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Glynn Lunney
Glynn Stephen Lunney (November 27, 1936 – March 19, 2021) was an American NASA engineer. Lunney was an employee of NASA since its creation in 1958, a flight director during the Gemini and Apollo programs. Lunney was on duty during historic events such as the Apollo 11 lunar ascent and the pivotal hours of the Apollo 13 crisis. At the end of the Apollo program, he became manager of the Apollo–Soyuz Test Project, the first collaboration in spaceflight between the United States and the Soviet Union. Later, he served as manager of the Space Shuttle program before leaving NASA in 1985 and later becoming a vice president of the United Space Alliance.
Lunney was a key figure in the US human spaceflight program from Project Mercury through the coming of the Space Shuttle. He received numerous awards for his work, including the National Space Trophy, which he was given by the Rotary Club in 2005. Chris Kraft, NASA's first flight director, described Lunney as "a true hero of the space age", saying that he was "one of the outstanding contributors to the exploration of space of the last four decades".
Glynn Stephen Lunney was born in the coal city of Old Forge, Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania, on November 27, 1936, the eldest son of William Lunney, a welder and former miner who encouraged his son to get an education and to find a job beyond the mines, and his wife Helen Glynn Lunney. He graduated from the Scranton Preparatory School in 1953.
A childhood interest in model airplanes prompted Lunney to study engineering in college. After attending the University of Scranton (1953–1955), he transferred to the University of Detroit, where he enrolled in the cooperative training program run by the Lewis Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio. The center was a part of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), a United States federal agency founded to promote aeronautical research. Cooperative students at NACA took part in a program that combined work and study, providing a way for them to fund their college degrees while gaining experience in aeronautics. Lunney graduated from college in June 1958, with a Bachelor of Science degree in aerospace engineering.
After graduation, Lunney remained with NACA. His first job was as a researcher in aerospace dynamics at Lewis Research Center, where he worked with a team studying the thermodynamics of vehicles during high-speed reentry. Using a B-57 Canberra bomber, the team sent small rockets high into the atmosphere in order to measure their heating profile.
Only a month after Lunney graduated, President Eisenhower signed into existence the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), into which NACA was subsumed. His timing was perfect, for as Lunney later said, "there was no such thing as space flight until the month I got out of college". Lunney was soon transferred to Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, where in September 1959 he became a member of the Space Task Group, which was the body given responsibility for the creation of NASA's human spaceflight program. Aged twenty-one, he was the youngest of the forty-five members of the group. His first assignment was with the Control Center Simulation Group, which planned the simulations used to train both flight controllers and astronauts for the as-yet unknown experience of human spaceflight.
A member of the Flight Operations Division, Lunney was one of the engineers responsible for planning and creating procedures for Project Mercury, America's first human spaceflight program. He took part in the writing of the first set of mission rules, the guidelines by which both flight controllers and astronauts operated. During Mercury, Lunney became, after Tecwyn Roberts, the second man to serve as the Flight Dynamics Officer (FIDO) in the Mercury Control Center, controlling the trajectory of the spacecraft and planning adjustments to it.
Lunney's colleague Gene Kranz described him as "the pioneer leader of trajectory operations, who turned his craft from an art practiced by a few into a pure science". It was during these years that Lunney became the protege of flight director Chris Kraft. He was sometimes referred to as "the son of Chris Kraft."
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Glynn Lunney
Glynn Stephen Lunney (November 27, 1936 – March 19, 2021) was an American NASA engineer. Lunney was an employee of NASA since its creation in 1958, a flight director during the Gemini and Apollo programs. Lunney was on duty during historic events such as the Apollo 11 lunar ascent and the pivotal hours of the Apollo 13 crisis. At the end of the Apollo program, he became manager of the Apollo–Soyuz Test Project, the first collaboration in spaceflight between the United States and the Soviet Union. Later, he served as manager of the Space Shuttle program before leaving NASA in 1985 and later becoming a vice president of the United Space Alliance.
Lunney was a key figure in the US human spaceflight program from Project Mercury through the coming of the Space Shuttle. He received numerous awards for his work, including the National Space Trophy, which he was given by the Rotary Club in 2005. Chris Kraft, NASA's first flight director, described Lunney as "a true hero of the space age", saying that he was "one of the outstanding contributors to the exploration of space of the last four decades".
Glynn Stephen Lunney was born in the coal city of Old Forge, Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania, on November 27, 1936, the eldest son of William Lunney, a welder and former miner who encouraged his son to get an education and to find a job beyond the mines, and his wife Helen Glynn Lunney. He graduated from the Scranton Preparatory School in 1953.
A childhood interest in model airplanes prompted Lunney to study engineering in college. After attending the University of Scranton (1953–1955), he transferred to the University of Detroit, where he enrolled in the cooperative training program run by the Lewis Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio. The center was a part of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), a United States federal agency founded to promote aeronautical research. Cooperative students at NACA took part in a program that combined work and study, providing a way for them to fund their college degrees while gaining experience in aeronautics. Lunney graduated from college in June 1958, with a Bachelor of Science degree in aerospace engineering.
After graduation, Lunney remained with NACA. His first job was as a researcher in aerospace dynamics at Lewis Research Center, where he worked with a team studying the thermodynamics of vehicles during high-speed reentry. Using a B-57 Canberra bomber, the team sent small rockets high into the atmosphere in order to measure their heating profile.
Only a month after Lunney graduated, President Eisenhower signed into existence the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), into which NACA was subsumed. His timing was perfect, for as Lunney later said, "there was no such thing as space flight until the month I got out of college". Lunney was soon transferred to Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, where in September 1959 he became a member of the Space Task Group, which was the body given responsibility for the creation of NASA's human spaceflight program. Aged twenty-one, he was the youngest of the forty-five members of the group. His first assignment was with the Control Center Simulation Group, which planned the simulations used to train both flight controllers and astronauts for the as-yet unknown experience of human spaceflight.
A member of the Flight Operations Division, Lunney was one of the engineers responsible for planning and creating procedures for Project Mercury, America's first human spaceflight program. He took part in the writing of the first set of mission rules, the guidelines by which both flight controllers and astronauts operated. During Mercury, Lunney became, after Tecwyn Roberts, the second man to serve as the Flight Dynamics Officer (FIDO) in the Mercury Control Center, controlling the trajectory of the spacecraft and planning adjustments to it.
Lunney's colleague Gene Kranz described him as "the pioneer leader of trajectory operations, who turned his craft from an art practiced by a few into a pure science". It was during these years that Lunney became the protege of flight director Chris Kraft. He was sometimes referred to as "the son of Chris Kraft."