Jan 21 1978
From The Space Library
NASA Administrator Robert Frosch in a briefing announced that NASA's FY79 budget would propose an 8% increase, providing "buying power" at about the 1978 level. The space science request had gone up about 27%, largely because of the Space Telescope and the Galileo (Jupiter-orbiter) project. Applications and aeronautics were each up about 16%. The proposed FY79 budget was $4.371 billion; the FY78 budget was $4.064 billion. The FY79 budget requested money for only four Space Shuttle orbiters; Frosch explained that the four orbiters would use two launch sites (KSC and Vandenberg AFB) and that NASA and the Air Force would phase out the existing stable of expendable boosters. Omitted was OV-101, the Enterprise, which would be used for approach and landing tests or for spare parts, or could be reconfigured in an emergency to spaceflight status.
The major new start NASA had included in the budget was the "Out of Ecliptic" (OOE) or Solar-Polar, a cooperative venture with ESA to fly two satellites to look at the structure of the sun's surface and at sunspots and poles. Other new starts NASA had requested were the HALO (halogen-occultation) experiments to study upper-atmosphere pollution, and the earth radiation-budget satellite system to study incoming and outgoing radiation. Key application continuations would be Landsat C and D, the Nimbus-G environmental satellite, Tiros-N next-generation weather satellite, and SEASAT-A. Space Transportation Systems would receive $l 827 700 000; Space Science $513 200 000; Space and Terrestrial Applications $283 400 000; Aeronautics and Space Technology $375 400 000; Tracking and Data Acquisition $305 400 000. Manpower would remain at the FY78 level, with 45 positions shifted from MSFC to JSC, KSC, and the Natl. Space Technology Laboratories. (NASA budget briefing, Jan 21/78; Marshall Star, Jan 25/78, 1; W Star, Jan 23/78, A-8; Av Wk, Jan 23/78, 13; Jan 30/78, 28)
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