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| A Titan II N-14 Test Flight cover featuring a "Swanson" stamped cachet, postmarked at Cape Canaveral with a hand cancel on May 9, 1963. |
Titan II N-14 was launched from Launch Complex 16 at Cape Canaveral, Florida, on May 9, 1963. The Titan II was being developed as the launch vehicle for NASA’s Project Gemini, but the U.S. Air Force continued to conduct research-and-development flights to improve the missile’s reliability. The Titan II N-14 test ended in partial failure when an oxidizer leak caused the second-stage engine to shut down prematurely, preventing the missile from reaching its intended target. Although N-14 was not a dedicated Gemini spacecraft launch, it formed part of the broader Titan II development program that supported the eventual qualification of the launch vehicle for crewed spaceflight.
