Oct 20 1965
From The Space Library
NASA Aerobee 150 sounding rocket with four NRL solar-study experiments was launched from WSMR to 115-mi, altitude. Rocket performed well and three experiments functioned as planned, providing good data: ultraviolet spectroheliograms were obtained, spatial detail in Lyman-Alpha light on the solar disk was photoelectrically recorded, and solar Lyman-Alpha flux measurements were made by the ion chamber. The fourth experiment was to have recorded the comet Ikeya-Seki against the corona, but because of a mechanical failure in the white-light coronagraph experiment these data were not obtained. (NASA Rpt. SRL)
Federal Communications Commission approved live television coverage from the aircraft carrier Wasp of Gemini VI recovery in the Atlantic Ocean. This would be the first live transmission from a recovery area since the U.S. man-in-space program began. Television signal from the Wasp would be sent to EARLY BIRD I which would relay it to the satellite ground station in Andover, Me., for transmission to the three television networks. (NYT, 10/22/65, 3)
NASA announced it would negotiate a contract with the Bunker-Ramo Corp. for installation and operation of a small-scale prototype document information retrieval system. Negotiations would be based on a cost-plus-fixed-fee proposal of $86,000. (NASA Release 65-334)
USAF awarded Philco Corp., Aeronutronic Div., a $1,200,000 increment to a previously awarded contract for fuzing and arming tests and evaluation of reentry vehicles. (DOD Release 730-65)
Apollo Spacecraft 009, first Apollo flight spacecraft of the type that would carry three U.S. astronauts to the moon and back, was accepted by NASA Manned Spacecraft Center during informal ceremonies at North American Aviation, Inc.'s, Downey, Calif, facility. Largest U.S. manned spacecraft built to date, Spacecraft 009 included a command module, service module, launch escape system, and adapter. (Marshall Star, 10/27/65, 1, 10; NAA S&ID Skywriter, 10/22/65, 1)
Ikeya-Seki comet reached perihelion (closest approach to the sun) with the comet only about 300,000 mi. from the visible solar disk and within a solar radius of the sun's surface. Traveling along an elliptical path that would carry it around the sun and deep into the solar corona, Ikeya-Seki had a visual magnitude of -10, nearly as bright as the moon. It was the brightest comet since the one in 1882 which reached an intensity of -7. (NASA Release 65-332; Osmundsen, NYT, 10/20/65, 39; Sullivan, NYT, 10/21/65, C23)
Third annual Albert A. Michelson Award of Case Institute of Technology was presented to Prof. Luis Alvarez, physicist at the Berkeley campus of the Univ. of California, Dr. Alvarez was honored "for the discovery of significant properties of cosmic rays, neutrons, isotopes and nuclear transformations; for leading in the development of quantitative tools for nuclear physics and for pioneering in radar and aircraft landing systems." (NYT, 10/21/65, 53)
Patent for a flying belt capable of propelling its passenger to 350-ft, altitude was granted Robert F. Courter, Jr, flight test engineer for Bell Aerosystems Co. The 155-lb, machine would have three tanks strapped to the passenger's back: two for fuel and one for nitrogen to push the fuel into the fuel tanks. Two handles-one in each hand-would control the steering. Courter envisaged the flying belt of the future as a solution to the commuting problem. (Lardner, Wash. Post, 10/20/65, A24)
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