Jul 8 1964
From The Space Library
Space News for this day. (2MB PDF)
X-15 No. 3, piloted by Capt. Joe Engle (USAF), flew 3,511 mph (mach 4.94) and gained altitude of 170,000 ft. in first test of infrared horizon scanner designed to give sharper outline of earth to astronauts re-entering earth's atmosphere. Flight also enabled Engle to make pilot checkout of adaptive control system which had ability to sense atmospheric conditions surrounding the craft. Flight was postponed twice before successful effort. (NASA X-15 Proj. Off.; AP, Wash. ash. Post, 7/9/64)
Scientists from the Air Force Cambridge Research Laboratories, the Swedish Space Committee, and NASA announced they would investigate the nature of noctilucent clouds during a period starting the last week in July and extending through Aug. 24. This would be the second in series of rocket-borne experiments to be conducted from Kronogard Range in Northern Sweden. Principal purpose of experiments was to confirm results of experimental flights completed in August 1962, when it was tentatively determined that noctilucent clouds were composed of meteoric particles or the residue of burned out meteors. Program calls for the firing of four Nike-Apache rockets for collection purposes and four Nike-Cajun rockets to measure temperatures and winds associated with the presence or absence of the clouds. (OAR Release 7-64-2)
NASA announced grant of $1,125,000 to Univ. of Illinois to finance construction of research laboratory facilities as wing to university's Coordinated Science Laboratory. To be called Aerospace Research Center, the facilities were to be for investigations of ionosphere properties, propulsion, molecular densities, rendezvous problems, and plasma physics. (NASA Release 64-169)
After two previous failures, USAF successfully launched four-stage, solid-fuel Athena missile. Rocket was fired from Green River, Utah, on estimated 15-min., 475-mi. flight to White Sands, N. Mex., carrying one of series of subscale experimental re-entry vehicles being tested as part of program to develop advanced re-entry vehicles for space travel and ICBM's. No other details of flight were given. (AP, Hartford Courant, 7/9/64)
Senate Independent Offices Subcommittee of Committee on Appropriations concluded its hearings on H.R- 11296, FY 1965 appropriations for independent offices (including NASA). (NASA TAR 111/134-135)
European Space Research Organization launched second British Skylark sounding rocket with scientific payload to altitude of 125 mi. from Salto di Quirra range in Sardinia. This launch and identical one the previous day were initial attempts of the 10-nation organization. (NYT, 7/11/64, 5)
NASA Administrator James E. Webb told Senate Appropriations Committee's Independent Offices Subcommittee that 15 Saturn V flights were planned for Project Apollo program, the lunar landing to be accomplished in the last three months of 1969 with the fifteenth flight. Webb also said that if the proposed $5.3 billion NASA budget for fiscal year 1965 were cut so that the Apollo program had to be slowed down, the cost of the program would increase by a billion dollars with each added year of delay. (Text)
Rocketdyne Div. of North American Aviation received four NASA contract modifications worth $22,378,626 on existing research and development production contracts for the F-1 engines, which provide thrust in first stage of Saturn V launch vehicle. NASA also awarded contract modifications to Douglas Aircraft Co. totaling $31,471,836 for additional work on the S-IV and S-IVB rocket stages. (Marshall Star, 7/15/64, 1, 9; Nashville Tennessean, 7/9/64)
Donald K. Slayton, Assistant Director for Flight Crew Operations, MSC, announced specific assignments for astronauts. Included in assignments was that of Alan B. Shepard, Jr., who was named chief of Astronaut Office, taking place of Slayton, who had been acting in the position in addition to other duties- (MSC Roundup, 7/8/64, 1)
Sir Bernard Lovell, Director of Jodrell Bank Experimental Station, re-ported in New Scientist that technical difficulties, and not a deliberate slackening of effort, were hampering Soviet activities in getting men to the moon. He noted that the Russians apparently had not made a probe work in space successfully for more than a few weeks and concluded that the Soviets were failing where "once they shone-in basic rocketry techniques." (Simons, Wash. Post, 7/9/64)
FAA experiments conducted over Oklahoma City during prior five months showed that the magnification of a sonic boom under certain atmospheric conditions occurred more frequently and with more force than had been predicted. The unexpected finding led FAA Administrator Najeeb E. Halaby to declare at a news conference that the sonic boom problem presented by a supersonic airliner appeared to be "more serious" than had been supposed. Halaby rejected charges that nation's supersonic airliner program was too hasty. He said that those most concerned with the plane's development felt that they were "going about the right rate." Further sonic boom tests would be made, he said, probably over desert areas. (Finney, NYT, 7/9/64, 12; Wash. Post, 7/9/ 64)
ComSatCorp announced that six persons had been nominated by its board of directors for election to the new board by public stockholders. They were: Leo D. Welch, Dr. Joseph V. Charyk, David M. Kennedy, George L. Killion, Leonard H. Marks, and Bruce G. Sundlun. The corporation announced that the first annual meeting of the shareholders was tentatively planned for Sept. 17 in Washington. (ComSatCorp Release, 7/8/64; NYT, 7/9/64, 43C, 45C)
Dr. John P. Meehan, physiologist at Univ. of Southern California, announced he would begin experiment in which 15 young men would lie flat on their backs for 30 days, then be put in a centrifuge and be subjected to forces eight times normal gravity while attempting to operate simulated space capsule controls. Purpose of the experiment was to duplicate effect of long periods of weightlessness in space on body's heart-blood system and to devise ways of overcoming it. (AP, Balt. Sun, 7/9/64)
Teamster President James R. Hoffa ordered end to picketing that had tied up vital construction work at Cape Kennedy. (Wash. Daily News, 7/8/64)
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