Dec 16 1994
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NASA announced the selection of Boeing Information Systems, Inc., Vienna, Virginia, for a contract to provide information resources and management support services to NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC. (NASA Release C94-ll)
A Youth Science Symposium, "Your Place in Space," drew 400 middle school students to the California Museum of Science and Industry. Randii Wessen, a science systems engineer with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, was an instructor in one of the space-age exercises. Other students launched rockets and learned the fundamentals of comets and rockets. (LA Times, Dec 16/94)
NASA officials indicated that details of scientific evidence supporting the theory that man-made chlorine was causing the ozone hole above Antarctica would be released on December 19. The evidence was based on three years of data from NASA's Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS). UARS instruments had found chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) used in electronics and refrigeration systems in the stratosphere. The stratospheric ozone layer was responsible for protecting people, animals, and plants from too much ultraviolet sunlight. (Reuters, Dec 16/94; W Post, Dec 17/94; NASA Release 94-215; UP, Dec 19/94; Reuters, Dec 19/94; LA Times, Dec 20/94; NY Times, Dec 20/94; W Post, Dec 20/94; W Times, Dec 20/94; USA Today, Dec 20/94; WSJ, Dec 20/94; 0 Sen Star, Dec 20/94; Fla Today, Dec 20/94; H Chron, Dec 20/94; H Post, Dec 20/94; C Trib, Dec 20/94; AP, Dec 20/94)
One of the six ball-screw housings, the $95 million Russian docking system shock absorber, failed its test and the Russian builder wished to replace all six. This might delay the June 8, 1995 launch of Shuttle Atlantis to dock with Russian Space Station Mir. (0 Sen Star, Dec 15/94)
U.S. Vice President Al Gore and Russian Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin signed a number of cooperation agreements in Moscow. The agreements included one to conduct joint space research to gather data on the Earth's atmosphere and to cooperate on the International Space Station. According to Yuriy Koptev, director of the Russian Space Agency, the agreement with NASA concerning the Earth's atmosphere provided for U.S. instruments for measuring the ozone layer and atmospheric components to be installed on Russian Meteor-3 satellites scheduled to be launched in 1996 and 1999. Agreement was also reached on a joint program of biological experiments under which two Russian Bion satellites with U.S. equipment were to be launched. Gore and Chernomyrdin also signed a customs agreement providing for duty-free clearance of goods shipped to Russia for cooperation in space, which would remove barriers causing delays in the Space Station program.
Also among the agreements was one concerning space medical research. In that connection, Amauld Nicogossian, NASA's Washington-based chief medical officer, said the space agencies of the two countries planned to spend about three months working out details. NASA proposed to offer $500,000 in equipment, materials, and money to enable the Russians to establish a Space Biomedical Center for Training and Research near the Moscow State University and Russia's Institute of Biomedical Problems. Russia would be expected to contribute a similar amount. The U.S. counterpart to the Russian training and research center would be at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, where officials planned to establish a similar alliance of university and commercial medical research institutions. (Reuters, Dec 16/94; UP, Dec 16/94; Interfax news agency, Dec 16/94 quoted in BBC Summary of World Broadcasts, Dec 19/94; Phillips Business Information, Dec 19/94; Phillips Business Information, Dec 22/94; H Chron, Dec 23/94)
NASA was preparing three rendezvous with Russian Space Station Mir to launch the new cooperative effort between Washington and Moscow. In the first, scheduled for February 1995, Shuttle Discovery would simulate docking with Mir but not in fact touch it. In June 1995, Shuttle Atlantis would actually dock with Mir and remain together for four days, ultimately taking aboard U.S. astronaut Norm Thagard who would have joined Mir in March. In October 1995, Atlantis would be outfitted with an Orbiter Docking System that would be installed on the Space Station to facilitate future rendezvous. (AFP, Dec 16/94)
Larry DeLucas, recently appointed chief scientist of the NASA Space Station project, said the Station provided the next step for businesses such as pharmaceutical companies that were trying to develop new and improved products such as high quality crystals, uninhibited by the Earth's gravitation-al environment. (Phillips Business Information, Dec 22/94)
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