Nov 23 1976
From The Space Library
NASA was negligent in the 1972 death of Kirby Dupree, supervisor of a support unit for astronauts, a federal judge ruled in awarding $575 000 to the widow and a 4-yr-old daughter. When a battery box exploded in an astronaut training facility at JSC, Dupree and James E. Scott were assisting with water experiments used to simulate space flights. Scott won $100 00 for injuries suffered in the accident. Both Dupree and Scott were employees of a contractor at the facility. (NYT, 25 Nov 76, 20)
A program conducted jointly by NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center and Langley Research Center had been trying literally to work the bugs out of aircraft, by studying materials and methods to keep insects from sticking to the leading edge of aircraft wings. The study was part of NASA's aircraft energy-efficiency program, aimed at developing an advanced long-range aircraft with possible savings of 20 to 40% in fuel consumption. The laminar flow-control technology on which the advanced craft would depend for savings required smooth airflow over the wings; impacted insects sticking to the leading edge of the wing could interrupt the airflow and cause turbulence. The test planes used at LaRC and DFRC had variously coated panels installed on the leading edges, with instrumented probes above them to register airflow changes resulting from adherence of insects and monitor differences attributable to the panel coatings. After a low flight over areas where insects would impact the wing surfaces, the aircraft would land for preliminary measurements and then fly at high altitudes and speeds to measure the effects on airflow. (DFRC Release 20-76; LaRC Release 76-41; NASA Release 76-190)
ERDA announced selection of Clayton, N.M., as the first municipal utility to field-test its 200-kw wind-turbine generator. The Clayton utility would operate the modern windmill for 2 yr beginning late in 1977, and would assemble test data on the performance and economics of wind-energy systems connected with conventional power plants and providing power through existing utility lines. Clayton, a 3000-inhabitant town located in an area of the Great Plains with high average wind speeds, would be the first U.S. locality in more than 30 yrs to generate electric power for public consumption through the use of wind. Its conventional utility system used both gas and oil generators. Integration of the wind-power system would be supervised by technicians from NASA's LeRC at Cleveland, 0., who would train the municipal utility employees in operating the wind turbine. (ERDA Release 76-348)
23-26 November: Reports in two national magazines-"both denied," the NY Times noted-charged that the Soviet Union had used laser beams to put U.S. early-warning satellites out of commission, and each predicted that the U.S. had been working on its own hunter-killer satellites. The current issue of Newsweek had reviewed the incident of 1975 when a U.S. early warning satellite and a companion relay satellite had been disabled over the Indian Ocean, citing "strong evidence, despite official U.S. denials, that last year's incident over Siberia was the work of a laser beam 10 000 times as strong as any natural blaze." U.S. Secy. of Defense Donald Rumsfeld had stated that the U.S. satellites had been damaged by the glare of natural gas fires along a pipeline in Western Russia, but did not deny that lasers might have caused the damage. Newsweek said the U.S. had already developed chemical lasers requiring no electrical power, and described a possible fleet of U.S. "dark satellites" with radar-absorbing exteriors that would be invisible to Soviet detection. It also predicted that a full-scale war in space-a science-fiction type of clash of hunter-killer satellites, manned orbital shuttles, and laser death rays-could "leap off the drawing boards" in the 1980s.
Reporter Tad Szulc said in the current Penthouse magazine that the U.S. government had not publicized the attack on its satellites used to police the 1972 arms pact with the USSR for fear of endangering negotiations with Moscow on a new strategic arms pact. He said Washington was perplexed by the Soviet effort to interfere with satellites that were verifying compliance with the 1972 treaty.
The NY Times noted that spokesmen for both the State Dept. and the Dept. of Defense had denied the magazine reports of interference with U.S. satellites, although DOD had verified that the USSR had been attempting to intercept its own satellites already in orbit, not always successfully. Pentagon sources told the NYT that the Soviet hunter satellites used conventional explosives, although shockwaves from an explosion would not proliferate in the vacuum of space and a hunter would have to be accurate enough to close in and destroy a target with debris. A NYT editorial 26 Nov. said the "vast sums" needed for space weapons would be more wisely spent on peace and good relations on earth. (C Trib, 23 Nov 76, 4-15; NYT, 23 Nov 76, 15; 24 Nov 76, 12; 26 Nov 76, A-22)
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