Carnarvon Aeromeds

Aeromedical Monitors / Flight Surgeons during Gemini

At the Aeromed console – the medical team at Carnarvon for Gemini IV. From left:

Dr Bill Walsh (RAAF), Dr Dick Pollard (NASA), Dr Michael Murray-Alston (RAAF).

Medium format photo by Hamish Lindsay.
2025 negative scan by Colin Mackellar.

For the Mercury and Gemini missions, Aeromedical Monitors (also knowns as Flight Surgeons – or “Sir Johns”) were positioned at each of the tracking stations to check the health of the orbital crew and to supervise various experiments to be perfomed by the astronauts. (See this page for information on the Aeromedical Monitors during Project Mercury.)

By the time the Apollo missions flew, communications from the remote stations had improved to the extent that Aeromedical monitoring could be centralised to Houston, and local Aeromeds were not needed.

Here is a (likely incomplete) list of Aeromedical Monitors (Flight Surgeons) at Carnarvon during the Gemini Program.

Click the image for a PDF file.

For Gemini IV, in June 1965, two Australian Aeromeds and one American were stationed at Carnarvon.

As the Flight Control Team at Carnarvon prepared for the launch of Gemini IV, Hamish Lindsay took a series of photos – including these of the Aeromedical Monitors. He provided prints of some of them to Australian Health Education Advisory Digest for an article on Space Medicine. (See the article below.)

The Aeromedical Monitors were an integral part of the Flight Control Team.

Gemini IV Flight Control team at Carnarvon – Aeromeds circled.

Back row from left:
Dick Simons (M&O), Fred Mitchell (AWA Company Manager), Lewis Wainwright (Station Director), and Dave Scott (Astronaut Observer).

Front Row:
Dr Bill Walsh (RAAF), Harry Smith, Dr Michael Murray-Alston (RAAF), John Ferry, Ed Fendell (Capcom), Joe Fuller, Dr Dick Pollard (NASA).

Gemini 4 flew June 3-7 1965.
Updated scan, 2023, from the medium format negative.

Att the Carnarvon Aeromed console for Gemini IV –

Dr Bill Walsh (RAAF), Dr Dick Pollard (NASA), Dr Michael Murray-Alston (RAAF).

Capcom Ed Fendell is just visible at the top right.

In this recording made during Gemini IV at Carnarvon at 21:23 GET, Capcom Ed Fendell and Carnarvon Surgeon Dick Pollard speak with Pilot Ed White onboard the spacecraft.

Listen here – and also see the full page of recordings made at Carnarvon.

Medium format photo by Hamish Lindsay.
2025 negative scan by Colin Mackellar.

The location of the Aeromed console in the Carnarvon Operations Room during Gemini.

The Aeromed console (red) was adjacent to the M&O console (i.e. Operations – blue) and opposite the Gemini consoles (yellow – Agena engineering, Capcom and the Gemini engineering console).

Adapted from Hamish Lindsay’s Equipment Layout chart.

Hamish has climbed on a ladder to take this photo looking down on the Sanborn chart recorder which is immediately to the left of Dr Michael Murray-Alston.

Medium format photo by Hamish Lindsay.
2025 negative scan by Colin Mackellar.

Hamish Lindsay contributed to this article on Space Medicine in Volume 2, Number 3, of Australian Health Education Advisory Digest published in July 1965.

Click the image for a PDF file.

Scan by Colin Mackellar from a copy preserved by Hamish Lindsay.

From the article above –

“Australia is making a unique contribution to the new field of space medicine. There are now five Australian ‘space doctors’ trained to monitor U.S. Astronauts from the Carnarvon space tracking station in Western Australia.

They are one civilian, Dr. John Lane, Director of Aviation Medicine, Department of Civil Aviation,

and four R.A.A.F. officers –

Wing-Commander Warren Bishop, C.O., R.A.A.F. Institute of Aviation Medicine, Point Cook, Victoria;

Wing Commander Bill Walsh and Squadron-Leader Michael Murray-Alston, both of the Institute, and Squadron-Leader Bill Read [should be Reed?], of Williamtown R.A.A.F. base, N.S.W.

Last month, when McDivitt and White circuited the earth for 4 days aboard their Gemini space craft, Wing-Commander Walsh and Squadron-Leader Murray-Alston were part of the team which watched over their health.

Eight further Gemini flights are planned -the next one in a few weeks time is scheduled to last seven days and eventually a three-man trip to the moon will be made aboard an Apollo spaceship.

The Carnarvon station, which is run for the Americans by the Commonwealth Department of Supply, is expected to take part in the full lunar programme.”

The article has an annotated version of Hamish’s photo of the Aeromed console.

Hamish’s console photo featured in the article.

Medium format photo by Hamish Lindsay.
2025 negative scan by Colin Mackellar.

Hamish also took this photo with the back-lighting turned on.

Medium format photo by Hamish Lindsay.
2025 negative scan by Colin Mackellar.

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