White Sands: lift-off RV-A-4 Bumper 5 with WAC rocket
on top
Strange launch from U.S.S. Midway on 6th September 1947
Cape Canaveral: RV-A-4 Bumper 8 on pad
Tiny Tim booster
Rear of the WAC Corporal
The WAC Corporal was the first sounding
rocket developed in the United States.
Begun as a spinoff of the Corporal program, the WAC was a "little sister" to
the larger MGM-5 Corporal. It was designed and built jointly by the Douglas
Aircraft Company and the Guggenheim Aeronautical Laboratory.
The WAC Corporal was a liquid-fuel rocket, with fuming nitric acid and aniline
used as oxidizers and furfuryl alcohol as fuel, launched with the help of a
solid fuel Tiny Tim booster.
The WAC Corporal (without Tiny Tim) combined with a German V-2 rocket to form
the "Bumper WAC".
WAC Corporal
• Empty weight: 296.7 lb (134.6 kg)
• Loaded weight: 690.7 lb (313.3 kg)
• Thrust: 1,500 lbf (6,700 N)
• Duration: 47 s
• Impulse: 67,000 lbf•s (300,000 N•s)
