Feb 25 1977
From The Space Library
NASA announced selection of Hughes Aircraft Co.'s Space and Communications Group, El Segundo, Calif., for negotiation of a cost-plus-award-fee contract valued at between $37.5 and $43.5 million, depending on the option selected, for design and fabrication of a thematic mapper to be used on Landsat D, scheduled for launch early in 1981. The thematic mapper would be a remote-sensing instrument offering improved data for land-resources management by making observations with repetitive temporal coverage and delivering to the users information with better spatial and spectral resolution (mapping on a 1:250 000 scale compared to 1:1000 000 on the present Landsat.)
The basic contract, including assembly, test, and qualification of a prototype flight model and one set of bench-test and calibration equipment, as well as support services, would have two options: either an additional flight unit with an additional set of test equipment and support services, or two additional flight units and support services. Completion and delivery of the prototype would be scheduled for late 1980. GSFC would manage the thematic-mapper program. (NASA Release-77-34)
NASA announced development of ultrathin large-area silicon solar cells thinner than a sheet of newspaper for increasing the power-to weight capability of solar arrays, considered a major breakthrough' in applying solar energy to missions requiring multikilowatts, even millions of watts, of electricity. The Solarex Corp. of Rockville, Md., had made the thin cells some 40 to 50 microns thick (only one-sixth as thick as cells in present solar arrays) in sizes up to 38cm2, proving both structurally flexible and less fragile than expected. Energy conversion of the new cells virtually equaled that of conventional cells, 11% compared to 12 or 13% for the thicker cells.
Lightweight cells would mean larger solar arrays for ion-propulsion systems in extended space exploration, and could supply power for platforms and remote-satellite power stations in the future. Solarex had delivered hundreds of the new cells to JPL at Pasadena, Calif., for test, evaluation, and design-application studies. (NASA Release 77-31)
More than half the 1497 reports received under the NASA aviation safety reporting system (ASRS) in its second quarter of operations included unsolicited recommendations for solutions of a variety of air traffic problems, NASA announced. The reports, dealing with air operations nationwide, reflected an increase in the quality of reporting for the period ending Oct. 14, 1976, the agency said. NASA's ASRS had been designed as an "early warning system" consisting of voluntary reports submitted by pilots, air traffic controllers, and others in the national aviation system.
During the first and second quarters, an average of 100 reports came in each wk; the number of reports from pilots declined during the second quarter, with reports from controllers now constituting half rather than a third of the total. At least three-fourths of all reports concerned incidents occurring in controlled air space, and some type of flight plan had been filed in 84% of the flights described. NASA had prepared and sent to the Federal Aviation Administration a total of 58 alert bulletins during the report period.
NASA personnel had initially screened all ASRS reports to remove the names of persons reporting; the reports went for analysis to the ASRS office of Battelle's Columbus Division in Mountain View, Calif. Attempts to verify information in 340 of the reports, by telephone contact with the reporter, were successful in 270 instances. Names of persons were removed to protect the right of free comment without fear of reprisal, and 80% of the reports were reviewed within 2 working days of their receipt. (NASA Release 77-30)
NASA issued requests for proposals from industry to design and manufacture the Infrared Astronomy Satellite (IRAS) recently approved by the U.S. and the Netherlands. Scheduled for launch in March 1981, the observatory would use a telescope furnished by the U.S., a spacecraft built by the Netherlands, and a control facility supplied by the United Kingdom. The IRAS in a 900km polar orbit would survey the entire sky for a yr, at infrared wavelengths not usable by earth-based telescopes because of atmospheric interference, to study stars forming and at the end of their life cycle.
JPL would manage the project and would design and operate a facility to produce an infrared sky map and a catalog containing up to 1 million infrared sources. NASA's Ames Research Center would be responsible for the 60m-aperture infrared telescope. Prof. Gerry Neugebauer of the Calif. Inst. of Technology (operating JPL for NASA) would head the U.S. scientific team, working with as many as 500 U.S., Dutch, and U.K. scientists, engineers, and technicians. Industry proposals were due by Mar. 1, with contractor selection later in 1977. (NASA Release 77-33)
MSFC reported NASA's Michoud Assembly Facility had shipped the first of four major pieces of test hardware for the Space Shuttle external tank, an intertank structural-test article scheduled to arrive by barge at MSFC about Mar. 5. It would go from New Orleans to Huntsville by way of Mississippi, Ohio, and Tennessee Rivers, the route NASA had used to ship Saturn stages for testing during the Apollo program. The other test articles (liquid-hydrogen tank, liquid-oxygen tank, and another intertank) would arrive later in 1977.
The external tank, one to be used for each Shuttle mission, would hold containers for liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen, connected by the intertank; the combined assembly would measure about 47m long. Test data would serve to verify the intertank's structural integrity before static test firing of the Shuttle's main propulsion system at the Natl. Space Technology Laboratories later in 1977. The test firings would use a full size external tank, three Shuttle engines, and an Orbiter aft-structure simulator, attached to the test stand through the intertank. (MSFC Release 77-30)
JSC announced it had awarded a cost-plus-award-fee contract worth $12 million to Lockheed Electronics Co. for a third yr of site-support services to JSC's White Sands Test Facility at Las Cruces, N.M. Estimated total value of the 3yr contract was $24 million. (JSC Release 77-11)
NASA Administrator Dr. James C. Fletcher gave the agency's distinguished public service medal to United Nations Secretary General Kurt Waldheim, at a ceremony at the National Air and Space Museum. Dr. Waldheim received the award for outstanding leadership as chairman of the UN Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space from 1965 to 1968 and from 1970 to 1971, and for "enduring contributions to the development of a constructive international consensus, during the critical formative years, on the challenging issues presented by man's first uses of outer space." (Text of presentation)
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