May 26 1978
From The Space Library
NASA reported it had halted MSFC preparations for vibration tests of the Shuttle orbiter Enterprise May 12, when the upper dome of the prototype liquid oxygen tank buckled inward while being filled with water. Pressurizing the tank to 1lb later removed the wrinkles. The tank implosion would delay Enterprise vibration testing, but the program office would have to review delay of the overall Space Shuttle program. (JSC Roundup, May 26/78, l; Marshall Star, May 10/78, 1)
NASA announced it had postponed to at least June 24 the scheduled June 10 launch of SEASAT-A because of precautionary changes and tests on the Atlas F launch vehicle. Temperature increases in the aft sections of recently launched Atlas vehicles had necessitated the changes and resulting tests.
NASA would use SEASAT-A, first satellite designed to study the world's oceans, to see if microwave instruments scanning from space could provide scientific data useful to oceanographers, meteorologists, and commercial users of the seas. The spacecraft would send information on seasurface winds and temperatures, currents, wave heights, ice conditions, ocean topography, and coastal storm activity.
NASA would attempt to demonstrate the feasibility of an operational multiple-satellite network to monitor oceans on a continuous near-real-time basis; twice daily, the system could provide ships at sea with detailed charts updated to show latest weather conditions, sea states, and hazards. Long-range use of the system could influence ship design, port development, and selection of sites for offshore facilities such as power plants. Other potential users of SEASAT data would include commercial fishermen, oil exploration firms, the Weather Service, pollution-control agencies, and the Coast Guard and Navy. (NASA Release 78-77; JPL Universe, May 26/78, 1)
LeRC reported that the Communications Technology Satellite Cts, world's most powerful comsat, had made possible quick diagnosis of burn and multiple-injury victims of a simulated catastrophe at the Baltimore/Washington International Airport. The Maryland Institute for Emergency Medical Services had conducted a disaster exercise called Emergency Management of an Airport Catastrophe as part of a 2-day seminar for physicians, interns, residents, nurses, and other health care professionals. The "disaster" (a simulated collision between a commercial airliner and a ground aviation fuel tanker) had tested airport and statewide emergency medical plans to aid the "injured," including about 180 crash victims. The scenario at the site included a breakdown in local communications, and an overload of local emergency medical facilities. A joint program between the U.S. and Canada, Cts operated on a new frequency at power levels 10 to 20 times higher than those of other satellites; the higher broadcast power had allowed use of much smaller and far less expensive ground-receiving equipment. (Lewis News, May 26/78,2)
JPL announced that more than 100 scientists from universities and corporations in the U.S. and Europe had attended its solar-probe science workshop at CalTech May 22-23 to discuss the proposed closest encounter with the sun. The proposed mission, being studied at JPL under NASA's Office of Space Sciences, would launch a uniquely designed spacecraft in 1985 into an orbit 2 100 000km (1.3 million m) above the sun's surface, arriving in 1989. Scientists had theorized that the sun probe would yield valuable new insights into solar physics, providing data on solar wind, solar particles, the solar magnetic field, and interplanetary dust. The workshop had reviewed new technologies needed for a spacecraft orbiting so close to the sun. JPL had begun studies of a new heat shield design, a high-powered telecommunications system with dual X- and X-band frequencies, new selenide-isotope power generators, and a drag-free spacecraft whose small rocket motors could counteract opposing external forces to keep the craft in correct solar orbit. (JPL Universe, May 26/78, 1)
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