Mar 30 1964
From The Space Library
Czechoslovakian news agency Ceteka reported Czechoslovakia would issue series of eight postage stamps in April bearing faces of 10 Soviet cosmonauts and American astronauts. (Reuters, Houston Post, 3/30/64)
NASA awarded $158, 466,800 contract to North American Aviation's Rocketdyne Div. for production of 76 F-1 rocket engines for the Saturn V launch vehicle. The action defined and detailed the procurement action initiated with letter contract in June 1962. Delivery of static-test engines to NASA Marshall Space Flight Center had already begun, and the first flight F-1 would arrive at MSFC in November. (NASA Release 64-48; Marshall Star, 4/1/64, 1)
NASA'S newly created Science and Technology Advisory Committee for Manned Space Flight convened for first time at John F. Kennedy Space Center, NASA. Formed to advise Dr. George E. Mueller, NASA Associate Administrator for Manned Space Flight, the committee met for briefings by NASA officials and tours of NASA facilities at Cape Kennedy and Merritt Island. (NASA Release 64-72)
MSC operations at Cape Kennedy, renamed MSC-Florida Operations, was reorganized as "part of a broad NASA organizational realignment aimed at strengthening Gemini and Apollo management structures at Washington, Houston, and Florida." The organization was headed by G. Merritt Preston, responsible for MSC operations at the Cape since 1961. (KSC Release 43-64; SC Roundup, 4/15/64, 8)
U.S.S.R.'s unsuccessful attempts to send payloads to Venus Feb. 26 and Mar. 4 Were reported in the U.S. press. Failures were attributed by U.S. military officials to difficulties with upper-stage rocket supposed to send the spacecraft out of parking orbit and onto its interplanetary course. (Av. Wk., 3/30/64, 15 ; Finney, NYT, 4/1/64, 1, 10)
USAF announced the nine major modifications to Titan II changing it from ICBM to a manrated launch vehicle for NASA's two-man Gemini spacecraft: addition of malfunction detection system; backup flight control system; redundant electrical system with changes for additional launch vehicle equipment, substitution of radio guidance for inertial guidance; elimination of retrorockets and verniers; new structure on second stage to hold new flight guidance and control equipment; new second-stage skirt assembly to join spacecraft; simplification of trajectory tracking; and redundancy in hydraulic systems. (AP, Balt. Sun, 3/31/64)
MSC announced first meteorite ever found in Fisher County, Texas, was turned over to SC for analysis by Mr. and Mrs. Bernard W. Neeper who found the four-pound meteorite two years ago on their farm. Meteorite investigations were made at SC in cooperation with the U.S. National Museum. (SC Release 64-61)
George A. Fuller and Warrior Constructors, Inc., jointly received a $1,967,868 contract for construction of electronics, instrumentation, and materials laboratory at NASA Mississippi Test Facility. The Army Corps of Engineers awarded the fixed-price contract. (DOD Release 257-64)
Former astronaut Lt. Col. John H. Glenn, Jr. (C) announced his decision to withdraw from the Democratic primary campaign for Senate candidacy in Ohio. Colonel Glenn was still convalescing from severe injury to his vestibular system in the inner ear sustained when he accidentally slipped and struck his head on a bathtub Feb. 26. In Houston, NASA Manned Spacecraft Center Director Dr. Robert R. Gilruth said: "The news of John Glenn's continued illness is upsetting. Our first concern is for his recovery. . . . We Will be happy to discuss with John and the-commandant of the Marine Corps his future if John so desires. . . . We wish him a speedy recovery." (AP, NYT, 3/31/64, 1, 18, 19; Burkett, Houston Chron., 3/30/64)
Dr. V. A. Bailey, prof. emeritus of physics at Univ. of Sydney, Australia, stated in the British journal Nature his theory that the sun has a large negative electric charge. He proposed that two satellites be launched around the sun, one clockwise and the other counterclockwise, to learn whether or not the sun had electrical charge and whether such a charge was negative or positive. Most physicists believed sun had no electrical charge. (Sci. Serv., NYT, 3/31/64, 21)
Possibility that lasers might someday be used in preventing dental cavities and in repairing existing ones was reported by researchers Dr. Ralph H. Stern and Dr. Reidar F. Sognnaes of UCLA School of Dentistry at International Association for Dental Research meeting in Los Angeles. The investigators emphasized that their preliminary study dealt with effects of lasers on dental tissue and standard dental repair material. (Sci. Serv., NYT, 3/31/64, 24)
Nicolai P. Erpilev, scientific secretary of the Astronomical Council of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, announced in Havana that the first Soviet satellite tracking station in Cuba would be installed in Havana in a special observatory and another one Would probably be established later at Santa Clara. (NYT, 3/31/64, 26)
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