Oct 27 1982
From The Space Library
NASA launched RCA-E (RCA-Satcom S) from ESMC at 9:28 p.m. on a Delta into a synchronous transfer orbit. It would be stationed on the equator at 143 °W over the Pacific to serve the continental United States, Alaska, and Hawaii. First of a series of second-generation domestic communications satellites made by RCA Astro-Electronics, it arrived at ESMC "slightly overweight" and carried no third-stage telemetry. Confirmation of third-stage burn and spacecraft separation was delayed until it passed over the tracking station in New Jersey to confirm that it was working satisfactorily. (NASA Dly Actv Rpt, Oct 29/82; NASA Release 82-155; NASA MOR M-492-206-82-06 [prelaunch] Oct 26/82)
NASA said that Cospas/SARSAT, an international search-and-rescue project of the United States, the Soviet Union, Canada, and France, had located four accident sites and saved seven lives in its first month of operation. The Soviet Union's Cospas satellite, launched June 30, had located two downed planes in Canada during September, another in September in New Mexico, and a cap-sized catamaran off the coast of New England in October less than 24 hours after receiving the first signal.
As part of the program the United States planned to launch in February 1983 a weather satellite, NOAA-F, carrying a search-and-rescue capability. GSFC managed SARSAT activities for NASA. (NASA Release 82-152)
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