Sep 24 1963

From The Space Library

Subcommittee of House Committee on Appropriations voted to approve $5.1 billion appropriations bill for NASA in FY 1964, $250,820,400 less than NASA authorizations bill. Rep. Olin E. Teague (D.-Tex.), Chairman of Manned Space Flight Sub­committee of House Committee on Science and Astronautics, Said President, Kennedy's proposal for U.S.-U.S.S.R. manned lunar flight was "bound to hurt." chances of full appropriations being passed by House and criticized idea of joint project as imprac­tical. (Finney, NYT, 9/25/63,1,15)

First public Showing of guidance and navigation system for Apollo manned space flights, the briefing conducted at. MIT's Instrumen­tation Laboratory, in charge of A he system design and develop­ment for NASA. (NYT. 9/25/63; Wash. Eve. Star, 9/25/63)

AFSSD briefed prospective bidders on two-phase program definition of a standardized Space guidance system (SSGS), aimed at develop­ing single system capable of providing guidance and control for launch vehicle, for orbital injection, and for actual Spacecraft mission performance. Phase One would study various missions and analyze hardware requirements; Phase Two would investi­gate means to develop hardware based on Phase One concepts. (M&R, 9/9/63,16; M&R, 9/30/63,18)

After lengthy debate, Senate voted (80-19) to ratify nuclear test­ ban treaty, initialed by U.S., U.K., and U.S.S.R. on July 25 in Moscow and prohibiting nuclear tests in the atmosphere, in space, and under water. (CR, 9/24/63,16909)

In his Washington Post column, Walter Lippmann said "The President has made his suggestion of collaboration in going to the moon at a time when there is some improvement in U.S.S.R.-U.S.A. relations. It happens also to be a time when there is a grow doubt among American scientists and among the people generally about the commitment to put an American man on the moon by the year 1970. "The President's proposal at the U.N. is, it seems to me, ex­cellent even if the joint effort proves to be technically and polit­ically impracticable. It is excellent because it may offer an hon­orable way to correct the mistakes of our original commitments about going to the moon. "There were two big mistakes. One was the commitment to put a man, a living person rather than instruments, on the moon. The other mistake was to set a deadline-1970-when the man was to land on the moon . . . " (Wash. Post, 9/24/63)

Senate passed (77-0) Defense appropriations bill for FY 1964, totaling $47,339,707,000. This was $258 million more than passed by House and $1.4 billion less than Administration request. Bills would be sent to conference committee for compromise. (CR, 9/24/63,16972; NYT, 9/25/63,1)

At International Atomic Energy Agency conference in Vienna, AEC Chairman Dr. Glenn T. Seaborg said agricultural and indus­trial applications of radioactive isotopes in U.S. had approximately doubled in past five years and that "we look for perhaps an increased trend in the next five years." (Underwood, NYT, 9/25/63,14)

U.S. Army conducted successful test-firing of Pershing ballistic missile from Black Mesa, Utah, to impact point within White Sands Missile Range. N.M. Test was part of current overland series conducted under near-tactical conditions. (DOD Release 1282-63)

DOD launched unidentified satellite from PMR employing Thor-Agena D launch vehicle. (Pies. Rpt. on Space, 1963, 1/27/64)

• September

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