Apr 3 1973
From The Space Library
Dr. John S. Foster, Jr., Director of Defense Research and Engineering in the Dept. of Defense, testified that DOD space shuttle efforts were being expanded, during NASA FY 1974 authorization hearings before the Senate Committee on Aeronautical and Space Sciences. A program memorandum on DOD shuttle use, to be coordinated with NASA, would include plans for early entry into the shuttle program, identify key DOD planning milestones, and treat funding and management issues. DOD would "place increased emphasis on new concepts of payload design and operation . . . essential to achieving the Shuttle's full potential for more effective, less costly space operations." Goals of DOD planning and coordination were to ensure that NASA knew and understood DOD needs so that the shuttle would be of maximum utility to DOD, to provide data essential to integrated planning and support decisions on future shuttle use, to explore ways to benefit most from the shuttle's unique capabilities, and to coordinate DOD shuttle activities with NASA to the best possible use of both agencies. The DOD Shuttle User Committee had been established as "a focal point for our broad and varied interests in the future military use of space." The Committee, under Air Force chairmanship, included representatives of other military departments and the Joint Chiefs of Staff; NASA would be invited to provide an observer. The Committee would guide studies of payloads and missions, explore the transition from launching DOD payloads with expendable vehicles to using the shuttle, and possibly would identify experimental DOD payloads to be carried on shuttle research and development flights for NASA.
DOD's FY 1974 space program budget request of $1.6 million, $205 million more than in FY 1973, would reduce the vulnerability of the Transit navigation satellite system; procure spacecraft and boosters for the Fleet Satellite Communications (FLTSATCOM) System and the Defense Satellite Communications System (DSCS) ; cover research and development costs of early-warning general support; and increase supporting R&D for the space test program, for advanced surveillance technology for earth-limb-measurement satellites, and for a joint-service navigation satellite experiment. FY 1974 funding for procurement of early-warning satellites and boosters had been reduced. (Transcript)
NASA Deputy Associate Administrator for Space Science Vincent L. Johnson testified on NASA's balloon program as the House Committee on Science and Astronautics' Subcommittee on Space Science and Applications concluded FY 1974 authorization hearings: "Balloons are used for a variety of programs in both atmospheric science and astronomy. We, in many cases, launch with a balloon a prototype of an astronomical instrument which we may later fly on a sounding rocket or orbiting satellite." Payloads ranged from test instruments to an infrared experiment; "as you get above the water vapor in the atmosphere you can do very good infrared experiments, and you can keep the instrument pointed precisely for quite long periods . . and do very valuable scientific work at nominal cost." Balloons were launched from Texas, South Dakota, Missouri, and Alabama in the U.S., and from Canada, Australia, and Argentina. "One of the beauties of the balloon program is that they can be launched from many areas, and we can recover the payloads. . . . We use the same payload many times for balloon observations, and it's not at all unusual to use the same payload for half a dozen flights with sometimes slightly different instrumentation each time.” (Transcript)
U.S. Geological Survey geologist Dr. Peter D. Rowley said in Denver, Colo., that results of a three-month field trip in Antarctica had backed the theory of a continental drift occurring over hundreds of millions of years. The field work, ending in January, had shown that mountains on the Antarctic peninsula's Lassiter Coast and adjacent areas were "missing pieces that can link the great mountain chains of the world." Rock samples taken by his team were 65 million to 135 million yrs old and had been pushed above the ocean's surface by upheavals that occurred when the earth's crust cooled. (UPI, LA Her-Exam, 4/4/73)
NASA launched a Black Brant VC sounding rocket from White Sands Missile Range carrying a Naval Research Laboratory payload to a 245.3-km (152.4-mi) altitude to evaluate instrumentation for the calibration rocket (CALROC) series to be launched in support of the manned Skylab missions [see Jan. 22]. The rocket performed satisfactorily but minimum data were acquired from the instrumentation. (GSFC proj off)
April 3-May 28: The U.S.S.R. launched unmanned Salyut 2 scientific space station from Baykonur Cosmodrome into orbit with 260-km (161.6-mi) apogee, 215-km (133.6-mi) perigee, 89-min period, and 51.6° inclination. The Soviet news agency Tass announced objectives were to perfect design, onboard systems, and equipment and to conduct scientific and technical experiments in space flight. Tass said systems were functioning normally.
Western observers speculated that a manned spacecraft would be launched to dock with Salyut 2 and establish a manned orbital workshop, resuming Soviet manned space flight after a two-year hiatus. The large Soviet tracking ships Gagarin and Komarov had been sighted in March moving from the Black Sea toward positions in the Atlantic Ocean.
On April 11 Tass confirmed earlier U.S. press reports that Salyut 2 had been maneuvered into a higher orbit. April 4 and 8 maneuvers had raised it to a 296-km (183.9-mi) apogee and 261-km (162.2-mi) perigee, with an 89.8-min period and a 51.6° inclination. Stable radio communication was being maintained and the "improved design of onboard systems and instruments" was being tested. Tass said systems and instruments were functioning normally. The new orbit, out of normal range of a manned Soyuz spacecraft, indicated to some observers a holding orbit because of delay in launching cosmonauts to join the station. Tracking data showed an increase in the number of fragments following the spacecraft after April 14. By the end of the month Goddard Space Flight Center listed 27 objects, of which 25 had reentered the atmosphere.
On April 18 Moscow sources said the U.S.S.R. had no plans for a manned flight to link with the space station and that Salyut 2 was carrying out experiments in connection with the joint U.S.-U.S.S.R. Apollo-Soyuz mission planned for 1975. Earlier Maj. Gen. Vladimir A. Shatalov, chief of the cosmonaut training project, had said Salyut laboratories could gather information for weather forecasting, geology, transport, communications, agriculture, and environmental protection without mentioning manned flight. By April 25 U.S. observers suspected that an April 14 failure, possibly an explosion or a wildly firing thruster, had sent the station tumbling end over end, tearing off the four solar panels and damaging the compartment, making cosmonaut manning of the station impossible. Radio signals from Salyut 2 were reported to have ceased. On April 28 Tass reported that Salyut 2 had "concluded the programme of flight" and that the data obtained in the experiments confirmed "the correctness of design and structural decisions and the properties chosen for the main systems and on-board equipment of the station. These data will be used in building a new spacecraft." The spacecraft reentered May 28.
Salyut 1, the world's first experimental orbiting workshop, had been launched April 19, 1971. A three-man crew-launched aboard Soyuz 10 April 23, 1971-had docked with Salyut I but did not board, returning to earth after two days in space. Three more cosmonauts-launched on Soyuz 11 June 6, 1971-docked, boarded the station, and conducted scientific experiments for 23 days. During their return to earth in Soyuz 11 June 30, they died after a valve accidentally opened and evacuated the air from the spacecraft compartment. A second Salyut was believed by Western observers to have been launched in July 1972 without achieving orbit. (GSFC SR: 4/30/73; 5/23/73. Un Gen Assembly Release A/AC.105/INF.272. FBIS-SOV: 4/4,12,30/73. NYT: Wilford, 4/4,11,25/73; 4/29/73. W Post: 4/16/73; O'Toole, 4/18,25/ 73, 5/2/73, 10/29/73; UPI, 4/19/73. Av Wk: 4/9/73, 21. A&A 1971.)
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