Oct 26 1977
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(New page: NASA reported that the fifth and final free flight of the Shuttle orbiter Enterprise, testing its braking on a concrete runway, had successfully made a landing...)
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NASA reported that the fifth and final free flight of the Shuttle orbiter Enterprise, testing its braking on a concrete runway, had successfully made a landing on concrete at Edwards AFB-although it had a bumpy finale when the orbiter touched down and bounced twice before stopping.
At a postflight press conference, pilots Fred W. Haise and Charles Gordon Fullerton said the craft had reached speeds higher than expected after separating from its Boeing 747 carrier. Shortly after 8am local time the 747 had taken off with the orbiter attached to the top of its fuselage, climbing during the next 50 minutes to about 20 000ft altitude, where it nosed over and began to dive: At about 17 000ft the orbiter separated and came straight down without the turns made in previous flights; the dive angle was 25-22° compared with a commercial jetliner's descent slope of about 3°: Touchdown, which came I min 55sec after separation, overshot the 5000ft mark on the concrete runway by about 1000ft. The rear landing gear had touched, but the craft hopped back into the air, bounced, and tipped slightly before the pilots steadied it and stopped it with 2000ft of runway remaining: Approach speed had reached 330mph on the indicators, and the pilots described "oddities in the way the speed dropped" during the descent.
Donald K. Slayton, in charge of the landing tests, said engineers this week would check out the airspeed indicators and the vehicle's calculated energy profile, but further tests were not probable. Plans for future orbiter landings would change on the basis of data from the fifth test, modifying the aim point to allow for higher lift/drag coefficients with the tailcone off and the slower bleed-off of airspeed. (NASA Release 77-224; postflt rept free flight 5, SpSh orbiter ALT NYT, Oct 27/77, A-18; LA Times, Oct 27/77, 2; W Post, Oct 27/77, A10, B-3; JSC Roundup, Oct 28/77, 1; Av Wk, Oct 31/77, 16)
NASA Administrator Dr. Robert A. Frosch announced reorganization of the agency effective Nov. 8 "to strengthen NASA organization and improve our effectiveness ... we will reduce the number of staff offices reporting directly to the Administrator." Headquarters operations would consist of 3 functions: the office of the Administrator, for general management; the chief scientist, chief engineer, and 5 program offices for program planning, management, and review; and 8 staff offices to give program, staff, and functional support. Each of the 5 program offices would have an associate administrator to manage aeronautics and space technology; space sciences; space and terrestrial applications (formerly applications); space transportation systems (formerly space flight); and space tracking and data systems (formerly tracking and data acquisition). (NASA Release 77-228)
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