Dec 22 1972
From The Space Library
Space News for this day. (1MB PDF)
Retirement of Dr. Eberhard F. M. Rees as Marshall Space Flight Center Director and appointment of Dr. Rocco A. Petrone, Apollo Program Director, to succeed Dr. Rees in January 1973 were announced by Dr. James C. Fletcher, NASA Administrator. Dr. Rees, with Dr. Wernher von Braun, had pioneered U.S. space and rocket activities, He had succeeded Dr. von Braun as MSFC Director in 1970. Dr. Petrone had been Apollo Program Manager at Kennedy Space Center before becoming Apollo Program Director at NASA Hq. in 1969. Dr. Fletcher commended Dr. Rees for "successful completion of the Marshall Center's role in the Apollo program. The performance of the Saturn launch vehicle . . . has been magnificent. The development of the Lunar Roving Vehicle and its performance ... is a tribute to his leadership." (NASA Release 72-244)
NASA released color photo of Shorty Crater area of Apollo 17 Taurus- Littrow lunar landing site. Photo, taken Dec. 12 during second extra-vehicular activity of Dec. 7-19 mission, confirmed existence of orange soil discovered by astronaut-geologist Dr. Harrison H. Schmitt. (NASA photo 72-HC-933)
Question of whether moon was hot or cold was discussed in Science by California Institute of Technology scientists Dr. Don L. Anderson and Dr. Thomas C. Hanks. High surface concentrations of uranium, thorium, and potassium found on moon and Apollo 15 heat-flow value of 33 ergs per sq cm per sec had indicated high present-day temperatures in lunar interior. But recent interpretations of lunar conductivity profile-"non-hydrostatic shape of the moon, the existence of mascons, the remarkable aseismicity of the moon, and the absence of present-day volcanism"-had suggested lunar interior had always been cold. "We find that the basic observations do not demand a presently cold moon and are, in fact, consistent with a hot moon. We find that an iron-deficient, highly resistive, hot lunar interior, capped by a cool rigid lunar lithosphere with a thickness of several hundred kilometers [100 kilometers 62 miles] can explain the relevant observations and is a reasonable model of the moon today." (Science, 12/22/72, 1245-9)
Scientists were developing estimate of interactions between unvisited deep-space planets and solar wind in National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration project to program future deep-space missions. Series of space environment models had been developed by Ames Research Center scientists Dr. Arthur W. Rizzi, NOAA physicist Dr. Murray Dryer, and Dr. Wen-we Shen of Texas Instruments, Inc. Scaled magnetopause or ionospheric shell had been made for each planet by using available data on earth, Mars, and Venus, and ex-tending models that had worked well for these planets to cases of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto. (Nona Release 72-161)
Boston Globe editorial commented on Apollo 17 splashdown. It was "little short of astounding. After a trip of about 500,000 miles [800 000 kilometers], the astronauts brought their command module safely home just a half mile [0.08 kilometer] from the planned splashdown point and within one second-repeat, one second-of the time scheduled when it blasted off two weeks ago. It would be unbelievable if it hadn't happened." (B Globe, 12/22/72)
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