Feb 28 1980
From The Space Library
ARC said that it would close the Pioneer project office effective February 29 after 16 years of sending spacecraft to various planets and to orbits around the Sun. The Space Missions Branch at ARC would handle the seven Pioneers still in interplanetary space: numbers 6 through 9 had formed a network of solar weather stations around the Sun, and Pioneer 10 and Pioneer Saturn was both headed out of the solar system after flights to Jupiter and Saturn. Pioneer Venus was in orbit about that planet photographing cloud circulation and sending back the first detailed maps of Venus's surface. ARC director C.A. Syvertson in a staff memo said that [project manager] "Charles Hall and all who have participated in the program deserve our congratulations and a hearty well done." When NASA Headquarters recently presented a number of NASA medals and other recognition to Pioneer individuals and teams, Hall received NASA's distinguished service medal, its highest award, before his retirement after 30 years with the agency, (ARC Release 80-4)
The International Telecommunications Satellite Organization (INTELSAT) reported that it had bookings for 260 hours of international satellite television when the winter Olympic games opened at Lake Placid, N.Y.; a tally after the games showed that 448 hours had been used, nearly double the original demand. Countries receiving direct broadcasts of the games included the United Kingdom, France, West Germany, Yugoslavia, Australia, Japan, Mexico, and Venezuela; these would have relayed many of the telecasts to a large number of other nations through Earth networks, INTELSAT said. (INTELSAT Release 80-02-I)
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29
