Oct 25 1966
From The Space Library
Propellant tank rupture occurred on Apollo spacecraft 017 Service Module during proof pressure test at 240 psi conducted by NAA at Downey, Calif.; in flight operating pressure would be 180 psi. No test personnel were injured. NASA had established board of inquiry to investigate. (NASA Release 66-285; NAA S&ID Skywriter, 10/28/66, 4; AP, Wash. Eve. Star, 10/28/66, D18)
U.K.'s Jodrell Bank Experimental Station reported that U.S.S.R.'s LUNA XII spacecraft had apparently entered orbit around moon and was transmitting telemetry but no photographic signals. U.S.S.R. had made no official statement since Oct. 22 launch. (UPI, NYT, 10/26/66, 10; Wash. Post, 10/26/66, A16)
NASA Aerobee 150 and Nike-Cajun sounding rockets launched 35 min. apart from WSMR reached 116-mi. (186-km.) and 74-mi. (119-km.) altitudes in GSFC-ESSA Institute for Telecommunication Sciences and Aeronomy experiment. Aerobee rocket and instrumentation, designed to measure micrometeoroid and cosmic dust impacts and electron densities, performed satisfactorily. Although Nike-Cajun did not reach predicted altitude and two of seven experiments to obtain data on ionospheric D-region did not function properly, satisfactory results were obtained. (NASA Rpt. SRL)
MSFC had awarded Univ. of Wisconsin a $679,101 contract to develop sensors for galactic x-ray mapping experiment to be flown on an Uprated Saturn I (Saturn I-B) launch vehicle in 1968. Sensors would explore x-ray sources other than sun and Crab Nebula. (MSFC Release 66-258)
Potential for application of biomedical knowledge acquired in space research was discussed by Dr. Richard L. Lesher, NASA Assistant Administrator for Technology Utilization, at the Conference on Biomedical Knowledge, Oklahoma City. He described two experimental efforts conducted by NASA's technology utilization program : (1) an agreement with Vocational Rehabilitation Administration to make available information from aerospace research to solve `problems of restoring the disabled to productive life," and (2) interdisciplinary biomedical application teams at research centers under NASA contract to define medical problems and identify aerospace technology applicable to their solution. (Text)
British Research Council had offered to pay one half the $11.2 million cost of constructing a 150-in. telescope in Australia, largest in Southern Hemisphere. Similar offer from Univ. of California was pending before Australian Government. (NYT, 10/26/66, 1)
October 25-28: 75th anniversary convocation, "Scientific Progress and Human Values," was held at Cal Tech. Dr. Lee A. DuBridge in welcoming address noted meeting represented "a time for self appraisal. . . . We at Cal Tech are seriously seeking to take a hard look at ourselves, at the world of science and technology of which we are part, and at the world of human beings who may either benefit or possibly suffer from what we do." NASA Associate Administrator for Manned Space Flight Dr. George E. Mueller said that "through the creative use of the capabilities that we are building up, space may . . . be used as one of many approaches to alleviate" problems of "famine, disease, over-population, and the need for more and better education" facing developing nations. Dreams of eventual space travel were "pure fantasy," according to Cal Tech astronautics professor Dr. Jesse L. Greenstein. He urged, however, that a greater portion of national expenditures be devoted to achieving interstellar communications-a task that "may ultimately become the greatest scientific adventure." Dr. Robert P. Sharp, professor of geology at Cal Tech, noted that although "earth scientists" were playing important role in national space program, it was also important that they "look downward into our own planet. . . . Our understanding of these distant bodies will depend to a good degree upon how well we understand our own plain earth." Likelihood that revolutionary improvement in communication on earth would transform society was suggested by John R. Pierce, research director of Bell Telephone Labs. Communications Sciences Div. Satellites would greatly expand potential of backward countries and would help build a sense of national identity in underdeveloped areas. "Technology is moving faster than our ability to assimilate it," scientist and industrialist Dr. Simon Ramo postulated. Dr. Ramo urged development of new class of men called "socio-technologists" who could "effectively link scientific developments with social betterment." Dr. Murray Gell-Mann, professor of theoretical physics at Cal Tech, said society must give new direction to technology, diverting it from applications that yield higher productive efficiency into areas that yielded greater human satisfaction. A symbol of this sort of change would occur when man no longer wanted to channel resources into "building bigger, noisier aircraft" or when society decided to divert a new highway around a virgin forest rather than build through it. (Texts; Bart, NYT, 10/26/66, 23; Duscha, Wash. Post, 10/26/66, A9; NYT, 10/30/66, 52)
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