Dec 18 1964
From The Space Library
Tass disclosed that ZOND II was equipped with a new type of rocket engine known as a plasma accelerator and that the engine, on radio command from earth, had successfully operated the attitude-control system that oriented the spacecraft with respect to the sun. It was the first time that such a plasma engine had been tested under conditions of actual space flight. Information continued to be received on the operations of the systems and units aboard the spacecraft; radio communication with the station was stable. (Tass, Komsomolskaya Pravda, 12/19/64, 1, ATSS-T Trans.; Shabad, NYT, 12/18/64, 12)
NASA selected 14 firms for negotiation of contracts to provide engineering, fabrication, and institutional support services to six laboratories and three offices of the Marshall Space Flight Center. Work would be in support of the Saturn/Apollo launch vehicle program With cost estimated at $68 million for one year. (NASA Release 64-322)
More than 900 persons had applied to NASA for the 10 to 20 positions for scientist astronaut that it would fill next year. To qualify, a scientist had to be under 34 years old, a U.S. citizen, no taller than six feet, with a B.A. degree and a doctorate or the equivalent in experience. Recruitment would end Dec. 31. Recommendations would be made by the National Academy of Sciences to NASA in the spring of 1965. (AP, Miami Her., 12/18/64)
USAF successfully launched a Minuteman II "instant ICBM" from Cape Kennedy. The test warhead hit its Atlantic target area more than 5,000 mi. from the launch site. (UPI, NYT, 12/20/64, 41)
Present dollar volume of contracts handled by the NASA-Michoud plant passed $1 billion during 1964. (N.O. Times-Picayune, 12/18/64)
Members of Local 1685, United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America, ended a 24-hr. strike at the Merritt Island Launch Area (MILA) and nearby Patrick AFB facilities. The walkout had tied up $246 million in construction for space projects, including construction on an assembly building for the Saturn V lunar rocket, and work at the Titan III and Saturn IB launch areas. Carpenters had protested the use of nonunion workers by the Akwa-Downey Construction Co., a subcontractor on one of the projects. It was the fourth major labor difficulty at NASA Kennedy Space Center in 1964. (UPI, NYT, 12/18/64, 39 and 12/19/64, 48; Chic. Trib., 12/18/64)
December 18-19: Total lunar eclipse occurred. A 15-ft.-dia. dish antenna, built by Marconi Co. and designed for Queen Mary College of London Univ., was used for the first time to view the eclipse. It was operated as a radiotelescope at wavelengths of about one mm.-possibly the largest ever built to operate at such short wavelengths. The dish employed an epoxy-resins structure reinforced with glass fibers and having a zinc-sprayed surface. During the eclipse, extensive heat-map measurements of the lunar surface were made from Egypt by team of Boeing Scientific Research Laboratories scientists. Preliminary analysis of their measurements showed hundreds of "hot spots," or surface temperature anomalies, on the lunar surface, although the experimenters had expected to find only a few dozen. The experimenters made 12 20-min. scans of the moon during the eclipse, in both the visual and infrared portions of the spectrum. Measurements were made at El Kottamia Observatory, 50 mi. east of Cairo, at invitation of United Arab Republic Astronomical Service. (M&R, 1/4/65, 21; NYT, 12/22/64; M&R, 1/18/65, 28)
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