Dec 2 1982
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(New page: NASA investigators of the failure of $2-million space suits on STS-5 issued an interim report blaming two missing parts and a faulty sensor. During the mission on Shuttle Columbia...)
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NASA investigators of the failure of $2-million space suits on STS-5 issued an interim report blaming two missing parts and a faulty sensor.
During the mission on Shuttle Columbia, an oxygen device in astronaut William Lenoir's suit failed to provide required pressure, and the fan in astronaut Joseph Allen's suit and portable life-support system would not operate. JSC program Operations Manager Richard A. Colonna, who headed the team, said that two vital plastic parts the size of a matchstick, worth less than a nickel apiece, that several to hold a pair of screws against a metal piece in Lenoir's suit, had been removed for a test last August and were never put back. Documentation indicated that the parts were in place, and during repeated tests, technicians failed to spot their absence.
The team said that the fan failed because a tiny magnetic sensor no bigger than a pinhead apparently gave way just after Allen put on his space suit. The motor running the fan and pumping water through the suit used the sensors, instead of the magnetic brushes used in most motors, because of the danger of a spark igniting the pure oxygen circulating inside the spacesuit.
Colonna said that the team would continue its investigation. He expected it to recommend further and more frequent testing and quality-control inspections by the manufacturer, Hamilton Standard, during space suit production and at JSC and KSC. (NASA Release 82-181; W Post, Dec 2/82, A-1)
Speaking to an audience of U.S. and Brazilian businessmen in the governor's palace at Sao Paulo, Brazil, President Reagan proposed that "a Brazilian astronaut train with ours so that Brazil and the United States can one day participate in a shuttle launch together as partners in space." George P. Shultz, U.S. secretary of state, told newsmen on Air Force One that Brazil's president Joao Figueiredo, hearing of Reagan's proposal, said "That's wonderful, and I know just who the first astronaut is going to be, Me" Brazilian officials. said that Reagan had initiated a welcome new climate in U.S. relations with Brazil but said that the closer ties were more a matter of potential than reality. (Text, Dec 2/82; W Post, Dec 3/82, A-1)
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