Jul 20 1963
From The Space Library
Eclipse of the sun visible across Canada and Northeastern U.S. NASA joined other scientists and astronomers in scientific studies during the eclipse, with emphasis on ionosphere and on sun's corona. At Churchill Research Range, USAF OAR facility located at Ft. Churchill, Can., six Nike-Apache sounding rockets equipped with instruments to measure electron density, electron temperature, and solar radiation in ultraviolet and x-ray regions were launched for NASA Goddard Space Flight Center; Aerobee 150 sounding rocket equipped with spectrophotometric instruments to measure absolute intensity of spectral features in ultraviolet region was launched for Johns Hopkins Univ.; and Canadian Black Brant sounding rocket with instruments to measure variations in D and E layers of ionosphere was launched for USAF Cambridge Research Laboratories. GSFC and AFCRL scientists said preliminary results indicated collected data confirmed previous predictions of composition of the ionosphere. At White Sands Missile Range, GSFC project for eclipse was Aerobee 150 sounding rocket equipped with coronagraph to photograph sun's corona, ultraviolet spectrometer aimed at sun's center, and camera to photograph Lyman-Alpha rays. At Wallops Station, GSFC project was measurement of electron and neutral particle temperatures in the ionosphere using instrumented payload launched by Aerobee 300A sounding rocket to 207-mi. altitude. At Pleasant Pond, Me., GSFC team photographed eclipse with specially made instrument for photographing stars and comets near the sun. DC-8 flying observatory flew north from Edmonton, Can., to meet eclipse at Great Slave Lake, following path of moon and flying above much of atmospheric-haze layer. Sponsored by Douglas Aircraft Co. and National Geographic Society with 11 other participating organizations, expedition included NASA Astronaut M. Scott Carpenter and NASA astronomer Dr. Jocelyn R. Gill studying various scientific details of the phenomenon, Also onboard were Sheldon Smith and Ray Torrey of NASA Ames Research Center, photographing rays of sun's corona. (NASA Release 63-148; MSC Release 63-113; Goddard News, 7/15/63, 1, 8; OAR Research. Review, Vol. 11, No. 11; DOD Release 978-63; Wallops Release 63-70; M&R, 7/29/63,24)
Five men locked in Boeing Co. test chamber on simulated 30-day space mission were forced to cut the test short after 104 hrs. because hole developed in reactor tank (comparable to septic tank). (AP, Cleveland Plain Dealer, 7/21/63)
NASA launched Scout rocket with flight experiment to test re-entry heat shield material for spacecraft, but Scout veered off course and had to be destroyed before it left vicinity of Wallops Station launch area. Cause of malfunction was being investigated. (Wallops Release 63-69)
Solid-propellant rocket motor for Titan III test-fired for first time at United Technology Center, burning for about two min. and producing more than a million lbs. of thrust. Two such motors would be used in first stage of Titan III. (M&R, 7/29/63, 15) )
Cathode of experimental ion engine set endurance record of 1660 hours operation. Electric propulsion engineers at LRC estimate they reached 16 per cent of the cathode life required for a round trip Mars mission. (Lewis Chronology, 7 )
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