Nov 21 1977
From The Space Library
NASA announced that the next launch of an Atlas Centaur rocket from KSC would be no earlier than Jan. 6, 1978, carrying an INTELSAT IVA commercial comsat. Originally scheduled for launch in Nov., the mission was first delayed for investigation of a previous Atlas Centaur launch that failed Sept. 29. That investigation was almost complete; the associate administrator for transportation systems, John Yardley, was to receive a report in early Dec. The postponement to Jan. was not caused by the investigation, NASA said, but by discovery of faulty feedback transducers in the Atlas engine-control actuators during routine testing. The new date would allow removal and replacement of components from that manufacturing batch and revalidation of the engine systems. (NASA Release 77-241)
NASA announced tentative selection of 18 scientists to participate in the Space Telescope project. The 10-ton spacecraft scheduled for Shuttle launch in 1983 to orbit at 500km (310mi) altitude would make observations deeper into space, and with more detail, than heretofore possible, covering about 350 times the volume of space now visible from earthbased telescopes. It had been designed for remote operation from the ground, including maintenance or retrieval by a space-suited astronaut for return to earth to be overhauled and relaunched. The telescope could accommodate 5 different instruments at its focal plane: both the faint object camera (ESA) and the wide-field camera could cover ultraviolet and blue spectra, the latter the red and near-infrared regions as well; the two spectrographs would offer a range of resolution impossible with a single instrument; and the photometer could calibrate the other instrument and image the galactic background. (NASA Release 77-239)
NASA announced that on Nov. 29 it would present first results of the scientific experiments on high-energy astronomy observatory HEAO 1 launched Aug. 12. Dr. Noel Hinners, associate administrator for space science; Dr. Frank B. McDonald of Goddard Space Flight Center, project scientist; and principal investigators for the experiments would report findings on pulsars, quasars, exploding galaxies, and black holes. Scientific instruments on the observatory offered highly sensitive detection and resolution of x-rays emitted by stellar sources throughout the universe; the spacecraft, rotating end over end, could survey the entire sky within 6mo. (NASA Release 77-242)
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