May 14 1985
From The Space Library
A Northrop F-20 Tigershark crashed today while practicing its routine for the Paris Air Show during a stopover at Goose Bay, Labrador, Aerospace Daily reported. The pilot, whose name was withheld pending notification of next of kin, was fatally injured. A Northrup spokesman said an investigation was underway to determine the cause of the crash and that the company "would expect the cooperation of the Air Force in the investigation since they are the executive agency for the F-20." The only other F-20 was at Edwards Air Force Base, California, and would remain there to continue the flight demonstration program "because of the high interest in the F-20 program in this country," the spokesman continued.
The first F-20 had crashed the previous October during a demonstration flight at Suwon Air Base near Seoul, South Korea, killing Northrop chief test pilot Darrell Cornell. Northrop reported at the time that the crash was "pilot induced" and the "the aircraft and all its systems functioned properly." The fourth Tigershark was on the assembly line.
An attempt earlier in the month to provide funding for the Northrop F-20 failed, Defense Daily reported, when an amendment by Rep. James Courter (R-N.J.) to substitute 30 Northrop F-20s for 24 General Dynamics F-16s in FY 86, brought up in a closed door markup by the House Armed Services procurement and military nuclear systems subcommittee, failed by a note of 8-4. An amendment by the panel's chairman, Rep. Samuel Stratton (D-NY), calling for competition between the F-20 and the F-16 in the FY 87 budget, prevailed.
The Stratton amendment specified that the Secretary of the Air Force, in the development of the tactical aircraft fighter program for the Five-Year Defense Plan beginning in FY 87, "shall establish a competition for procurement of tactical fighter aircraft to meet the requirements of the Air Force above a minimum number of F-16 and F-20 aircraft that the Secretary determines appropriate for meeting the requirements of the active and reserve components. Such competition shall be among all suitable aircraft, including the F16 and F-20 aircraft." A report drafted for the subcommittee stated that the F-16 and F-20 "are both roughly comparable aircraft. Both have new and modern radar and avionics systems, both have excellent performance as air-to-air combat fighters, and both have highly accurate air-to-ground bombing systems." The report did note that the F-16 had the advantage in range and payload capabilities, while the F-20 has "a significant advantage" in reliability and maintainability factors that affect the combat readiness and operating costs." (ND, May 15/85, 1; D/D, May 2/85, 9)
NASA announced its National Space Technology Laboratories (NSTL), through its Earth Resources Laboratory, signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the Anthropology Department of the University of Colorado at Boulder to use satellite imaging and remote sensing technology to probe the tropical Andean jungles for archaeological remains in Peru's Rio Abiseo National Park.
Of particular interest in the park were the ancient site of Gran Patajen, the subtropical cloud forest, and the park's diverse ecology. Using sophisticated instrumentation that would allow researchers to "see" through the dense vegetation to locate evidence of past settlements in the now uninhabited region, researchers would combine data from the Landsat earth resources satellite with information gathered by a specially equipped aircraft from NSTL. The researchers might also observe and map interesting geographical features and variations in vegetation.
Thomas Lennon, co-director of the university's Rio Abiseo National Park Research Project, said of the undertaking, "NASA's assistance will enable us to take a good look at the 1,060-sq-mile park from above-immensely easier than trekking through the jungle on foot. When cultural resources are identified through image analysis, we'll be able to check it out on the ground. This approach allows us to make the best use of the limited researchers as well as the time we'll have in the field." The university, NASA, and a remote sensing team at Peru's National Agrarian University in Lima would work together to extract information from various sensing devices. An early outcome of the project should be accurate up-to-date maps of the uncharted parkland.
The project was one of three archaeological research investigations supported by NASA's remote sensing program administered by NASA’s Office of Space Science and Applications, Washington, D.C. In another project with the University of Colorado, NASA was examining volcanic destruction of cities and vegetation in Costa Rica. In the third project, NASA was supporting Richard Leakey of the Leaky Foundation who was searching for evidence of human evolution in Kenya, Africa.
NASA’s work on the projects resulted from its interest in expanding the scientific applications of space technology, in these cases to archaeology and anthropology, which could benefit from advancements in remote sensing technology. (NASA Release 85-73)
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