Sep 3 1964
From The Space Library
NASA-modified Arcas sounding rocket, launched at Wallops Island, Va., carried white rat in specially designed, instrumented payload compartment in nose cone of the rocket to 114,000-ft. altitude, where the payload separated from the booster, a parachute deployed, and the container floated down to the surface of the ocean. Package was recovered by helicopter a few minutes later about 20 mi. offshore, and the rat was returned to NASA Wallops Station for observation and analysis. During the flight, biomedical data such as heartbeat and body temperature of the rat were telemetered to ground stations. Launch was part of Bio-Space Technology Training Program. (Wallops Release 64-65)
Reorientation maneuver was made with SYNCOM III communications satellite, high above the Pacific Ocean, to align the communications antenna atop the spacecraft for optimum coverage of the earth. This positioned the antenna along a north-south axis perpendicular to the orbital plane. Side effect of this maneuver, plus an orbital adjustment made Aug. 31, was to reduce the eastward drift rate from 3.6° per day to less than 3° per day. (NASA Release 64-230)
X-15 No. 3 flown by Milton O. Thompson (NASA) to altitude of 77,000 ft. and speed of 3,545 mph (mach 5.37), the flight studying heat transfer rates and boundary layer noise on specially installed surfaces on the bottom of the aircraft (NASA X-15 Proj. Off.; FRC Release)
Three NASA astronauts began flights in T-33 trainer jets simu-lating approaches to the lunar surface. Maj. Edwin E. Aldrin, Jr., Capt. David R. Scott, and Elliott M. See, Jr., sent their planes into dives from altitudes of about 15,000 ft. toward the large, rugged lava flow in southern Idaho; cameras in the planes recorded the approaches, and the astronauts made their own observations of the surface. Planes were leveled out at about 3,000-ft. altitude. (Houston Post, 9/3/64)
NASA announced agreement had been reached by Malagasy Republic and U.S. on the relocation and expansion of NASA tracking station on Madagascar. Previously located at Majunga, the station was being relocated near Tananarive and expanded to include instrumentation for Project Gemini monitoring and communicating and for scientific satellite tracking and recording data. (NASA Release 64-222)
Lockheed Constellation "crashed" near Phoenix, Ariz., in test conducted for FAA by Flight Safety Foundation. The airliner, with 21 passenger "dummies" and several thousand pounds of cameras and measuring instruments onboard, traveled down the runway at 115 mph to crash into barriers of wood, earth, and steel; it slid another 500 ft. and stopped with its fuselage upright but cracked in two places, one wing sheared off, and the other wing twisted. Aircraft remained in such good condition that passengers apparently would have survived the crash, unlike similar test of DC-7 last April, in which the aircraft hit the barriers at 160 mph and was destroyed. (Clark, NYT, 9/4/64, 53)
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