From: yee@trident.arc.nasa.gov (Peter E. Yee)
Newsgroups: sci.space.news
Subject: NASA Headline News for 04/08/92 (Forwarded)
Date: 8 Apr 92 18:07:01 GMT
Article-I.D.: news.1992Apr8.180701.4805
Followup-To: sci.space
Organization: NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA
Apparently-To: sci-space-news@ames.arc.nasa.gov


             Headline News
Internal Communications Branch (P-2) NASA Headquarters

      Audio Service: 202 / 755-1788

This is NASA Headline News for April 8, 1992   . . .

STS-49 mission commander Dan Brandenstein and his fellow 
crewmembers at a press conference this morning said their mission will 
exercise new procedures for orbital rendezvous.  Previous 
rendezvous operations with shuttle orbiters have involved quiescent 
satellites already positioned in their rendezvous orbit.  For the Intelsat 
satellite rendezvous, retrieval, repair and redeploy sequence for the 
STS-49 mission, the Intelsat satellite will be in a 300-mile-high orbit at 
the start of the mission.  Following Endeavour's launch into a 
200-mile-high orbit, Intelsat flight controllers will use four 
maneuvers to lower the communications satellite to the 
Endeavour's orbit.  The nominal orbit circularization maneuver 
performed immediately following an orbiter's launch will be used on this 
mission for the orbiter's initial rendezvous phasing maneuver.

The crew also said that all seven crewmembers will be using "hot" 
microphones during the rendezvous operations, meaning all the 
internal and air-to-ground communications among the crew and 
between the orbiter and the flight controllers in Houston will be 
transmitted live.  The mission will also feature several orbiter 
maneuvers with space-suited crewmembers tethered inside the payload 
bay.  This crew also will give Earth-bound viewers a better view of their 
activity through the use of additional television cameras mounted on 
the helmets of the satellite-grappling crewmembers -- Rick Hieb and 
Pierre Thuot.  Two other crewmembers --  Kathryn Thornton and Tom 
Akers -- will also be spacewalkers on this flight.  The mission calls for 
three spacewalks as part of the mission goal of performing successive 
spacewalks to demonstrate the capability to support space station 
assembly procedures.

The terminal countdown demonstration test with the crew and the 
Kennedy Space Center launch team is set to occur on April 17.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

This afternoon at 1:00 pm astronomers working with data from 
the Hubble Space Telescope will present new findings which 
strongly suggest a massive black hole is at the center of the 
small galaxy M32.  M32 is a companion elliptical galaxy to M31 -- 
Andromeda -- and is quite small and compact, with a diameter of only 
1,000 light years.  It is one of the Milky Way's closest neighbors at a 
distance of only 2.3 million light years.  The findings result from HST 
observations which show the density of stars in the nucleus of M32 
appears to increase steadily towards the center of the galaxy with no 
signs of leveling off.  The results are very similar to predictions for 
what a massive black hole should do to the central structure of a 
galaxy.  HST investigator Tod Lauer, National Optical Astronomy 
Observatories, said "this is the densest stellar system known.  The 
density of stars may be over 100 million times greater than the 
distribution of stars in the neighborhood of the Sun."  According to 
Lauer, a visitor to a planet in the M32 system would be able to read 
newspapers by starlight.  Lauer said the night sky there would never 
get darker than an Earth twilight.  The scientific presentation will be 
shown live on NASA Select TV.


  
Here's the broadcast schedule for Public Affairs events on NASA 
Select TV.  Note that all events and times may change without notice, 
and that all times listed are Eastern.
  
     9:00 am  STS-49 pre-mission flight crew briefing from JSC.
    12:00 pm  Safe Computing.
    12:15 pm  Aeronautics and Space Report.
    12:30 pm  Setting the Stage for the Future.
     1:00 pm  Hubble Space Telescope / Compton Gamma Ray 
                 Observatory press conference on Black Holes and Quasars 
                 from NASA Headquarters.
     2:00 pm  Delayed presentation of Associate Administrator for Space 
                 Science and Applications Dr. Lennard Fisk's testimony on 
                 the Landsat program before the House Environment 
                 Subcommittee (taped on April 7).
     4:00 pm  NASA Today and subsequent programming repeats.
     8:00 pm  NASA Today and subsequent programming repeats.
    12:00 am  NASA Today and subsequent programming repeats.
Thursday, April 9, 1992
    12:00 pm  NASA Today news program followed by historical and 
                 educational programs.
     4:00 pm  NASA Today and subsequent programming repeats.
     8:00 pm  NASA Today and subsequent programming repeats.
    12:00 am  NASA Today and subsequent programming repeats.
Friday, April 10, 1992
    12:00 pm  NASA Today news program followed by historical and 
                 educational programs.
     4:00 pm  NASA Today and subsequent programming repeats.
     8:00 pm  NASA Today and subsequent programming repeats.
    12:00 am  NASA Today and subsequent programming repeats.
  
This report is filed daily at noon, Monday through Friday.  It is a 
service of NASA's Office of Public Affairs.  The editor is Charles 
Redmond, 202/453-8425 or CREDMOND on NASAmail.  NASA Select 
TV is carried on GE Satcom F2R, transponder 13, C-Band, 72 degrees 
West Longitude, transponder frequency is 3960 MegaHertz, audio 
subcarrier is 6.8 MHz, polarization is vertical.
Newsgroups: sci.space.news