Zucker, his backer, and selected press representatives met on a hilltop on Sussex Downs. After a first successful test launch without payload, two launches were made with postal covers. The observers guessed the rockets went as high as 400 to 800 m. Banner headlines the next day announced 'The First British Rocket Mail' and carried Zucker's claim that soon he would inaugrate regular one minute rocket post service between Dover and Calais.

FBI agents interrogate Tsien Hsue-shen on allegations that he is a Communist. The same day his security clearance is revoked, making it virtually impossible to continue meaningful work in rocketry. The allegations seem unlikely to his associates at CalTech (his wife was the daughter of one of Chiang Kai-shek's leading military strategists). Two weeks later, Tsien announces his intention to return to China. Tsien, denied the possibility to work, becomes enmeshed in a tug-of-war between differing viewpoints in the US government bureaucracy: those that want to deport him as an undesirable alien, and those that want to keep him in the country because of what he knows.

American physician payload specialist astronaut 1991-1998. Active Payload Specialist Trainee for Shuttle STS-90 Neurolab Mission; he had been Alternate Payload Specialist for STS-58 Mission SLS-2. 1 spaceflight, 15.9 days in space. Flew to orbit on STS-90 (1998).

Air Research and Development Command headquarters established a post of Special Assistant for BioAstronautics to the Deputy Commander for Ballistic Missiles. Life sciences personnel were to be placed on temporary duty with, or assigned to the ballistic missile division and authorized to make appropriate decisions. Command headquarters was to be informed of all decisions and through monthly reports maintain cognizance of development, fabrication, testing and scheduling of the life sciences portion of the over-all program. The Aeromedical Laboratory at Wright Air Development Center; USAF School of Aviation Medicine; and Aeromedical Field Laboratory of Air Force Missile Development Center were designated points of contact for weapon systems management organizations and contractors concerned with the life sciences experiments and hardware development. (Chronological Space Hist, 1958.)

Launches of Vostok 5 and 6 are delayed due to failure of the command radio line. There were many such failures during preparation of the spacecraft. It will take three to four days to fix. Kamanin inspects the site for the planned cosmonaut quarters on the Syr Darya river. It is located next to Khrushchev's houses (which he has handed over to Chelomei for quartering his people) and the television centre. The building will face east, with a view of the river and a wooded island. Bykovskiy is run through a first 'practice press conference' to teach him the correct responses to questions. The military officers want to minimise press contacts with the cosmonauts in any case. But the kids in the town are mad about the cosmonauts -- the chanted from 6 to 11 pm in the evening outside their quarters, and Kamanin has seen teenage girls stand in the rain for hours for a chance to see Titov (and he never even came out as promised).

The DRG (German Rocket Society) planned a new series of rocket launches but found further launches throughout the Germany due to a new regulation prohibiting such launches over 100 m altitude. This rule was enacted when a student was killed at Braunlage in Lower Saxony during a rocket experiment by Gerhard Zucker.

Following the third sleep period, the crew prepared for retrofire, which was initiated during the 45th revolution. The spacecraft landed at 13:59 GMTwithin 1.6 km of the primary recovery ship, the aircraft carrier Wasp. The crew remained with the spacecraft, which was hoisted aboard 53 minutes after landing.

At an 08:30 communications session Filipchenko reports to the tracking vessel Komarov that all is OK, everything normal, they are eating well. At 22:15 alarming telemetry is received that indicates that the temperatures in the fuel tanks are getting high due to the extended time of continuous exposure to the sun. They drop slightly after two minutes in shadow.

First space station flight, two years before the American Skylab. The Soyuz 11 launch proceeds without any difficulties. The first orbital correction in the set of rendezvous manoeuvres to head for Salyut 1 is made on the fourth revolution. At 15:00 Kamanin and other critical staff board a plane for the mission control centre at Yevpatoriya. The aircraft takes 4 hours 30 minutes to get there.

Equipment aboard Salyut 1 included a telescope, spectrometer, electrophotometer, and television. The crew checked improved on-board spacecraft systems in different conditions of flight and conducted medico-biological research. The main instrument, a large solar telescope, was inoperative because its cover failed to jettison. A small fire and difficult working conditions will lead to a decision to return crew before planned full duration of 30 days.

The U.S. Senate voted to prohibit the Air Force from conducting its planned eight-missile Operational Base Launch (OBL) program, Giant Patriot, scheduled for the winters of 1974-1975 and 1975-1976.The $26 million request for the test launches was deleted from the military procurement bill by the Senate vote, and the Senate restricted Minuteman operational test launches to Vandenberg AFB.

SAMSO was authorized by the Office of the Secretary of the Air Force to develop a radio guidance system for Titan III34Ds launched from Vandenberg instead of the IUS inertial guidance system. This program change would reduce development costs for the Titan III34D program.

Docked with Salyut 6. Launched unmanned to provide return vehicle for Soyuz 32 crew of Lyakhov/Ryumin after Soyuz 33 primary propulsion system failure. Checked the operation of the spacecraft propulsion unit; transportated the crew of the Salyut-6 station back to earth.

High resolution photo surveillance; film capsule; maneuverable (?); also performed earth resource tasks. Investigation of the natural resources of the earth in the interests of various branches of the national economy of the USSR and international cooperation.

Docked with Salyut 7. Delivered to the Salyut-7 orbital station a crew consisting of flight commander V A Dzhanibekov and flight engineer V P Savinykh to carry out emergency repairs to inert Salyut 7 station and to conduct scientific and technical research and experiments.

PROGRESS-56: This cargo ship was separated from the Mir station and destroyed. It was expected that this would happen before the launch of Soyuz-TM5, estimated for tomorrow. During the last operation there have been, deviations from schedules used before. Normally the period between the undockng of a freighter and the next launch is longer. During the radio conversation with TsUP during the pass in orbit 13202/13203 from 1849-1854 UTC they spoke about the departure of the Progress-36. Titov reported that they had been able to observe it until the attitude change of the station. Now this was difficult and they had to look for a suitable porthole. Manarov explained that they were positioned on one side. A few minutes later they saw the Progress-36. Titov said that it looked like Venus, even somewhat clearer. At 1853 UTC Manarov made a photograph of the freighter. He did this on a request of TsUP and used a computer for aiming the camera. At 195220 UTC he entered the command via the "display" and made the shot at 1853 UTC sharp. It was a pity that the sky was overcast over here during the periods that the 2 objects were passing. This must have been so the next pass just before the start of the Progress-36 engine at 2028 UTC to reduce its speed for decay in the atmosphere. which followed a few minutes later. Undoubtedly Moscow will speak about 6 June as for Moscow time it was already 6 June., for UTC still 5 June. A few days ago -probably with the use of the Progress engine- they changed altitude. (Somewhat higher, but enough to corrupt all prediction programs). A manoeuvre necessary for a good ballistic configuration for the rendezvous soon to follow.

SOYUZ-TM5: The last preparations are in progress now on Baykonur . If all goes well the take off will be on 7 June 1988 at 1405 UTC (1805Msc Time) The independent flight will last 2 days and my own calculation (so might deviate much or somewhat) tells me that the docking might take place on 9 June at 1538 UTC. While editing this story the commission did not yet appoint the crew which will fly. Yesterday they all were in good health and so probably the Soyuz will be flown by Solovyov, Savinykh and the Bulgarian Aleksandrov: if not so Lyakhov, Zaytsev and the Bulgarian will have to postpone terrestrial activities for 10 days. During the flight of Soyuz-TM5 there will be radio traffic on 121.750 Mc, (FM) so several ground services on West European airfields can expect funny sounds during there wok. During a previous occasion. Titov reacted on radio traffic of the Airport Rotterdam. (Until now they do not believe that!) After docking with Mir (Kvant port )the main channel for radio traffic will be 143.625 mc again. In Bulgaria there is a lot of enthusiasm and the Observatory of Stara Zagora will act as a sub control station.

Greetings and radio amateurs 73-s,

Chris van den Berg, NL-9165/A-UK3202.

Communications satellite. First successful Proton/Briz-M launch. The Proton placed the Briz-M/Gorizont payload stack into a suborbital trajectory. The stage then performed four maneuvers to put the satellite into geosynchronous orbit:

• Burn 1 placed the stack into a 200 km, 51.6 deg parking orbit probably inclined at around 51.6
• Burn 2 raised apogee to 6000 km and changed inclination slightly
• Burn 3, at second perigee, four hours after launch put the stack in a 369 x 34,988 km x 48.8 deg transfer orbit. The Briz-M then jettisoned its empty toroidal supplementary fuel tank.
• Burn 4, ten hours after launch, placed Gorizont No. 45L in near-geostationary orbit.

Launch delayed from December 2002, then to February 10, 2003, then to February 28, March 15, April 28 and May 19. Finally moved forward from June 12 and 7. Upper stage changed from DM3 after several failures. The fifth burn of the Briz-M upper stage placed the spacecraft in a geostationary transfer orbit of 6,445 km x 35,674 km x 17.2 deg. The satellite used its own engine to place itself in geosynchronous orbit at apogee. Alcatel Spacebus 3000B3 with C and Ku band communications for North America from a geotationary position of 72 deg W. Americom at the time of launch had become a subsidiary of Societe Europeene des Satellites (SES), Luxembourg, which operated the European Astra satellie constellation. As of 2007 Mar 10 located at 83.02W drifting at 0.008W degrees per day.

CIBER near infrared astronomy telescope, sent to its highest ever altitude, to minimize atmospheric emissions contaminating its observations of the cosmic extragalactic background light. The CIBER payload fell in the Atlantic as planned, and was not recovered. CIBER observes in the 0.8-2 micron band.

R&D launch. New-generation Rubezh ('Frontier') missile, most likely impacting the Balkash test range at Sary Shagan. The new missile is suspected to be a derivative of the existing Topol solid fuel series of missiles; earlier launches were in September 2011 and May and October 2012.