Apr 27 1966
From The Space Library
Meteorological sounding rocket launched from Chamical, Argentina, was first in series of launches planned for NASA-Argentine Space Commission (CNIE) cooperative program. CNIE had scheduled 13 launches for 1966 as part of Inter-American Experimental Meteorological Rocket Network (EXAMETNET), in which Argentina, Brazil, and US. would cooperate to establish in the Western Hemisphere a north-south chain of stations for coordinated sounding rocket launchings to obtain experimental data on weather patterns. Brazil launched first rocket under EXAMETNET program from Natal, Brazil, Jan. 12. (NASA Release 66-103)
JPL 100-kw. radar was flown successfully on NASA Convair 990 at 3-6-mi. (5-10-km.) altitude in preliminary test for rocket flight [see May 9]. (JPL Release, 6/26/66)
Third MOLNIYA I communications satellite, launched into elliptical orbit by U.S.S.R. April 25, transmitted television broadcast from Vladivostok. Transmission of televised May Day celebration from Moscow to Vladivostok via satellite had been scheduled for May 1. All equipment was functioning normally. (Pravda, 4/28/66, 4, USS-T Trans.)
Soviet press reported that Belka and Strelka, dog passengers on U.S.S.R.'s SPUTNIK V in orbit more than 24 hrs. Aug. 19-20, 1960, were alive and well. (AP, Wash. Post, 4/28/66, B7)
Army Corps of Engineers had established Extra-Terrestrial Research Agency, headed by geologist Alice S. Allen, to coordinate studies of lunar surface in anticipation of moon exploration requirements. Comprehensive study of such surface properties as soil density, light reflectivity, and thermal and electrical conductivity, Corps of Engineers believed, would permit deductions about problems of "walking, digging, and moving of surface loads . . . providing shelter, water supply and necessary construction materials and tools. " (Henry, Wash. Eve. Star, 4/27/66, C3)
Properly managed, the value of the returns from Government investment in research and technology outweighed by "orders of magnitude" the investment itself, Dr. Chalmers W. Sherwin, deputy director (research and technology) , Defense Department Research and Engineering. told a meeting in Chicago jointly sponsored by the Patent Law Assn. of Chicago and the Chicago Assn. of Commerce and Industry. Sherwin said the value of R&D had been confirmed by "Project Hindsight," a study covering such systems as the Mark 46 torpedoes, Minuteman II, Hound Dog, Polaris, Sergeant, and Lance missiles. "We are not sure whether good ideas attract `good' (that is, flexible) money, or if innovative organizations just `happen' to always have such money. Available technology money simply must be spread all over the place in little pockets near the need. It is not the ivory towers which need flexible money the most, it is rather the organizations heavily involved in real problems particularly in the early stages of development of new systems." (Text)
A surface-based deep-sea search and retrieval system was described by its inventor, Willard N. Bascom, president of Ocean Science and Engineering, Inc., in an interview with William Hines of Washington Evening Star. Bascom, holder of a patent on "SEARCH" , said his system could be ready in a year and that "total cost of a `sEARCH' vessel ready for operation anywhere in the world would not exceed $9 million." He cited `presently unrecoverable losses of spacecraft and experimental weapons as an urgent justification for developing a deep-sea retrieval system," and said that he had offered "SEARCH" to the Navy. "Similar proposals have been submitted to the Air Force and NASA," Bascom said his system, an outgrowth of the Mohole deep-sea drilling project, would use scanning devices and grappling tools suspended from a converted cargo ship. (Hines, Wash. Eve. Star, 4/27/66, A7)
FAA had total of 9,566 US. airports, heliports, and seaplane bases on record at end of 1965, 76 more than 1964 tally. Texas, with 846 landing facilities, led other states. (FAA Release 66-43)
Dr. Eric A. Walker, president of Pennsylvania State Univ. and chairman of the National Science Board, was elected president of the National Academy of Engineering. (NAE News)
Dr. Vamevar Bush, Honorary Chairman of the Corporation, MIT, received the National Academy of Engineering's first Founders' Medal at 2nd annual NAE meeting in Washington, D.C. Dr. Bush, former president of Carnegie Institution of Washington, director of Office of Scientific Research and Development during World War II, and NACA Chairman 1939-41, was cited as "the engineer who mobilized this country's scientific and technical resources for war and created the blueprint for the post-war cooperation of science and government." (NAE Release, 4/19/66)
About 25,000 acres at KSC had been set aside as a national wildlife refuge, the National Geographic Society revealed. Cape Kennedy and nearby Cocoa, Fla., were especially rich in bird life; a record total of 204 species had been tabulated by the Audubon Society. (NYT, 4/27/66, 52)
Click here to listen to the Post-flight Press conference about Gemini 8.
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