From: henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer)
Subject: space news from Sept 14 AW&ST
To: sci-space-news@news.arc.nasa.gov
Followup-To: sci.space
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 1992 04:38:43 GMT

ESA's first test of intersatellite communications, with data from Eureca
being relayed to ESA's ground network via the Olympus comsat, seems to
have worked, with results now being evaluated.

Magellan resumes radar mapping Sept 3, being nursed along to fill in the
last significant gap in the maps.  The mapping run will end Sept 13, to
be followed by resumption of gravity measurements.  This could be the last
Magellan mapping run, given Magellan's technical problems and the looming
threat of funding termination in the spring.

Rockwell signs Memorandum Of Understanding with NPO Energia for a number
of joint projects, notably having the Russian firm provide Mir-compatible
docking equipment to go on a shuttle orbiter.

The outlook for Hermes has gone from bad to terrible as the budget signals
from member nations keep on getting worse.  The program has already been
demoted from a manned operational craft to an unmanned demonstrator, and
may now get the kiss of death (conversion to a "technology development"
program).  The dark horse now is possible joint development with Russia
of a manned craft [presumably a semi-ballistic capsule; there have been
voices crying in the wilderness for years, saying that a capsule would
make much more sense than Hermes as Europe's first manned spacecraft].

Goldin appears ready to abandon NASP in favor of a pair of more modest
hypersonic projects, HALO and SAPHYRE, proposed by Dryden.  HALO would
be a manned Mach 10-ish research plane launched from the back of an
SR-71.  It would be boosted to high speed and altitude by a rocket
engine, and would then light up a scramjet for a few minutes' testing,
eventually gliding down for an unpowered landing.  It would fly 50-100
times over 5-7 years.  The concept is not new; ideas like this have
been kicking around for years as the logical approach to hypersonic
flight research.  Ken Iliff of Dryden, who is leading the effort, says
"a Mach 10-class vehicle is feasible with today's technology... an
intermediate step before we build a functional scramjet that has to
work the first time".  SAPHYRE, as a complement, would be a derivative
of Sandia's fairly secret SWERVE reentry vehicle, and would be flown a
small number of times at Mach 12-25 to investigate basic scramjet
physics at higher speeds.  Goldin is enthusiastic although he isn't
yet making promises:  "I don't want to commit to it yet... but boy,
does it make a lot of sense!".  The NASP people are trying desperately
to find something -- anything -- wrong with the concept.  [At last, a
hypersonics program that makes sense.  NASP, although conceived with
the best of intentions, was too big a step, and has turned into a
megaproject -- like the shuttle -- that is very hard to fund and,
if funded, cannot be allowed to fail... which is no way to run an
X-plane program.  The X-30 is dead, long live the X-32.]  [I assume
HALO would be the X-32; there already is an X-31.]

The space station survives another funding showdown in Congress, but
is likely to get a bit less money than it has asked for... which will
mean a small schedule slip.  There will also be some slippage if ASRM
dies, because all three lab modules will then need two shuttle flights
each rather than one.

Lockheed announces a technology-cooperation agreement with NPO Energia,
to include a joint effort to propose Soyuz-TM as an interim space-station
lifeboat.  ("Interim" because the current Soyuz designs don't have the
on-orbit lifetime to be parked at the station for five years without
attention, which is a design goal for the lifeboat.)

Ball wins USN contract for the Geosat Follow-On mission, one satellite
with options on two more, including delivery on orbit.  The satellite
will be a derivative of JHU-APL's experimental Geosat launched in 1985.
It will carry a passive radiometer and a radar altimeter, and will
use GPS for precision orbit determination.  The main mission is to
provide ocean data for naval operations (although the data will also
be available through NOAA).  Launch mid-1995 on Pegasus.

Editorial urging the US to get its act together, noting the diversity
of launch-vehicle projects -- NASP, ASRM, SSTO, NLS, shuttle upgrades --
and commenting that there seems to be no rational decision process for
deciding which ones are worth pursuing into full-scale development.
-- 
MS-DOS is the OS/360 of the 1980s.      | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
              -Hal W. Hardenbergh (1985)|  henry@zoo.toronto.edu  utzoo!henry
Newsgroups: sci.space.news