FACTBOX: Space pioneer Schirra dies

(Reuters) - Wally Schirra, one of the seven Project Mercury astronauts who pioneered U.S. space exploration in the 1960s, has died, NASA said. He was 84.

Schirra was one of the seven young men selected in 1959 to lead the Cold War space race against the Soviet Union. Only John Glenn and Scott Carpenter remain from the project.

Here are a few facts about Schirra's life:

* Born in March 1923 into an aviation family, Schirra was one of the seven Mercury astronauts named by NASA in April 1959. He then piloted the Sigma 7 Mercury flight in late 1962, which orbited Earth six times.

* That flight lasted 9 hours, 15 minutes and attained a speed of 17,557 miles per hour at an altitude of 175 miles. It traveled almost 144,000 miles (230,400 km) before re-entry.

* He was the command pilot on the historic 1965 Gemini 6 flight. The highlight was a successful rendezvous of Gemini 6 with the already orbiting Gemini 7 spacecraft. This was the first rendezvous of two manned maneuverable spacecraft and established another space first for the United States.

* In 1968 he was the command pilot on Apollo VII. Schirra has logged a total of 295 hours and 15 minutes in space. He was the only astronaut to have flown Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo missions.

* In 1969 Schirra retired from the U.S. Navy and NASA.

Sources: Reuters/NASA