Jun 27 1994
From The Space Library
In an interview with NASA Administrator Daniel S. Goldin concerning dangers to the proposed Space Station from man-made space junk, he said the danger of debris smashing through the Station shield was 20 percent over its expected 10-year life and that NASA would do whatever was necessary to get adequate safety. Because of the lengthy period the Space Station was scheduled to spend in space, the danger was greater than for a single Shuttle flight. William M. Shepherd, Deputy Manager for the Johnson Space Center in Houston, said that each module for astronauts was getting about 3,000 pounds of added shielding to help protect it from the greater velocity of orbiting junk. Goldin asserted that an international agreement for controlling the contamination of space was needed to deal with the situation. (NY Times, Jun 27/94; USA Today, Jun 27/94; C Trib, Jun 27/94; Fla Today, Jun 28/94)
NASA announced that the Ulysses spacecraft had become the first robotic exploration vehicle in history to reach a polar region of the Sun when it passed over the Sun's southern polar area June 26 after a journey of almost four years from Earth. The European Space Agency built Ulysses, and Space Shuttle Discovery deployed it in October 1990. In February 1992, Ulysses spent nearly 11 days exploring unknown regions of Jupiter before it gained enough momentum to loop into an orbit that passed over the poles of the Sun. The Sun has a global magnetic field and magnetic poles, but many details concerning the polar caps and magnetic fields, including the influence of incoming cosmic rays, remain unclear. (NASA Release 94-104; Fla Today, Jun 29/94)
An unmanned DC-X (Delta Clipper Experimental) rocket made an emergency landing at the White Sands Missile Range following a mysterious explosion soon after its engines started. The Ballistic Missile Defense Organization developed the missile, and McDonnell Douglas Corporation manufactured it. The flight was the fifth for the unusual rocket, which was made to take off and land vertically. The DC-X was grounded in the fall of 1993 when the project ran out of money. However, NASA came up with enough funds to keep the program going until Congress appropriated $5 million to complete its flight test program. Ultimately, the rocket was to be turned over to NASA. (NY Times, Jun 28/94)
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