The failed rendezvous with the discarded Titan stage

Gemini 4 launched on June 3, 1965, at 15:15:59 UTC from Launch Complex 19 atop a Titan II GLV. The crew was Command Pilot James McDivitt (his first flight) and Pilot Ed White (his only flight).

Shortly after reaching orbit, McDivitt attempted to approach the discarded second stage of the booster — intended as the first American in-orbit rendezvous test. The crew's distance estimates disagreed (McDivitt guessed 400–500 feet, White "a little over 200 feet," and at worst half a mile versus three-quarters of a mile), and the stage was venting residual propellant, causing unpredictable movement.

Flight engineers had not yet fully grasped a basic principle of orbital mechanics — that a prograde thrust toward a target changes the chaser's own orbit and does not close the distance, often the opposite. McDivitt burned through nearly half his thruster fuel before abandoning the attempt, needing to preserve enough for the mission's key objective — White's spacewalk.