Tag Archives: space history

Bouncing Signals Off the Moon, a Half Century Ago

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Today in space history — 50 years ago, in fact — an intercontinental radio transmission was made using the moon as a relay station. The signal went from Jodrell Bank, England to the Air Force Cambridge Research Center in Bedford, MA.

(Click to enlarge.)

It was a neat idea, and perfectly reasonable in the age before long-lived, reliable communications satellites had been built. This book chapter details the Jodrell Bank work, and this page discusses an earlier U.S. Navy program to use the moon as a communications relay.

(Image from Flickr, by longhorndave, Creative Commons licensed.)

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A Lifting Body and a 'Misty' Launch

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Two space history anniversaries today:

Forty years ago today — May 9, 1969 — John A. Manke flew the HL-10 lifting body in its first supersonic flight at the Dryden Flight Research Facility at Edwards Air Force Base.

(HL-10 on the Edwards AFB lakebed, with B-52 flyover. NASA photo ECN-2203. Click to enlarge.)

And fifteen years ago — May 9, 1994 — a Scout rocket launched from Vandenberg AFB carrying the second Miniature Sensor Technology Integration spacecraft: MSTI-2, pronounced “Misty-two.” I was stationed at Vandy at the time, though I confess I don’t remember that particular launch.

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Space History: Magellan, Mission to Venus

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Twenty years ago today — May 4, 1989 — the Space Shuttle Atlantis launched from Kennedy Space Center on mission STS-30. Astronauts David M. Walker, Ronald J. Grabe, Norman E. Thagard, Mary L. Cleave, and Mark C. Lee deployed the Magellan spacecraft on its voyage to map the planet Venus.

(STS-30 mission patch. Click to enlarge.)

The Magellan mission used synthetic aperture radar to map 98% of the planet’s surface before contact with the spacecraft was lost in October 1994. More information about the mission is available on this NASA page.

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Goddard, ENTERPRISE, and the Agent Scorecard

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Fifty years ago today — May 1, 1959 — The “Beltsville Center” was renamed the Goddard Space Flight Center in honor of the first person to launch a liquid-propellant rocket, Dr. Robert Goddard.

Thirty years ago today marked the first time the Space Shuttle pathfinder configuration — using the Shuttle Enterprise — was assembled in the Vehicle Assembly Building and transported to Launch Complex 39A.

(Shuttle Enterprise at the Udvar-Hazy Center of the National Air & Space Museum. Click to enlarge.)
(Image from Wikipedia by Ad Meskens, licensed under Creative Commons.)

Finally, after the first week here’s the tally on my hunt for a literary agent:

  • Agents queried: 9
  • Rejections received: 4

No expressions of interest or offers of representation yet. I’m still researching other agents to query. Wish me luck!

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Gravity Probe-B Launch Anniversary, Plus Two Launches

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Five years ago today — April 20, 2004 — NASA’s Gravity Probe-B spacecraft was launched by a Delta 2 rocket from Vandenberg AFB. The mission carried four gyroscopes that were

the most perfect spheres ever made by humans. If these ping pong-sized balls of fused quartz and silicon were the size of the Earth, the elevation of the entire surface would vary by no more than 12 feet.

according to this NASA page. The mission was designed to test Einstein’s theory of space-time, and especially the effects of a rotating mass like the Earth on space-time. It collected date for 17 months, but solar flares and other glitches corrupted some of the data according to this report.

In more recent launch news, the Indians launched an Israeli-built spy satellite and Sea Launch launched a military communications satellite for Italy.

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First X-24 Flight, Forty Years Ago

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Forty years ago today — April 17, 1969 — Air Force test pilot Jerauld R. Gentry flew the X-24 lifting body demonstrator on its first glide flight at the Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards AFB, California. The X-24 program investigated the flight regime of unpowered vehicles returning from space, and provided important data for developing the Space Shuttle.

(NASA Image ECN-2006. Click to enlarge.)

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Two Obscure Space Anniversaries

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Today we offer two space anniversaries that are a bit more obscure than usual:

Fifty years ago today — April 13, 1959 — the Discoverer-2 satellite launched from Vandenberg AFB on a Thor Agena rocket. Discoverer was the cover name for the CORONA photoreconnaissance program. Here’s a fascinating page about CORONA on the National Reconnaissance Office web site.

And thirty-five years ago today — April 13, 1974 — Westar-1, the first domestic communication satellite, launched from Cape Canaveral on a Delta rocket.

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Space History: Space Radar on the Shuttle

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Fifteen years ago today — April 9, 1994 — the Space Shuttle Endeavour launched from Kennedy Space Center on mission STS-59. Astronauts Sidney M. Gutierrez, Kevin P. Chilton,* Linda M. Godwin, Jerome “Jay” Apt, Michael R. Clifford, and Thomas D. Jones operated the Space Radar Laboratory (SRL-1) on this mission.

You would think, 15 years after it was demonstrated on a shuttle flight, that the U.S. would have a more robust space-based radar capability. Alas, no: when I was on active duty, serving on the Air Staff, the Air Force was still advocating for that program. (Here’s a 2005 Space Review article about it.) I doubt there will be any room for it in the Pentagon budget any time soon.

___
*Now a USAF General. He commanded AF Space Command and is the current Commander of US Strategic Command.

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Challenger Launch, 25 Years Ago

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Twenty-five years ago today — April 6, 1984 — the Space Shuttle Challenger launched from the Kennedy Space Center on mission STS-41C. , 8:58 a.m., EST, KSC. Astronauts Robert L. Crippen, Francis R. Scobee, Terry J. Hart, George D. Nelson, and James Van Hoften launched the Long Duration Exposure Facility (LDEF)-1 launched and performed the first in-orbit spacecraft repair on the Solar Max satellite.


(NASA image of STS-41C launch.)

[BREAK, BREAK]

The past few days, I’ve seen a lot of space-related news stories — the North Korean launch failure, the possibility that Congress might start letting U.S. companies sell militarily critical space technology, etc. — so I posted some of them in the Space Warfare Forum for anyone who might be interested.

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