Sep 6 1976
From The Space Library
Aviation Week magazine reported that the State Superior Court of Ariz. had found against aeronautical chartmaker Jeppesen Sanderson, sued by insurance underwriters for failing to include on the map of the Philippines a peak near Manila-Mt. Kamunay, nearly 1050 m high-where four crewmen were killed in July 1971 when a Pan American Boeing 707 flew into the mountain. More than $5.8 million was awarded in damages for value of cargo and aircraft in a ruling called a "landmark in product liability litigation." The suit had been brought originally by three of the four widows, whose damage awards had not been set. (Av Wk, 6 Sept 76, 47)
Leadership of Europe's comsat programs had gravitated toward the U.K.-"more by accident" than by design, said an ESA official-since prime contractorship for those programs had fallen to Britain's Hawker Siddeley Dynamics within the European consortium known as MESH (Matra of France, ERNO of W. Germany, Saab-Scania of Sweden, Aeritalia of Italy, and Fokker-VFW of Holland). Current programs included OTS, the orbital test satellite scheduled for launch in 1977 to evaluate items for an operational European telecommunications system; Marots, to be launched in 1978, an experimental maritime comsat; and ECS, the European comsat that ESA hoped to fly in the early 1980s. Aviation Week & Space Technology magazine reported that potential markets worldwide for prime-contractor capability had become so numerous that MESH had divided marketing responsibilities among its members according to their influence in various regions, HSD being strongest in Arab League areas and in Africa. An HSD official noted that Europe was ahead of the U.S. in three-axis stabilization and in higher frequencies for satellite communications; demonstration of effective project leadership would assure future success in the world market. (Av Wk, 6 Sept 76, 96)
6-8 September: A MIG-25 (Foxbat) Soviet mach 3.2 fighter plane made an emergency landing at 1:57 pm (457 GMT) at the Hakodate commercial airport on Hokkaido, northernmost of Japan's three main islands. Pilot of the MiG-25, Soviet Air Force Lt. Victor I. Belenko, initially asked for an interpreter and a canvas cover for the plane because it contained "military secrets." Japanese officials, who said at first that the pilot would be returned to the Soviet Union if his landing was merely an emergency, later said Belenko had asked for political asylum and would be transferred to the U.S. on 8 Sept.
Japan's Natl. Police Agency announced that Belenko was the 15th Soviet national to seek protection in Japan with a view to taking political asylum in some other country; of the previous 14, 11 went to the U.S. and 1 each to Italy, Israel, and West Germany. (FBIS, Hong Kong AFB in English, 6, 7 Sept; Tokyo Kyodo in English, 6, 7 Sept; Av Wk, 13 Sept 76, 25; W/ Post, 7 Sept 76, A-1)
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