1. Able was a modified form of the Aerojet AJ-10 second stage of the Vanguard rocket used as the second stage of the Thor-Able, Thor-Able Star, and Atlas-Able launch vehicles.

2. Able was also an early, ill-fated American lunar program approved by President Eisenhower on 27 March 1958, and intended to place a satellite in orbit around the Moon. Project Able became the first lunar shot in history, preceding even Luna 1, when a Thor-Able took off at 12:18 GMT on17 August 1958, before a small group of journalists. Unfortunately, only 77 seconds into the flight, the Thor's turbopump seized and the missile blew up. Telemetry from the probe was received for a further 123 seconds until the 39-kilogram spacecraft ended its brief journey by falling into the Atlantic. Although not given an official name the probe is referred to as Pioneer 0 or Able 1. Before the launch of the second probe the whole program was transferred to NASA, which renamed it Pioneer.

3. Able may also refer to a rhesus monkey that was housed in a biocapsule and sent on a suborbital flight by a specially-configured Jupiter missile on 28 May 1959. Able and its companion Baker, a female squirrel monkey placed in a second biocapsule, became the first live animals to be recovered after traveling outside Earth's atmosphere. Able died on 1 June 1959, from the effects of anesthesia given to allow the removal of electrodes. An autopsy revealed that it had suffered no adverse effects from its flight.¹ See also animals in space.

 

Reference

1. Powell, J. W. "The Flight of Able and Baker." Journal of the British Interplanetary Society 38 (1985): 94–96.