Jul 1 1977
From The Space Library
NASA announced it would conduct sounding-rocket tests with the USSR Hydromet Service for 2wk in Aug. to compare U.S. and Soviet measurements of upper-air temperatures and detect discrepancies in their meteorological instruments. NASA would launch a series of rockets from Wallops Flight Center and the Hydromet representatives would launch rockets from the research ship Akademik Korolev off the U.S. east coast. Under a 1971 agreement on space sciences and applications, the two nations in 1972 had begun exchange of data that had shown the temperature field in the eastern hemisphere to be consistently colder than that of the western hemisphere. Both sides had evaluated their. rocket systems for sources of error; direct comparisons made in 973 at Kourou, French Guiana, had again shown discrepancies in temperature and wind data. Improvements in instruments and techniques since 1973 had made further comparisons necessary, NASA said. (NASA Release 77-133)
Kennedy Space Center announced it would host for the second consecutive yr a gathering of more than 85 meteorologists and atmospheric physicists for TRIP 77 (Thunderstorm Research Intl. Program 1977), including 21 principal investigators and their associates, continuing their studies of lightning and thunderstorms and the hazards resulting from them. The 1976 program had yielded much data on electrical charges within and between clouds and from clouds to earth's surface. (KSC Release 127-77)
Marshall Space Flight Center announced it had resumed the atmospheric variability experiments (AVE) begun in 1964 to study processes associated with the onset and development of severe storms. Originally conducted to aid in scheduling Saturn rocket firings at MSFC, the experiments were designed to detect unusual weather conditions common to different localities before severe storms occurred, to improve short-term predictions based on data from weather balloons, weather satellites, and ground-observation posts. Sixth of the AVE series recently conducted over 24hr in an area including Texas, Alabama, Illinois, and North Dakota had monitored severe storms with hail and tornadoes in Missouri and western Tennessee, and a frontal system with low-pressure disturbances in Alabama. (MSFC Release 77-122)
KSC announced it had awarded a $480 193 fixed-price contract to Reynolds, Smith and Hills of Jacksonville, Fla., for modifications to Complex 39B to adapt it for Shuttle launch operations as had been done to Complex 39A: KSC had used 39B to launch Apollo 10; Skylabs 2, 3, and 4; and the U.S. spacecraft of the Apollo-Soyuz mission. (KSC Release 125-77)
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