May 8 2001
From The Space Library
The American geosynchronous relay satellite XM 1, often referred to as Roll, launched into space aboard a Russian Zenit rocket, from a floating launchpad in the Pacific Ocean. The launch of Roll followed on the heels of the March 2001 delivery to space of XM 2, known as Rock. With both Rock and Roll in orbit, XM Satellite Radio became available to subscribing listeners in the United States. The president of the company XM Satellite Radio, based in Washington, DC, called Rock and Roll the “newest power couple” in Washington, DC, declaring that his firm was ready to compete with Sirius Radio for subscribers. Boeing Satellite Systems had designed and built the satellites. (The Boeing Company, “Sea Launch on a Mission To Launch XM’s ‘Roll’ Satellite,” 1 May 2001, http://www.boeing. com/news/releases/2001/q2/news_release_010501s.html (accessed 28 January 2010); Spacewarn Bulletin, no. 571, 1 June 2001, http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/spacewarn/spx571.html (accessed 28 July 2008); Jim Banke, “Sea Launch Sends ‘Roll’ Spacecraft into Orbit for XM Satellite Radio,” Space.com, 8 May 2001, http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/launches/zenit_launch_010508.html (accessed 28 July 2008)
NASA collaborated with George Washington University’s Space Policy Institute to host a symposium commemorating 40 years of human spaceflight, an era that had dawned with Alan B. Shepard Jr.’s 15-minute suborbital flight on 5 May 1961. NASA Administrator Daniel S. Goldin opened the conference, followed at the speaker’s podium by astronauts and space experts. The conference, “Looking Backward, Looking Forward,” provided a valuable forum, not only for discussing the accomplishments of the United States’ space program, but also for considering space exploration’s possible future evolution. (NASA, “NASA Conference To Commemorate 40 Years of Human Space Flight,” news release N01-28, 1 May 2001; NASA and Space Policy Institute, “Looking Backward, Looking Forward: Forty Years of U.S. Human Spaceflight,” (program, symposium organized by Space Policy Institute, Elliott School of International Affairs, George Washington University, in collaboration with NASA History Office, NASA Office of Policy and Plans, American Astronautical Society, and National Space Society, Washington, DC, 8 May 2001), http://history.nasa.gov/40hsconf.pdf (accessed 29 July 2008)
NASA announced a partnership with John Deere and Company of Moline, Illinois, to allow farmers to use NASA’s global positioning technology to navigate their fields and monitor their soil. Using a system developed at NASA’s JPL, farmers would be able to access GPS data to locate points as small as 4 inches (10 centimeters) wide. Specifically, according to the agreement, NASA and John Deere’s NavCom Technology Inc. had created a partnership to explore further the uses of GPS in farming. Scientists in NASA’s Earth Science Enterprise believed that GPS might prove especially useful in the area of natural hazard monitoring, providing farmers with images of their land in the event of a tornado, fire, or other disaster. The pathbreaking agreement resulted from the activities of the Commercial Technology Office at JPL, which focused on exploring new ways that technologies developed by American space programs could benefit other American industries. (NASA, “NASA Satellite Technology Goes Down on the Farm,” news release 01-62, 8 May 2001.)
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