May 3, 1999
Web posted at: 6:02 p.m. EDT (2202 GMT)

CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (CNN) -- Those who've waited 38 years to find out what went wrong the day Liberty Bell 7 blew its hatch and sank into the Atlantic Ocean may finally get some answers.

Beating the odds, a salvage crew over the weekend found the telephone-booth-sized capsule sitting upright three miles (4.8 km) below sea level on a ridge that runs along the Atlantic Ocean floor within a 24-square-mile (62-square-km) search area off Grand Bahama Island.

But the underwater robotic rover used to identify and photograph the spacecraft sank in rough seas Saturday, putting recovery efforts on hold until a new vessel can be obtained.

"We found something in water half a mile deeper than the Titanic," salvage expert Curt Newport from his research vessel, the Needham Tide. "It's smaller than one of the Titanic's boilers, and we did it on a bottom that is one of the worst ones I've ever seen."

Liberty Bell 7 -- the only U.S. manned spacecraft ever lost following a successful mission -- became flooded and sank in 1961 when the hatch blew. Ever since, there's been debate on whether it was a malfunction, or whether Grissom did something to cause it to blow.

Grissom -- who almost drowned -- insisted that he'd done nothing wrong.

Emotional roller coaster

Newport said on his way back to port Sunday that he went from an emotional high when the capsule was located to an emotional low when the recovery vessel sank, all in a matter of hours.

"I can't think of a more perfect example of triumph and tragedy," he said in a ship-to-shore news conference arranged by the Discovery Channel, which is funding the mission.

Before its tether snapped, the remotely operated submersible sent back haunting video of the capsule.

Still shiny in spots, the spacecraft is propped upright on a sandy knoll, its window and parachute liner still intact and its periscope still extended. The words "United States" and "Liberty Bell" are plainly visible.

Newport said he also could see the fake crack that was painted on the exterior of Liberty Bell 7 to replicate its namesake, as well as the singe marks left by the explosives that blew out the hatch following splashdown on July 21, 1961.

The explosives detonated too soon, and the spacecraft took on so much water that helicopter rescuers could not lift it from the sea. Grissom nearly drowned but was pulled to safety.

Human error or freak mishap?

The mishap forever marred Grissom's otherwise successful 15-minute sub-orbital flight, which was the nation's second manned space shot. The astronaut, who went on to fly in Gemini, insisted until his death in the 1967 Apollo launch pad fire that he'd done nothing wrong.

Some wondered at the time -- and still do -- whether Grissom bumped something or even panicked.

His widow, Betty Grissom, feels certain the hatch malfunctioned. In any case, she wishes the capsule was never found.

Mrs. Grissom said last month that she resents not being consulted from the start about the salvage effort and doesn't want the capsule to be restored at the Kansas Cosmosphere and Space Center, as is the plan. That's where the capsule eventually will be put on display under an agreement with NASA and the Smithsonian Institution.

'Oh my God, I can't believe it'

At first, Newport thought the dark, tall, conical object was airplane wreckage. He was stunned when he saw the words "United States."

"I remember saying, 'Oh my God, I can't believe it. That's it. We found it. This is it!'" he said. "There was a lot of shaking hands and slapping each other on the back and just congratulating each other and just staring in disbelief at this spacecraft in front of us, us being the first ones to see it since 1961."

Newport, 47, a former space station worker, had made two previous attempts to find the capsule in the early 1990s, but did not have sophisticated enough equipment or enough time to accomplish the job.

Two cameras and a tape recorder that sank with the capsule could shed light on why the hatch blew open too soon -- one of the biggest mysteries of American space flight. But it's doubtful the film can be salvaged after so long underwater.

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