Jun 5 1980
From The Space Library
The Soviet Union launched Lt. Col. Yuri V. Malyshev and Vladimir V. Aksyonov toward the orbiting station Salyut 6 in Soyuz T2, an "improved model" of its manned capsule. An uncrewed Soyuz T1 tested in December 1979 docked automatically with Salyut 6 and remained for 99 days. A U.S. expert on USSR space activity said that T2 was "a new ship" except in appearance: the main change was an on-board computer that for the first time let cosmonauts navigate independently of ground control. Launched from Tyuratam, the T2 arrived June 6 to join Leonid Popov and Valery Ryumin. (W Star, June 5/80, A-12; June 6/80, A-10; June 7/80, A-12; W Post, June 6/80, A-22; NY Times, June 6/80, B-6)
NASA announced award by LeRC of parallel 1-year $1 million contracts to TRW's Defense and Space Systems Group and to Hughes Aircraft Company for designing an advanced commercial communications satellite system.
Operating in a high-frequency 30- to 20-GHz band not used in the United States commercially, the system would help handle: the increased communications expected in the next 20 years which would saturate existing domestic communications satellite capacity. The new system, a network of ground stations using two shuttle-launched spacecraft, would lower costs of services such as videoconferencing, teletext, and electronic mail delivery. (NASA Release 80-84)
The House Committee on Science and Technology said that on June 11-12 its subcommittee on space science and applications would hold hearings on the Space Industrialization Act of 1980 (H.R. 7412) for private commercialization of space. Rep. Don Fuqua (D-Fla.), committee and subcommittee chairman, said that the bill he sponsored would create a space industrialization corporation to develop new products, services, and industries using space technology and the properties of the space environment. NASA would continue to advance national capabilities in space, Fuqua said, but the corporation would be responsible for encouraging private development. (Committee Release 96-196)
NASA announced that the Shuttle main engine had reached a milestone June 5 when two of the three main engines that would fly on Columbia's first mission demonstrated flight readiness in test firings at NSTL that sent total test time over the 80,000-second mark. This was the minimum needed to assure reliability of the liquid-fuel main engines. A third engine would undergo an identical test in two weeks. (NASA Release 80-85)
NASA reported that GSFC had chosen Canadian Astronautics, Ltd., to negotiate a $3,042,500 contract for local-user terminals to process signals from search-and-rescue instruments aboard the NOAA-E, NOAA-F, and NOAA-G satellites in the early 1980s. The instruments would relay signals from distressed ships and aircraft to the terminals, which would use them to locate the distressed craft and aid rescue operations. The first terminal would be at Kodiak, Alaska, with others at Scott Air Force Base, Ill., and the Coast Guard station at San Francisco. The Soviet Union, Canada, and France would demonstrate the search-and-rescue capability. (NASA Release 80-87)
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