talks about the details of that historic accomplishment. that launch was scrubbed 10 different times before finally taking off on the friendship 7 or weather or technical reasons. the auto pilot failed after one of three orbits around the earth. there were concerns that the heat shield could give way upon return. even fears about what the flight could do to john glenn s body. the things we were looking back on those first flights seem so primitive they are almost laughable. but the doctors and ophthalmologists were concerned
glenn essentially had to pilot the friendship 7 for the final two laps around the earth, heather. heather: amazing looking at that footage. how it nasa responding to plans to cancel the shuttle program? reporter: many officials at nasa and glenn himself came out with disapproval over nasa plans to scrap the shuttle. glenn himself said this is a real problem because america is basically dependent on russia right now to ferry its astronauts to and from the space station. nasa however is unveiling plans to talk about its next space capsule, the owe rye i don t know. it will begin unmanned space flights 2014. manned space flights 2021 the target will be the moon and asteroids. but still a long way off. glenn and others expressing disapproval the enemy, the battle they once fought in the cold war, the soviet union the u.s. dependent on rush shuns to ferry astronauts back and