Mar 23 1994
From The Space Library
NASA showed photographs taken by Galileo spacecraft revealing for the first time an asteroid orbited by its own moon. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory released the photos of asteroid Ida. (NASA Release 94-50; Reuters, Mar 23/94; P Inq, Mar 24/94; LA Times, Mar 24/94; W Post, Mar 24/94; USA Today, Mar 24/94; NY Times, Mar 24/94)
An independent safety review panel said NASA's Space Shuttle fleet urgently needed a safer fuel pump and feared that continued job cuts at Kennedy Space Center would endanger astronauts. The panel also advocated the need for more specific plans to avoid crashing into orbiting "space junk" as well as the need to finalize a quick-escape system for Space Station astronauts. (H Post, Mar 24/94)
A congressional report, based on a House Subcommittee on Space tour of the European and Russian space communities, said Europeans were tired of U.S. changes in the International Space Station project and uncertain about U.S. plans to take Russia in as a full partner. The report also expressed concern about how well Russia could support its part of the Space Station agreement. (AP, Mar 23/94)
NASA announced the signing of a memorandum of understanding with the Commission for Space Activities of the Federative Republic of Brazil (COBAE). The two parties were to conduct a sounding rocket campaign in Brazil from July through October 1994 to investigate the electrodynamics and irregularities in the ionosphere and mesosphere along the Earth's magnetic equator and study their relationship with the neutral atmosphere and winds. NASA was to launch, with the support of COBAE, 33 rockets from the new Brazilian launch range, Centro de Lancamentos de Alcantara in Maranhao. Brazilian scientific participation was to he coordinated by the Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas Espacials (INPE) and was to he named the Guara Campaign after a bird native to the equatorial region of Brazil. (NASA Release 94-51)
NASA announced the selection of 55 researchers to receive two-year grants to conduct microgravity research. Annual funding of each proposal was approximately $50,000, for an overall total of more than $5.6 million.
Proposals selected were 24 in fluid physics, 26 in materials science, and six in fundamental physics. The goal was to explore new ideas about the influence of gravity on physical and chemical processes that might improve Earth-based production methods and materials. (NASA Release 94-52)
NASA announced the completion of the International Space Station System Design Review. Using approximately 75 percent of Space Station Freedom hardware, the completed Station was to consist of U.S. elements, including the integrated truss, habitation module, and laboratory module; the Russian science power platform, service module, and functional cargo block vehicle (FGB); the European laboratory module; the Japanese Experiment Module and exposed facility; and the Canadian remote manipulator system. The assembly was to begin with launch of the FGB vehicle in November 1997. The U.S. contribution to the Station was estimated to cost $17.4 billion from fiscal year 1994 until assembly was complete in 2002. The ground system for the Station was to build on the Shuttle and Freedom programs. (NASA Release 94-53; USA Today, Mar 25/94; W Times, Mar 25/94; AP, Mar 25/94; Antelope Valley Press, Mar 26/94)
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) in its report faulted NASA's effort to fit a program projected in the late 1990s to cost more than $20 billion a year into an annual budget of $14 billion. The CBO said such effort risked delay and failure, and the CBO offered the alternative of grounding the astronauts and ending the Space Shuttle program. Specifically, the report proposed one of the following: ending costly piloted space flight, concentrating instead on robot aircraft and new technology for industry; emphasizing a robotic spacecraft and conducting only four instead of eight Space Shuttle flights a year; concentrating on piloted space flight, building the Space Station and planning for manned missions to the Moon and Mars, limiting robot missions to pathfinder projects for the Moon-Mars effort. NASA Administrator Daniel S. Goldin said NASA would not back away from the administration's balanced aeronautics and space program. He added that any of the three CBO alternatives would destroy that balance and that NASA could accomplish daring and difficult missions on a tight budget. (NASA Editor's Note N94-27; B Sun, Mar 25/94; W Times, Mar 25/94; P Inq, Mar 25/94; NY Times, Mar 25/94; 0 Sen Star, Mar 25/94; W Post, Mar 25/94; AP, Mar 25/94; LA Daily News, Mar 27/94; Federal Computer Week, Mar 28/94; 0 Sen Star, Mar 31/94)
James Sensenbrenner, Republican from Wisconsin, and ranking member of the House Space Subcommittee, wrote NASA Administrator Daniel S. Goldin requesting information about U.S. dependence on Russia, payments to the Russian government, cost constraints on the Space Station in view of NASA's tight budget, and financial agreements with Station international partners. He expressed reservations over the decision to move the Station to a higher orbital inclination at the Russian request and expressed the fear that the agreement with Russia was negotiated from a position of U.S. vulnerability because of budgetary limits. (Defense Daily, Apr 1/94)
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