Oct 16 1978
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(New page: NASA announced that, as of Oct. 1, it had transferred the USNS Vanguard, which had supported Apollo, Skylab, and Apollo Soyuz manned-spaceflight missions for 12yr and was last of an or...)
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NASA announced that, as of Oct. 1, it had transferred the USNS Vanguard, which had supported Apollo, Skylab, and Apollo Soyuz manned-spaceflight missions for 12yr and was last of an original 5-ship tracking and reentry-coverage flotilla, back to the U.S. Navy for navigation and ocean survey work. Vanguard, built by General Dynamics Corp.'s Quincy, Mass., shipyards and commissioned Oct. 15, 1966, had been the last of three identical ships (Mercury, Redstone, Vanguard) specifically designed for and dedicated to manned spaceflight support. The ships had demonstrated their versatility by supporting automated scientific-satellite missions and their extensive capabilities, functioning as well as any ground tracking station. The Mission Control Center at Houston had transmitted and received voice commands, biomedical data, spacecraft-environment reports, and command/control functions directly through the ship, which had formed part of a tracking network to ensure communications with spacecraft out of contact with land tracking stations. Space Tracking and Data Network (STDN) veterans estimated that fully half the Vanguard's NASA lifetime had been spent in a mission-support status, the rest being in port, yard repair, or transit time. (NASA Release 78-157)
ESA announced its Ots 2 satellite had successfully completed its first transmission tests of television programs beyond continental Europe. During a conference on "The Role of Space Technology for Development" in Cairo Oct. 7-12, ESA had demonstrated TV-signal transmission from the British Post Office's Goonhilly Downs station via Ots 2 to a transportable receiving station in Cairo. From Oct. 7 to 11, nearly 8hr of BBC-1 TV programs were transmitted directly from Britain to Egypt at a rate of about 1.5hr per day. Ferranti Microwave Division of Ferranti Electronics Ltd., in association with the U.K. Dept. of Industry, had developed the transportable station.
After 5mo of preliminary tests, the Ots 2 communications-test program had reached an operational level that would last at least 3yr, to prepare for subsequent exploitation of the operational European Communications Satellites (ECS) that would begin service in 1981. Tests had included telephone as well as TV routing and propagation experiments and new applications using much simpler terminals. Some 50 institutes, universities, and telecommunications entities would participate in the second category of tests, using more than 30 small terminals with 3m-diameter antennas. (ESA Release Oct 16/78)
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