Jun 12 1979
From The Space Library
After almost a month of waiting for good weather, the first manpowered flight across the English Channel took off at 5:50 a.m. from Folkestone, arriving at Cap Gris Nez in 2 hours, 55 minutes. Bryan Allen, 26, a cyclist, hang-glider, and biologist from California who, at 137 pounds was nearly twice as heavy as his craft, pedaled the 70-pound gossamer Albatross (built of carbon-filament tubing and covered in transparent mylar) nonstop for 25 miles. Rules were that the craft must be heavier than air, must be propelled only by the crew, must not fly higher than 160 feet, and must not discard any parts in flight. Allen had traveled an average of 6 to 8 feet above the water but had dipped to within a foot of the surface several times when strong winds arose about halfway over.
The flight won a $205,000 Kremer prize ("almost enough to pay the costs") and a niche in history for aeronautical designer Paul MacCready, who also built the Gossamer Condor that in August 1977 won a $102,500 Kremer prize for the world's first controlled man-powered flight, steered by Allen around a 1.15-mile figure-8 course in California. The Condor was now on display in the National Air and Space Museum. U.K. industrialist Henry Kremer had established the prizes to be awarded by the Royal Aeronautical Society, which called the Channel crossing "a tremendous achievement." (NY Times, June 13/79, A-1, A-8; W Post, June 13/79; A-1; W Star, June 12/79, A-1; June 14/79, A-18)
The May 25 crash of a DC-10 aircraft killing 275 was predictable in view of previous problems with that plane, Rep. John L. Burton (D-Calif.), chairman, told a House subcommittee on transportation June 11. He asked Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Administrator Langhorne Bond why the FAA had twice previously grounded the DC-10s for inspection and twice sent them into the air again. After the accident, the FAA waited for 13 days to ground the DC-10s, "and then only because a federal judge... acting on a suit brought by the Airline Passengers Association ordered them to do it," Washington Star columnist Mary McGrory noted.
Engine-mounting pylons, which an FAA memo from California not seen by Bond had called a design fault, apparently caused some of the problems. Bond said that what McGrory called "the worst plane tragedy in U.S. history" was "a single, severe event" when "that pylon experienced an overload of that wing and those fasteners," insisting that FAA's actions were proper at the time. Rep. Burton said that since 1974 the FAA had had many pylon problem reports; Bond said they did not form a pattern, as they concerned "individual and random defects in an entire area. . there was no trend." In 1975, McDonnell Douglas had suggested some remedies for problems with the pylons; Bond told the subcommittee that manufacturers' suggestions were not mandatory, and the FAA did not make the airlines follow them. (W Star, June 12/79, A-2, A-4)
Neil A. Armstrong, "America's reluctant space hero," said the United States should develop a permanent manned orbiting space, station for long-duration exposure of people and equipment to the space environment. At an interview about the 10th anniversary of the moon landing, the University of Cincinnati engineering professor who in 1969 had been the first man to walk on the moon said that, if the United States had an ongoing manned space program, "we could have solved the problems" with Skylab. (Today, June 12/79, 16A)
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