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Aviation History
1960
1960 - 0267.PDF
i FLIGHT, 26 February 1960 267 Missiles and Spaceflight Visiting the Jodrell Bank experimental station of Manches- ter University on February 19, Prof Alia Masevich paused in front of the 250ft steerable radio tele- scope with her host, Prof A. C. B. Love//, director of the station. Mrs Masevich ex- pressed thanks for Jodrell's help in tracking sputniks and Soviet space probes, interest in the faci- lities of the US team from Space Techno- logy Laboratories, and envy at the"big dish" US INTEREST IN SKYLARK A "multilateral" sounding-rocket programme involving the USA,Australia and Britain, was forecast in a speech in Washington on February 16 by Arnold W. Frutkin, Director of the Office of Inter-national Programs of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Mr Frutkin said "The US hopes to purchaseBritish Skylark rockets for which the Australian launching range at Woomera is fitted and to instrument them for the necessaryexperiments, the rockets themselves to be launched by the Australians." (A review article on Skylark begins on page 269.) Interest in co-operative projects, Mr Frutkin" said, had beenexpressed formally and informally to NASA by scientists in many countries. "For example, the Australians have proposed that theyprepare instrumentation to study very low-frequency emissions above the ionosphere in the regions of the lines of magnetic force.The instrumentation would be launched in rockets or satellites by the United States." Also mentioned by Mr Frutkin was the NASA plan to establishnew Minitrack satellite-tracking stations in the United Kingdom and Canada. Details of the proposed British Minitrack station, atWinkfield, were given exclusively in Flight last week. TEN-YEAR PLAN FOR SPACE The launching schedule planned by the US National Aeronauticsand Space Administration for the next decade was outlined by Richard E. Homer, NASA associate administrator, in Washingtonrecently. The numbers of major rocket vehicles involved are given in the table below: — Vehicle Redstone Atlas...Juno 2 Thor-Able Atlas-Able Scout... Thor-Delta Thor-Agena B Atlas-Agena B Atlas-Centaur SaturnNova type ... Total 1960 (Last half) 1 1 1 2 1 4 2 _ - - 12 (Quarters) 2 7 1 1 2 1 - 3 1 _ _ _ 2 — - 2 2 _ 7 1 1 1 _ _ 1 1 29 62 * _ ft S 1 3 S 28 63 _ 1 _ ft ft 4 4 7 23 Fiscal Years 64 _ ft ft 5 •; 25 65 ft ft 6 ft 4 28 66 _ ft ft 39 4 28 67 6 6 I124 28 68 ft ft .12 4 1 29 69 ft 6 12 4 2 30 Total 8 14 5 12S 56 12 43 88 27 3 260 In fiscal year 1962 and beyond, Mr Homer commented, thepresent variety of first-stage launch vehicle types would be reduced to one solid-propellant rocket (Scout) and three liquid-propellant vehicles—-Thor, Atlas and Saturn. He continued: "This, number might very well be reduced further by eliminating Thorvehicles earlier than is indicated in this chart. The Agena B and the Centaur will become our utility second stages until largernigh-energy upper stages come into use on the Saturn in fiscal year 1965 and beyond. . . . Beyond the capability of the Saturnseries of vehicles, we have provided for introduction of a vehicle, Rocket engineers will be particularly intrigued by this full-scale mock-up ot the Rocketdyne F-l, rated at 1.5m Ib thrust. It reveals the definitive Mbopump, on the axis of the chamber. This engine was illustrated by a drawing on page 201 of our issue of February 12 the Nova, with four to six times the first-stage thrust based uponthe 1| million pound F-l engine currently under development. We foresee the beginning of development testing on such a vehiclein 1968." (Photograph of engine mock-up below.) Discussing the missions to be attempted by these boosters, thespeaker said that in the current year the first orbital experiments in both meteorology and communications would be made, andalso the first sub-orbital flight of an astronaut, "boosted more than 100 miles into space with a Redstone vehicle." During 1961 "asophisticated lunar impact vehicle" would be launched, Centaur flight tests would begin, and the first orbital flight in ProjectMercury would occur. "From there we go through the ten-year period with a com-prehensive program of exploration of the Moon and the near planets and developing the Saturn launch vehicle to provide neces-sary information and capability for the beginning of manned circumlunar flight in the latter part of the decade. It appearsto be clear, from a careful analysis of launch vehicle requirements as we now understand them, and information yet to be developedthat a manned landing on the Moon will fall . . . beyond 1970." SPACE-TALK IN THE HOUSE In an adjournment debate in the House of Commons on February22, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Aviation, Geoffrey Rippon, said that a space-stabilized satellite weighingl,000-2,0001b "could, if wished," be placed in a 200-300 mile near-circular orbit by a combination of Blue Streak, Black Knightand "a small additional rocket stage" by the mid-1960s. It would provide a platform for astronomical observation. A full report ofthis debate will appear in next week's issue. Answering questions on space research in the House onFebruary 15, the Minister of Aviation, Duncan Sandys, said that plans for Anglo-American cooperation, already announced,were "developing satisfactorily"; vertical soundings and experi- ments in the ionosphere were being carried out in cooperationwith Canada and Australia; and "All Commonweath countries have been invited to give us their suggestions on all aspects of theprogramme and they are being kept fully informed of progress." After reaffirming that "we are going ahead with design studiesof the modifications which would be needed to make it possible for Blue Streak and Black Knight to be used for launching satellitesourselves," Mr Sandys said "Meanwhile we shall make any use we can of test firings to obtain further information about condi-tions in the upper atmosphere." [One scientific experiment which had "thumbed a ride" in this way in a Black Knight on October 30last was described earlier this month at the Royal Society: this was the measurement of cosmic-ray intensity, using a single Geigercounter, by the Physics Department of Imperial College.] A final question came from Woodrow Wyqtt: "Does theMinister realize that many scientists and engineers of a practical nature, as distinct from those members of the Royal Society whoadvise him, are extremely worried that, if we do'not soon begin to spend something of the order of £20m a year in space research,we will be left behind in this branch of technology by Russia and America, with consequent suffering to our expjprts in theengineering and scientific field? Will the Government stop fiddling about with sums of £100,000 or £200,000 and get on
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