Deke Slayton

At 69 years old, Deke Slayton has this physical status:

In January 1959, Slayton was selected as one of the candidates for NASA's Project Mercury, the first U.S. crewed space flight program. Despite his initial lack of interest in spaceflight, he agreed to pursue astronaut selection. After an initial interview at the temporary NASA headquarters in the Dolley Madison House in Washington, D.C., Slayton was psychologically and physically tested at the Lovelace Clinic in Albuquerque, New Mexico, along with fellow future astronauts Scott Carpenter and Jim Lovell. On April 2, 1959, Slayton was notified of his selection as an astronaut. He moved his family from Edwards Air Force Base to a housing development near Fort Eustis, where he was neighbors with fellow Mercury Seven astronauts Gus Grissom and Wally Schirra.: 66, 69–75

After he began at NASA, Slayton was assigned to the development of the Convair Atlas LV-3B.: 98  In 1959, during a centrifuge training course, he underwent an electrocardiogram that found that he had erratic heart activity. He received further medical evaluation at Brooks Air Force Base and was diagnosed with idiopathic atrial fibrillation, but he was considered healthy enough to continue flying.: 78–79, 85–86  During the uncrewed Mercury-Atlas 4 orbital spaceflight, he worked at the tracking station in Bermuda. He was selected for the second American crewed orbital mission, Mercury-Atlas 7, which he intended to name Delta 7.: 104–105, 110  In early 1962, NASA Administrator James Webb opened an investigation into Slayton's atrial fibrillation. On March 15, 1962, two months prior to the launch of Delta 7, Slayton was medically disqualified from the flight and replaced on the mission by Scott Carpenter.: 111–114  Initially, Slayton's ineligibility was only for his assigned mission, and he attempted to improve his health by exercising more regularly and abstaining from alcohol. NASA leadership determined that Slayton was still at risk for atrial fibrillation and removed his eligibility to fly any of the remaining Mercury missions.: 115–116  Flight doctors recommended a cardiac catheterization to determine if he had a congenital condition, but NASA management rejected the proposal because of the risks of the operation.

After being grounded by NASA, Slayton was selected in early 1962 to serve as the senior manager of the astronaut office. One of his first roles was to select the Group 2 astronauts, and the new class was announced in September 1962. Additionally, he was tasked with making future crew assignments, and assigned Gordon Cooper to Mercury-Atlas 9.: 115–122  In an administrative restructuring in October 1963, Slayton became assistant director of Flight Crew Operations, in addition to his job managing the astronaut office. In November 1963, he resigned from his commission in the Air Force after he was permanently disqualified from flying and became a civilian executive for NASA. After Alan Shepard was grounded due to Ménière's disease, he replaced Slayton as the manager of the astronaut office, while Slayton continued to work for Flight Crew Operations and was promoted to its director in 1966.: 133–140  Slayton continued to be responsible for making crew assignments, and determined the astronauts that would fly on the Gemini and Apollo missions.: 166–168, 184  Slayton created a crew rotation, where a crew would be selected as the backup crew for a mission and would later be the prime crew three missions later.: 42

During the Apollo 1 fire, Slayton was in the Cape Canaveral LC-34 blockhouse. He was a close friend of fellow astronaut Gus Grissom and had considered working inside the capsule to determine communications problems and would have worked under the footrests, where the fire would later begin.: 16–17 : 185, 189  After the fire, Slayton called a meeting of the astronauts from the first groups to be chosen, in April 1967 and announced that they were the candidates for the first lunar landing.: 27  Slayton oversaw the crew reassignments for the upcoming Apollo missions, as well as the selection for Group 6 and Group 7 astronauts. During this time, he continued to show symptoms of atrial fibrillation. After NASA Administrator James Webb decided that Apollo 8 would become a circumlunar mission, Slayton switched the previous crew to the Apollo 9 because of their experience with the lunar module and moved both the prime and backup crew from Apollo 9 to Apollo 8. Due to his crew rotation schedule, the backup crew of Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins became the primary crew for Apollo 11.: 200–203, 223–224, 250 : 58–62, 136–137  Slayton continued to assign the crew for the remaining lunar landings. Slayton chose to replace Ken Mattingly with Jack Swigert on Apollo 13, after concerns arose that Mattingly could develop measles during the mission.: 288  In 1969, he made the controversial decision to assign Alan Shepard as the Apollo 13 commander, which was viewed by some astronauts as a conflict of interest, due to Shepard's previous position as head of the astronaut office. Shepard would be later reassigned to command Apollo 14 by the Office of Manned Spaceflight director George Mueller, against Slayton's wishes, who felt that Shepard needed additional training time.: 346–348  After the postal covers scandal during the Apollo 15 mission, Slayton reassigned the crew to non-flying jobs, effectively ending their astronaut careers.: 496–497  Slayton supported keeping Joe Engle as the lunar module pilot on Apollo 17, but was pressured by NASA management to replace him with Jack Schmitt, a scientist-astronaut.: 271 : 450–451

While grounded, Slayton took several measures to attempt to be restored to flight status, including regularly exercising, taking vitamins, quitting cigarette smoking and coffee and reducing his consumption of alcoholic beverages. In 1970 his palpitations became more frequent and he started taking experimental daily doses of quinidine, a crystalline alkaloid. This treatment was successful, but concerned that taking medication would still disqualify him from solo flying, Slayton stopped taking it against doctors orders. After a decade of seeing doctors around the world, in 1971 Slayton was examined at the Mayo Clinic after a long period without heart fibrillation, and was determined to not have a coronary condition. On March 13, 1972, NASA announced that Slayton had returned to flight status.: 264, 274, 275

In February 1973, Slayton was assigned to the Apollo–Soyuz Test Project (ASTP) as a docking module pilot, along with commander Thomas Stafford and command module pilot Vance Brand. The American crew began a two-year training program, which included learning the Russian language and making trips to the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in the USSR. He remained in a managerial role throughout the Skylab program, and resigned as Director of Flight Crew Operations in February 1974 in preparation for his upcoming flight.: 280–281, 290 : 160–166

The Apollo and Soyuz spacecraft both launched on July 15, 1975. On July 17, the two craft rendezvoused in orbit and the American astronauts conducted crew transfers with cosmonauts Alexei Leonov and Valeri Kubasov. At the end of the flight, an erroneous switch setting led to noxious nitrogen tetroxide fumes from the command module's RCS thrusters being sucked into the cabin during landing and the crew was hospitalized as a precaution in Honolulu, Hawaii, for two weeks. During hospitalization, a lesion was discovered on Slayton's lung and removed. It was determined to be benign, but he would have likely been grounded from ASTP if it had been discovered before the flight.: 300–305 : 188–195  He was 51 years old, making him the oldest astronaut to fly in space at the time.

Prior to the ASTP flight, Slayton was assigned by Chris Kraft to manage the Approach and Landing Tests (ALT) of the Space Shuttle program. The ALT program developed the tests for the Space Shuttle orbiter Enterprise, and modified several F-104 Starfighters and T-38 Talons to train the astronauts. While working on the Space Shuttle, he also assisted in developing the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft.: 306–312

The ALT program ended in late 1977 and Slayton agreed to manage the Space Shuttle's Orbital Flight Tests (OFT). During the selection of the Group 8 astronauts, Slayton advocated for fewer selections, with the expectation that two-man crews would fly the regular satellite deployment missions. He officially retired in 1980, but continued to serve in an advisory role for STS-1, and flew a T-38 chase plane during the landing of STS-2. He formally left NASA on February 27, 1982, and had flown 7,164 hours.: 310–323

Post-NASA career

After his retirement from NASA, Slayton served as president of Space Services Inc., a Houston-based company earlier founded to develop rockets for small commercial payloads. He served as mission director for a rocket called the Conestoga, which was successfully launched on September 9, 1982, and was the world's first privately funded rocket to reach space.: 329–342  Slayton also became interested in aviation racing, and was President of International Formula One Pylon Air Racing and Director of Columbia Astronautics. He also served on the Department of Transportation's Commercial Space Advisory Committee.: 323–328

In 1991, Slayton began working with space historian Michael Cassutt to write his autobiography, titled Deke!: U.S. Manned Space from Mercury to the Shuttle, which was published in 1994, a year after his death.: 343  Slayton also co-wrote the 1994 book Moon Shot: The Inside Story of America's Race to the Moon with fellow astronaut Alan Shepard.

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