Jan 7 1972
From The Space Library
Launch of Apollo 16 manned lunar landing mission, scheduled for March 17, was postponed by NASA because of problems with suit fitting, lunar module (LM) battery, and command module (CM) docking-ring jettison device. Apollo 16 would be launched April 16-with LM landing on moon April 20 and lifting off moon April 23-and would return to earth April 28. (NASA Release 72-8; AP, B Sun, 1/8/72, A5)
Dr. Robert C. Seamans, Jr., Secretary of the Air Force, issued statement in Washington, D.C., on President Nixon's Jan. 5 decision to proceed with development of space shuttle. Decision "initiates a program which holds great promise for scientific and technological advances in the interests of the nation and all mankind. We are also interested in its potential as a means for performing our military mission more efficiently and economically. The Air Force role in the program is to provide NASA data to help assure that the Shuttle will be of maximum utility to the DOD and we are pleased that the proposed vehicle is configured to meet potential DoD needs. We will continue our close coordination with NASA as their development program proceeds." (Text)
Space shuttle concept endorsed by President Nixon made it "all but certain" that Kennedy Space Center would be selected for shuttle's launch site, New York Times said. Space experts seemed to feel that only by "converting the assembly buildings, launching pads and communications center" at KSC "would it be possible to develop a shuttle port for $300 million." (NYT, 1/7/72, 7)
Newspaper editorials commented on decision to develop space shuttle. Kansas City Star: "The next great step in space for the United States seems assured. President Nixon has pressed the go-ahead button and apparently it will be largely a matter of adequate funding by Congress. In view of the record of space accomplishments, there is not much doubt that the planned space shuttle program will be fruitful both from the standpoint of technological success and long- range scientific benefits." (KC Star, 1/7/72)
St. Louis Globe-Democrat: "There are so many potentialities for the shuttle that it is bard to envision all of them. But there is no doubt that if it is completed space travel for the average citizen may become a distinct possibility in the 1980s." (St Louis G-D, 1/7/72)
Christian Science Monitor said "space discovery versus human needs argument should not be seen as an either/or issue. This is so even leaving aside the jobs creation or economic return arguments." Monitor believed that "a space shuttle program, because it is so practically linked to fulfilling man's age-old vision of mastering the heavens, will unleash more constructive human energy than it will consume. And this excess will make meeting earthside demands the easier." (CSM, 1/7/72)
Atlanta Journal Constitution: "The program . . . has the almost immediate benefit of employing some 50,000 highly trained aerospace workers who have faced a dismal job picture as the Apollo program has phased out. And, again, the proposal demonstrates that imagination and vision and a willingness to dare are still part of the American way of doing things." (Atlanta JC, 1/7/72)
Milwaukee Journal: "The shuttle offers the opportunity to make space flight fairly routine, of taking large numbers of people and supplies in and out of space, of manning earth resource space stations continuously, of monitoring and repairing communications and re-source satellites. It is a worthwhile program." (MI, 1/7/72)
Los Angeles Times said military aspect of space shuttle needed clarification. "Most taxpayers welcomed the decision to end the wasteful competition between NASA and the Air Force on the shuttle and orbiting space station." NASA had not explained how shuttle's civil and military functions would be kept separate. "No American wants the Soviet Union to tip the balance of power with its own space program. But it might help avert a new confrontation if the military applications were enumerated along with a statement of whether the American government thinks shuttles are bound by the international agreement barring nuclear weapons from outer space." (LA Times, 1/7/72)
Seattle Times: "The history of warfare shows that victory usually goes to the one who occupies the high ground. Near-earth space is the `high ground' of modern military planning. In approving a full go- ahead for ... space shuttle program, President Nixon this week served notice that this nation intends to occupy the `high ground.' " (Seattle Times, 1/7/72)
Half-hour documentary film "The Worlds of von Braun" was televised by WMAL-TV in Washington, D.C. Documentary, filmed at NASA Wallops Station, included footage never before televised, from NASA, U.S.S.R., and moon. In film, Dr. Wernher von Braun, NASA Deputy Associate Administrator for Planning, discussed his careers as World War II rocket expert and with NASA in interview with WMAL-TV Public Affairs Director James Clarke. Washington Post TV critic Victor Cohn said of film: "Wernher von Braun is a compelling man and a true believer . and the joy is that of seeing any man so thoroughly absorbed in a discipline that he absorbs you, even at the distant end of a TV tube." (NASA Special Ann, 1/4/72; W Post, 1/7/72, Bl)
U.S.S.R.'s Cosmos 463 (launched Dec. 6, 1971) and Cosmos 464 (launched Dec. 10, 1971) had been launched "in quick succession" to observe India-Pakistan war and had been brought down ahead of schedule in Soviet "rush to analyze the pictures," George C. Wilson said in Washington Post. "The rapid-fire space shots are fresh evidence that the era of open skies has arrived" even though neither U.S. nor U.S.S.R. openly acknowledged it. "Instead, both superpowers look down on the other from space, cameras rolling, and mobilize this new space tool for special missions in time of crisis.. . Some , . , specialists think that since both superpowers depend heavily on their satellites for information, there is now a form of mutual deterrence in space which will keep one side from attacking the other's satellites. However, there is widespread agreement that the United States has nothing to compare with the Soviets' satellite inspection ability." (W Post, 1/7/72, A16)
Lyudmila liquid-hydrogen chamber at joint nuclear research institute in Dubna, U.S.S.R., had been completed, Tass reported. Institute scientist Aleksander Baldin had said chamber would be used with world's largest nuclear accelerator at Serpukhov to study photo-birth of particles-crushing of one proton by high-energy protons. (FBIS- Sop, 1/10/72, Li )
San Francisco Examiner editorial praised U.S. Pay Board's veto of 12% wage increase for aerospace workers: "Even in its ailing state the aerospace industry has continued as a major American exporter. It has thus prevented the serious deficit in this country's balance of trade from becoming truly horrendous. But it holds no monopoly on aerospace technology. Unless it can maintain high productivity and competitive wage costs, foreign-made planes will become as common in our skies as foreign-made cars are on our highways." (SF Exam, 1/7/72)
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