Heat Shield, Mercury, MA-9, Faith 7 (Half)

Project Mercury was the first American human spaceflight program, putting one astronaut into space on six occasions between 1961 and 1963. The circular ablative heatshield on the Mercury spacecraft protected it during reentry in the earth atmosphere two ways: 1) the very shallow curved surface created a shock wave that kept much of the ionized gases created by reentry at a distance; 2) the remaining heat flux was carried away by the ablation (erosive evaporation) of the glass fiber-phenolic resin composite.

This heatshield flew on the Mercury-Atlas 9 Faith 7 spacecraft of L. Gordon Cooper, Jr., May 15-16, 1963, and was later removed. It was transferred from the NASA Johnson Space Center to the Smithsonian in 1976 in two pieces.