"The rocket had worked perfectly, and all I had to do was survive the reentry forces. You do it all, in a flight like that, in a rather short period of time, just 16 minutes as a matter of fact"
About this Quote
The intent is partly personal and partly institutional. Shepard is selling competence. Early NASA needed astronauts who sounded less like poets and more like instruments: reliable, unpanicked, managerial about danger. His phrasing turns existential risk into procedure. That was crucial in 1961, when Freedom 7 wasn't just a ride; it was a televised referendum on whether the U.S. could match the Soviet lead after Yuri Gagarin.
The subtext, though, is that "perfectly" is a wish as much as a report. Shepard isn't describing a serene glide through history; he's acknowledging how little control a human actually has once the countdown ends. "All I had to do" is almost comic because it's true: after launch, the astronaut becomes payload with a pulse, strapped to a chain of hardware and physics. The throwaway "as a matter of fact" is the final tell - a man using plain talk to domesticate the sublime, turning the edge of death into a timed segment on the schedule.
Quote Details
| Topic | Science |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite | Cite this Quote |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Shepard, Alan. (n.d.). The rocket had worked perfectly, and all I had to do was survive the reentry forces. You do it all, in a flight like that, in a rather short period of time, just 16 minutes as a matter of fact. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-rocket-had-worked-perfectly-and-all-i-had-to-20688/
Chicago Style
Shepard, Alan. "The rocket had worked perfectly, and all I had to do was survive the reentry forces. You do it all, in a flight like that, in a rather short period of time, just 16 minutes as a matter of fact." FixQuotes. Accessed February 2, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-rocket-had-worked-perfectly-and-all-i-had-to-20688/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"The rocket had worked perfectly, and all I had to do was survive the reentry forces. You do it all, in a flight like that, in a rather short period of time, just 16 minutes as a matter of fact." FixQuotes, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-rocket-had-worked-perfectly-and-all-i-had-to-20688/. Accessed 2 Feb. 2026.
