Mar 6 1986
From The Space Library
Several of the more than 30 U.S. scientists serving as coinvestigators on the European Space Agency's Giotto mission were members of the television team scheduled to analyze and televise images of Halley’s Comet from the spacecraft on March 13. Launched in July 1985, the Giotto was one of five spacecraft (others were the Soviet Union's Vega 1 and 2 and Japan's Suisei and Sakigake) headed for an encounter with the comet. In position 300 miles from Comet Halley's nucleus, the Giotto promised to obtain the highest resolution imaging. (NASA Release 86-23)
Rear Admiral Richard H. Truly, Associate Administrator for Space Flight, announced assignments to the NASA 51-L Data and Design Analysis Task Force. The task force was to collect and analyze information to support a thorough review of all aspects and potential causes of the Challenger accident. (NASA Release 86-24)
NASA announced that U.S. scientists would have the opportunity to participate with the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS) of Japan in the High Energy Solar Physics program. The goal of the mission was to better understand high energy phenomena on the Sun through x-ray and gamma ray observation instruments carried on a spacecraft. (NASA Release 86-25)
NASA officials provided investigators with new evidence challenging the theory that the Challenger accident was triggered by failed rocket seals caused by cold weather. They presented pre-launch photographs showing a flaw in the suspected o-ring on the right side booster, a possible correlation to the fact that workers assembling the booster were hampered with a misshaped rocket segment. New tests on the o-rings conducted at Morton Thiokol's plant demonstrated that they sealed properly to temperatures at 10 degrees below zero. Also, the Challenger, according to meteorologist Irving P. Krick, sustained wind shear of 125 to 150 miles per hour just prior to the accident, which would have been similar to "flying into a tornado." (W Post, Mar 7/86)
The Soviet Union's Vega 1 spacecraft sent back pictures of Halley’s Comet as it passed within 5,500 miles of its nucleus. The photographs, displayed on screens at a Soviet Space Center, were viewed by scientists from around the world and brought the scientific community together behind the Iron Curtain. A host of new data such as the possibility that the Comet contains two nuclei, that the core is three or four miles across, and evidence bolstering the idea that the Comet is leftover debris from the solar system's creation some 4.6 billion years ago was revealed. The presentation also gave American scientists a chance to study Halley’s Comet; the United States launched no spacecraft for that purpose. The Soviet's second probe, Vega II, passed 5,125 miles from the comet's core on March 9. (FBIS, Tass (Eng trans), Mar 7/86; NY Times, Mar 7/86; W Post, Mar 7/86; W Times, Mar 7/86; B Sun, Mar 7/86; C Trib, Mar 7/86; Mar 10/76; CSM, Mar 7/86; March 10/86)
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