Gus Grissom was an American astronaut in the Mercury space program and the second American, after Alan Shepard, to fly in space. He took a suborbital trip aboard the Liberty Bell 7 on July 21, 1961. The flight was notable for Grissom`s brush with death, when an explosive charge blew open the hatch on impact and Grissom nearly drowned.
Along with fellow astronauts Ed White and Roger Chaffee, Grissom was killed during a preflight test of the Apollo mission to the moon on January 27, 1967.