Dec 1 1976
From The Space Library
Officials of U.S. airlines told Secretary of Transportation William T. Coleman, Jr., in an all-day hearing that lack of government help in financing the costs of government-imposed rules for quieting planes could lead to severe setbacks in service, such as wholesale groundings, diminished competition, fuel waste, less relief from noise, and possible loss of the national lead in aircraft technology. The airlines had suggested a plan last spring to set aside a fourth of the 8% ticket tax for replacement or refitting of planes that exceeded the new noise limits. Opposed to this plan was James C. Miller 3d, assistant director of the administration's council on wage and price stability, who said that he would favor a "pollution tax," imposed on planes inversely to the amount of noise suppression achieved, rather than "a subsidy from the public purse." Secy. Coleman said he would make a recommendation to the outgoing Ford administration by the end of Dec. New noise rules promulgated by the Federal Aviation Administration, DOT, were to take effect on l Jan., setting up a 4- to 8-yr timetable for replacing or refitting aircraft that did not comply with stringent limits on noise. (NYT, 2 Dec 76, 21)
NASA announced appointment of Dr. James J. Kramer as acting Associate Administrator in the Office of Aeronautics and Space Technology (OAST), replacing Robert E. Smylie, who would become Deputy Director at GSFC. Dr. Kramer, who came to NASA Hq from LeRC in 1971, had been manager of the refan program office. In a related action, Paul F. Holloway, director for space at LaRC, would begin a temporary appointment as acting deputy Associate Administrator of OAST on 3 Jan. 1977. (NASA anno. 1 Dec 76) Launch complex 14 at KSC-used for John Glenn's orbital flight in Feb. 1962 and other manned launches until 1966-was blown up with plastic explosives by an Army demolition team after the Air Force decided the rusty and obsolete towers constituted a hazardous area and should be demolished. The scrap metal would be sold to the highest bidder. News reports noted that a stainless steel memorial would remain to mark the place where the seven original astronauts took their first steps into space. (W Star, 2 Dec 76, A-3; CBS News transcript, Cronkite-Dean, 1 Dec 76; NBC Nightly News, Brinkley, 1 Dec 76)
A Pentagon group charged with making decisions on weapons programs-the Defense Systems Acquisition Committee-held its first meeting to consider production of the controversial B-1 bomber and scheduled another meeting for 6 Jan. 1977 to decide on consolidation of cruise missile programs backed separately by the Air Force and the Navy. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld had stated-apparently with approval from the transition team of the incoming Garter administration-that he was responsible until 20 Jan. for making weapons decisions that came up for scheduled consideration; however, he had also told subordinates that DOD should exercise restraint in passing on programs that the incoming administration might review or change. President-elect Carter had questioned the necessity for a B-1 bomber program. The controversy over cruise missiles arose from Air Force advocacy of an air-launched missile that could be used only with a B-1 or B-52 bomber, this restraint offered the verification possibility, acceptable to the USSR, of controlling the number of cruise missiles by counting the bombers carrying them. However, the Navy had advocated its Tomahawk missile which could be launched from a submarine torpedo tube as well as from a surface ship or a bombing plane. The Navy's preference would thwart verification of future arms-limitation agreements, since all attack submarines as well as surface ships and bombers could be potential platforms for launching the Navy missile. The Carter transition team was concerned, said the New York Times, that the Navy might be trying to lock in the new administration with a pre-inauguration decision that would complicate future negotiations with the USSR. Both the Navy and the Air Force programs were started after a 1972 agreement with the USSR that placed a 5-yr limitation on strategic ballistic missiles; the $15 million design studies had grown into $300 million development programs, and had reached the point where a decision was needed on proceeding into costly engineering development. Observers pointed to the Army's plan to award contracts in the next week or so on its $7 million programs for troop-carrier and attack helicopters as a decision that would make it difficult for the' incoming administration to re-examine its predecessor's policy. (NYT, 2 Dec 76, 23)
A report in Izvestia on Soviet passenger planes to be in service by 1980 failed to mention the Tupolev-144 supersonic transport, the Washington Post reported. An official of the USSR Aviation Ministry said the trouble-plagued Tu-144 would not go into passenger service in 1976 as promised last Dec., when the highly publicized "first scheduled supersonic service" began between Moscow and Alma Ata in Soviet Kazakhstan. That service, initially twice a week, carried only mail and cargo, and was viewed by Western observers as an extended test-flight program. The mail service had been cut back to once a week in June 1976, with reports of problems in the passenger cabin such as noise, vibrations, and pressure. The Tu-144, which on 31 Dec. 1968 had been the first supersonic civilian plane to fly, was designed to carry up to 140 passengers up to 5600 km, but had never been known to meet either specification; observers said its fuel consumption was greater than expected. Its service on Aeroflot lines, set to begin in 1974 or 1975, had been set back by a crash in Paris in 1973. Although ignoring the Tu-144 in the Izvestia story, Aviation Minister Boris Bugayev said the state-operated Aeroflot fleet would include the 350-passenger llyushin-86 airbus, not yet flown, and the medium-range 120-passenger Yak-42 airplane, which he said would be "put into service in the current Five-Year Plan period." (W Post, 1 Dec 76, A-12)
ESA announced award to European industry of two study contracts, one to define a large (about 900 kg) technological and experimental satellite in geostationary orbit, the other to define the communications payload for such a satellite. The 4-mo contracts, each valued at about $450 000 U.S., went to groups headed by Engins Matra and SNIAS of France for the spacecraft, and to a group headed by Germany's AEG-Telefunken for the payload. The new satellite would be designed for launch by ESA's Ariane, possibly on the fourth development flight scheduled for Oct. 1980; it would flight-test equipment and techniques as forerunner of a large platform carrying various communications payloads for direct and semidirect television and sound broadcasting and for propagation experiments in the 20- to 30-ghz range. The new system would differ from ESA's OTS in offering new services required by countries without elaborate ground communications and broadcasting installations; it would carry four or more high-power TV channels for direct home reception, besides providing low-cost facilities for national telecommunications through small "thin route" terminals. (ESA release 1 Dec 76)
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