Jan 18 1966
From The Space Library
Scheduled test of Apollo Launch Escape System (LES) at WSMR was postponed indefinitely due to heavy cloud cover. Countdown for the Little Joe II had proceeded to minus 30 min. [See Jan. 20] ‘‘(UPI, NYT, 1/19/66,38)’’
NASA Langley Research Center awarded a $5-million contract to Virginia Associated Research Center to operate NASA Space Radiation Effects Laboratory-a $15-million facility established by LaRC for research in support of national programs in space technology-through mid-1970. ‘‘(LaRC Release)’’
HL-10 lifting body vehicle, designed and developed by NASA Langley Research Center to help solve control problems of future manned spacecraft entering earth’s atmosphere, was formally delivered to NASA by its builder, Northrop Corp., in ceremonies at company’s Hawthorne, Calif., plant. The 22-ft.-long 4,600-lb., wingless, tri-finned research vehicle would be dropped from B-52 aircraft for flight tests at 45,000-ft. altitude and mach .8 (530 mph). ‘‘(LaRC Release)’’
Rep. Joseph E. Karth (D-Minn.), emphasizing the need for expanded efforts in the field of oceanography, said before the National Space Club in Washington, D. C., that oceanography was becoming increasingly related to space. He noted the recent NASA-Naval Oceanographic Office agreement whereby NOO would coordinate all investigations about possible applications of manned earth orbital operations in the field of oceanography. He suggested that this program “be expanded formally to include unmanned operations as well.” He urged a national program with national gods, “coordinated by one agency like . . . [NASA]” and given adequate funds--“an all-wet NASA.” Karth said he did not think that post-Apollo programs, such as manned expeditions to Mars or to the moons of Jupiter would gain “general acceptance” until “we have solved the continually worsening home planet problems of hunger and poverty.” ‘‘(Text)’’
U.N. Committee on Peaceful Uses of Outer Space had proposed a world conference on outer space to be held in New York. The conference should examine the impact of space data on education and communications-issues of major importance even to poor and economically retarded states. ‘‘(NYT, 1/20/66, 12; SBD, 1/31/66, 185)’’
Funeral of Soviet space designer Sergey Korolev was held in Red Square. After eulogies by Leonid Smirnov, deputy chairman of the U.S.S.R. Council of Ministers; Mstislav V. Keldysh, President of the U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences; Nikolay Yegorychev, Moscow Gorkom Secretary; and Cosmonaut Yuri A. Gagarin, the funeral procession moved to the Kremlin wall where the urn containing Korolev’s ashes was placed in a niche. Commentary in the New York Times: “Death has finally declassified the role and identity of Academician Sergei P. Korolev, the man who provided the scientific and technical leadership of the vast Soviet rocket program. The extraordinary pomp of his state funeral in Red Square contrasted sharply with the almost complete anonymity imposed on him while he was alive. In the most fruitful years of his career, the man who led the Soviet Union’s march into the cosmos from the first sputnik to Leonov’s ‘walk in space’ was normally referred to in the Soviet press only as the mysterious ‘chief designer.’ Korolev’s rockets were powerful enough to send men into orbit and to put cameras into position to photograph the back side of the moon. But they were too weak to break the chains of secrecy that denied him, while he lived, the world applause he deserved.” ‘‘(Tass, 1/18/66; NYT, 1/20/66, 31)’’
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 30 31
