Apr 3 1984
From The Space Library
NASA announced that it awarded to the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, Colo., a cost-plus-fixed-fee contract of $7,076,741 for operation and maintenance of the National Scientific Balloon Facility (NSBF) in Palestine, Tex. The contractor would provide the personnel, materials, supplies, and services to manage, operate, and maintain the NSBF, including flight program operation, engineering activities, and research and development. The NSBF would annually conduct 60 to 70 scientific balloon flights.
GSFC's Wallops Island, Va., facility would administer the contract. (GSFC Release 84-4)
April 3-11: The Soviet Union launched today, aboard the Soyuz T-11, two Soviet cosmonauts, Col. Yuri Malyshev and Gennady Strekalov, and the first Indian cosmonaut, Rakesh Sharma, a 35-year-old Air Force pilot, for an eight-day visit to the Salyut-7 space station to join three other cosmonauts who had been living there since February 8. The joint flight was the 11th in the Intercosmos series that had taken non-Soviet cosmonauts into space along with Soviet counterparts.
On this flight, Sharma would conduct medical experiments in which he would practice yoga as a possible means of coping with space sickness. Experiments would also include detailed space surveys of the Indian subcontinent. The Soviet Union and India televised the launch, and Tass quoted Prime Minister Indira Gandhi as saying that the joint mission gave a "new dimension" to friendship between India and the Soviet Union.
The three returned to Earth April 11 in a perfect parachute landing of their Soyuz T-10 space capsule near the town of Arkalyk, 1,500 miles southeast of Moscow. Tass reported that the cosmonauts were "feeling fine." The report continued, "New information on peculiarities of the human organism's adaptation to space flight conditions was obtained" Beyond stressing Soviet-Indian cooperation and friendship, the flight also demonstrated the peaceful uses of outer space, Soviet officials commented. (FBIS, USSR, Apr 4/84, U1-4; FBIS, USSR, Apr 11/84, U1-3; NY Times, Apr 4/86, A-l6; W Post, Apr 12/84, A-33)
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