The deputy commander organizational structure, under which the division carried out its development mission and support functions, was enlarged to four deputy commanders--one each for ballistic missiles, military space systems, installations, and resources. 3 (Hist, The Space Systems Division--Background (1957-1962), Feb 63, prep by SSD Hist Div.)

First probe to impact lunar surface. Delivered a pennant to the surface of the Moon and conducted research during flight to the Moon. Impacted Moon 13 Sep 1959 at 22:02:04 UT, Latitude 29.10 N, Longitude 0.00 - Palus Putredinis, east of Mare Serenitatis near the Aristides, Archimedes, and Autolycus craters. After launch and attainment of escape velocity, Luna 2 separated from its third stage, which travelled along with it towards the Moon. On 13 September the spacecraft released a bright orange cloud of sodium gas which aided in spacecraft tracking and acted as an experiment on the behavior of gas in space. On 14 September, after 33.5 hours of flight, radio signals from Luna 2 abruptly ceased, indicating it had impacted on the Moon. Some 30 minutes after Luna 2, the third stage of its rocket also impacted the Moon. The mission confirmed that the Moon had no appreciable magnetic field, and found no evidence of radiation belts at the Moon.

President John F. Kennedy spoke at Rice University, Houston, Tex., where he said:

"Man, in his quest for knowledge and progress, is determined and cannot be deterred. The exploration of space will go ahead, whether we join in it or not, and it is one of the great adventures of all time, and no nation which expects to be the leader of other nations can expect to stay behind in this race for space. . . .

"We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.

"It is for these reasons that I regard the decision last year to shift our efforts in space from low to high gear as among the most important decisions that will be made during my incumbency in the office of the Presidency. . . ."

NASA announced it would launch a special satellite before the end of the year 'to obtain information on possible effects of radiation on future satellites and to give the world's scientific community additional data on the artificial environment created by the radiation belt.' The 100-pound satellite would be launched from Cape Canaveral into an elliptical orbit ranging from about 170-mile perigee to 10,350-mile apogee. First 'mystery' satellite in history of space exploration was launched, according to British magazine Flight International. The magazine said the satellite orbited at a height of 113 miles and reentered the earth's atmosphere 12 days later. The satellite was listed as belonging to the U.S. Air Force, but spokesman said this was a 'scientific guess based on our assessment of previous satellite launchings.' Launching was not confirmed, and no official U.S. listing included such a satellite.

The President's Scientific Advisory Committee requested a briefing from the Air Force on possible military space missions, biomedical experiments to be performed in space, and the capability of Gemini, Apollo, and the X-20 vehicles to execute these requirements.

NASA announced that, in the future, unmanned lunar landing spacecraft e.g., Rangers and Surveyors) will be assembled in "clean rooms" and treated with germ-killing substances to reduce the number of microbes on exposed surfaces. These sterilization procedures, less stringent than earlier methods, were intended to prevent contamination of the lunar surface and, at the same time, avoid damage to sensitive electronic components. Heat sterilization was suspected as one of the reasons for the failure of Ranger spacecraft.

Tsien had conducted a series of meetings with the Chinese leadership during the year to redefine China's missile development plans. There are clashes between Tsien, who favours an American engineering approach, and his staff, who were trained in Russian and favour the Soviet approach. Finally the missiles were defined by their target objectives, and a new development plan was adopted, with definite goals. The 1059 missile (copy of Russian R-2) was redesignated DF-1. The DF-2 was to be improved to carry an atomic bomb to a range sufficient to hit Japan. The DF-3 ICBM was cancelled, and the new DF-3 project would involve development of a nuclear-tipped missile capable of reaching the Philippines (earlier referred to as the DF-1). The DF-4 was to be capable of hitting Guam, and the DF-5 would be an ICBM capable of reaching the United States. The DF-2, DF-3 and DF-4 would use strap-down accelerometer guidance packages, while the DF-5 was to be equipped with a full-fledged inertial guidance unit.

Hurricane Betsy hit the United States and Apollo Program Director Samuel C. Phillips presented an interim report to NASA Associate Administrator Robert C. Seamans, Jr., concerning the effects of the storm on NASA property and programs:

Michoud (La.) Plant

all of the buildings suffered moderate to severe damage. So far as could be determined, Saturn hardware in process was not damaged to any appreciable extent. Damage was estimated at between $2 and $4 million. Time lost by the storm and due to cleanup and repairs would probably affect program schedules by two or more weeks.

Transportation

the barge Promise tied up at the Michoud dock broke free and was beached. Externally, no damages were visible. The dock area was heavily damaged.

Production of Liquid Hydrogen

Air Products, Inc., plant under construction across the canal from Michoud was reported to be under nine feet of water. Extent of the damage was unknown.

Reentry Ships Huntsville and Watertown

these vessels were under modification at the Avondale Shipyard, New Orleans. Both broke loose and were hard aground. The Watertown was battered but the holds were dry; it looked like it could be salvaged. The Huntsville had a 9-m (30-ft) gash in the side plus three other holes. The engine rooms were flooded. Navy salvage crews did not think the vessel was salvageable.

Cape Kennedy

damage from the storm was minor. The storm did cause a shutdown of site activation activities on Complex 34, costing four critical days.

More highjinks with Conrad. First orbit docking with Agena, followed by boost up to record 800 km orbit, providing first manned views of earth as sphere. Tether attached by Gordon to Agena in spacewalk and after a lot of effort tethered spacecraft put into slow rotation, creating first artificial microgravity.

The primary objective of the Gemini XI mission was to rendezvous with the Gemini Agena target vehicle (GATV) during the first revolution and dock. Five maneuvers completed the spacecraft/GATV rendezvous at 1 hour 25 minutes ground elapsed time, and the two vehicles docked nine minutes later. Secondary objectives included docking practice, extravehicular activity (EVA), 11 experiments, docked maneuvers, a tethered vehicle test, demonstrating automatic reentry, and parking the GATV. All objectives were achieved except one experiment - evaluation of the minimum reaction power tool - which was not performed because umbilical EVA was terminated prematurely. Umbilical EVA began at 24 hours 2 minutes ground elapsed time and ended 33 minutes later. Gordon became fatigued while attaching the tether from the GATV to the spacecraft docking bar. An hour later the hatch was opened to jettison equipment no longer required. At 40 hours 30 minutes after liftoff, the GATV primary propulsion system (PPS) was fired to raise the apogee of the docked vehicles to 741 nautical miles for two revolutions. The PPS was fired again, 3 hours 23 minutes later, to reduce apogee to 164 nautical miles. The crew then prepared for standup EVA, which began at 47 hours 7 minutes into the flight and lasted 2 hours 8 minutes. The spacecraft was then undocked to begin the tether evaluation. At 50 hours 13 minutes ground elapsed time, the crew initiated rotation. Initial oscillations damped out and the combination became very stable after about 20 minutes; the rotational rate was then increased. Again, initial oscillations gradually damped out and the combination stabilized. At about 53 hours into the mission, the crew released the tether, separated from the GATV, and maneuvered the spacecraft to an identical orbit with the target vehicle. A fuel cell stack failed at 54 hours 31 minutes, but the remaining five stacks shared the load and operated satisfactorily. A rerendezvous was accomplished at 66 hours 40 minutes ground elapsed time, and the crew then prepared for reentry.

Kamanin advises Nikolayev his chances of being named to fly Soyuz 8 are very low. Tereshkova arrives at Kamanin's office in the evening. She is infuriated that her husband is not to be allowed to fly the mission. She says she will take the matter to Ustinov and Polanskiy. Kamanin tells her that would be a mistake.

Lunar Sample Return. Landed on Moon 20 September 1970 at 05:18:00 GMT, Latitude 0.68 S, Longitude 56.30 E - Mare Fecunditatis. Luna 16 was launched toward the Moon from a preliminary earth orbit and entered a lunar orbit on September 17, 1970. On September 20, the spacecraft soft landed on the lunar surface as planned. The spacecraft was equipped with an extendable arm with a drilling rig for the collection of a lunar soil sample. After 26 hours and 25 minutes on the lunar surface, the ascent stage, with a hermetically sealed soil sample container, left the lunar surface carrying 100 grams of collected material. It landed in the Soviet Union on September 24, 1970. The lower stage of Luna 16 remained on the lunar surface and continued transmission of lunar temperature and radiation data. Parameters are for lunar orbit.

The Phase B contractors, plus Grumman/Boeing and Lockheed, are given further study contracts to produce shuttle designs based on the expendable external tank approach. Lockheed was asked to evaluate the NASA Houston design using an MSC-040 configuration orbiter, external tank, including the MSC040C using three high-performance engines. While the USAF was driving the shuttle design criteria, it had so far not committed to any significant funding for the shuttle. The USAF contribution was limited to allowing NASA use the government-owned Plant 42 at Palmdale, paying for any launch facilities at Vandenberg AFB needed for USAF launches, and providing flight test support at Edwards AFB.

SAMSO awarded a contract to Avco Systems Division for production of carbon-carbon nosetips for the Mark 12A reentry system. A small business set-aside contract to Fiber Materials, Incorporated was subsequently voided. A total of 1,071 nosetips were to be produced by Avco for a total price of $11,998,739.

Manned five crew. Deployed UARS; conducted materials and biological research. Payloads: Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS), Ascent Particle Monitor (APM)-03, Physiological and Anatomical Rodent Experiment (PARE)-01, Protein Crystal Growth (PCG)-ll-2, Middeck Zero-Gravity Dynamics, Experiment (MODE)-01, Investigations Into Polymer Membrane Processing (IPMP)-04, Cosmic Radiation Effects and Activation Monitor (CREAM-02), Radiation Monitoring Equipment (RME)-lll-06, Shuttle Activation Monitor (SAM)-03, Air Force Maui Optical Site (AMOS) Calibration Test.

Upper Atmospheric Research Satellite; deployed from STS-48 on 15 Sepetember 1991. It studied the depletion of the ozone layer, confirming that CFCs cause the `ozone hole', and improved models of upper atmosphere chemistry, including studies of methane in the Antarctic, sulphur dioxide from volcanoes, and global wind measurements. Some media hysteria surrounded its reentry on 24 September 2011, but it apparently came down unobserved in the Pacific Ocean east of Hawaii.

Manned seven crew. Carried Spacelab-J with microgravity and biology experiments. Payloads: Spacelab-J, nine getaway special canister experiments, Israel Space Agency Investigation About Hornets (ISAIAH), Shuttle Amateur Radio Experiment (SAREX) II, Solid Surface Combus-tion Experiment (SSCE).

Deployed and retrieved Orfeus-SPAS. During the EVA conducted tests in support of the Hubble Space Telescope first servicing mission and future EVAs, including Space Station assembly and maintenance. First night landing at KSC. Payloads: Advanced Communication Technology Sat-ellite (ACTS)/Transfer Orbit Stage (TOS), Orbiting Retrievable Far and Extreme Ultraviolet Spectrometer—Shuttle Pallet Satellite (ORFEUS-SPAS) with Remote IMAX Camera System (RICS), Limited Duration Space Environ-ment Candidate Materials Exposure (LDCE) (Beam Configuration C), Commercial Protein Crystal Growth (CPCG Block II), Chromosome and Plant Cell Division in Space (CHROMEX), High Resolution Shuttle Glow Spectroscopy-A (HRSGS-A), Auroral Photography Experiment-B (APE-B), Investigation into Polymer Membrane Processing (IPMP), Radiation Monitoring Equip-ment (RME-III), Air Force Maui Optical Site Cal-ibration Test (AMOS), IMAX In-Cabin Camera.

NASA experimental communications; Advanced Communications Technology Satellite; deployed from STS-51 9/12/93; 100 deg W. Positioned in geosynchronous orbit at 100 deg W in 1993-1999 105 deg W in 2000. As of 5 September 2001 located at 105.36 deg W drifting at 0.007 deg W per day. As of 2007 Mar 10 located at 105.14W drifting at 0.004W degrees per day.

METSAT 1 was an Indian (ISRO) meteorological, geostationary satellite that was launched by an upgraded, four-stage PSLV-C4 rocket. The satellite was manoeuvred from the transfer orbit to a geostationary postion at 37° E longitude on September 16, and then was parked at 74° E longitude on September 24. As of 2007 Mar 11 located at 74.00E drifting at 0.007W degrees per day.

The unloading of nearly three tons of new supplies from a Progress cargo vehicle began in earnest this week aboard the International Space Station. Commander Yuri Malenchenko and NASA ISS Science Officer Ed Lu spent time each day unpacking, cataloging and stowing the equipment. Additional Details: here....

Military communications satellite, launched to replace Zhongxing 22 in geosynchronous orbit at 98.0 E. Part of the Feng Huo series for secure digital data and voice tactical military communications. As of 2007 Mar 10 located at 98.10E drifting at 0.006W degrees per day.

Tongxing Jisshu Shiyan Weixing yi hao (Communications Engineering Test Satellite No. 1). Military satellite; speculation was that it was the first in a constellation of ballistic missile early warning satellites. The booster's upper stage reached a 208 km x 635 km x 27.1 deg parking orbit 10 minutes after launch and coasted to the equator, where a second burn at 16:01 GMT sent the stage and payload to a 195 km x 35,814 km x 27.1 deg geotransfer orbit.