“Please, dear God, don’t let me fuck up.”
Alan Shepard
A quote that we all may have said to ourselves more than once but never spoke it. I find this citation compelling for several reasons. First, why it was said; second, when it was said; third, who said it. I will start from there.
Late in the 50’s, NASA recruited over 100 test pilots for the manned space program. After several months of grueling training, seven members were chosen for the original Mercury space program. Alan B. Shepard Jr. was one of these men and responsible for this unforgettable quote. The original quote he said to himself was “Don’t Fuck Up, Shepard…”. It was modified for the movie “The Right Stuff” and later became known to aviators as Shepard’s Prayer.
Shepard cited these words shortly before taking off in America’s first manned space flight while strapped into a Redstone rocket full of ethyl alcohol and liquid oxygen (basically a giant bomb). I can only imagine what he must have felt like before takeoff. This short flight will take him to an altitude of 116 miles and he would have to endure 11.5 g-forces on re-entry. This is enough to kill most men if sustained for more than a few seconds. Unlike Sputnik which was totally automated, Shepard actually had flight controls to adjust pitch and yaw during takeoff as well as re-entry.
