From: yee@trident.arc.nasa.gov (Peter E. Yee)
Subject: NASA Daily News for 09/09/92 (Forwarded)
Apparently-To: sci-space-news@ames.arc.nasa.gov
Followup-To: sci.space
Organization: NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA
Date: Mon, 14 Sep 1992 17:58:03 GMT

Daily                News
Wednesday, September 9, 1992  24-hour audio service at 202/755-1788

 % STS-47 flight crew arrives at Kennedy Space Center;
 % Launch weather forecast calls for 80 percent favorable probability;
 % JPL flight controllers test Galileo antenna deploy motor;
 % NASA Commercial Development Center to launch Consort tomorrow;
 % 737 windshear flight tests at Denver and Orlando have concluded;
 % Langley researchers investigating possible windowless cockpit.

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

The countdown for the launch of Endeavour for its Spacelab-Japan STS-47
mission got underway this morning at 3:00 am as scheduled.  The flight
crew, mission commander Robert Gibson, pilot Curtis Brown, Jr., and
mission specialists Mark Lee, Jerome Apt, Jan Davis and Mae Jemison,
and Japanese payload specialist Mamoru Mohri, all arrived at 8:30 this
morning at the Kennedy Shuttle Landing Facility.  The crew will be
involved in the final training briefings throughout the remainder of
the week.  The flight deck crew, Gibson and Brown, will be practicing
shuttle landings using the Shuttle Training Aircraft.

On Launch Pad 39-B, remaining activity prior to launch includes moving
the Rotating Service Structure back from Endeavour on Friday and
loading of cryogenic propellants into the External Tank early Saturday
morning.  Launch is set for 10:23 am, Saturday, September 12.  The
launch window extends through 2:17 pm.  Present weather forecast for
Saturday calls for clear skies and light winds with an 80 percent
probability of favorable launch weather throughout the window.  The
seven-day mission is scheduled to conclude on Sept. 19 with a landing
at KSC.

The next countdown process status briefing will be tomorrow at 9:00 am
on NASA Select television.  On Friday, a series of briefings will start
at 8:30 am and will cover the Spacelab-Japan mission experiments and
requirements; the Get Away Special and other secondary experiments; and
will conclude with a programmatic review at 11:30 am.  All the
briefings will be covered live on NASA Select television.

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

Jet Propulsion Laboratory Galileo flight controllers today are testing
the spacecraft's antenna deployment mechanism drive motor system.  The
test, which began yesterday, consists of two motor pulses, separated by
a day-long period during which the motor mechanism will have warmed up
nearly 40 degrees F.  These tests are similar to a previous test this
past July at a time when Galileo was much further from the Sun and the
mechanism was much colder.  The tests are part of a series of
diagnostic procedures the JPL team is undertaking to determine the
optimum manner by which to try again this January to deploy the
antenna.  The January attempt will occur when the spacecraft will be at
nearly its warmest temperature.  According to previous analyses done by
JPL, this upcoming warm period will be the most favorable time to try
using the motor mechanism to force-release the stuck antenna ribs.

The spacecraft is presently only 66.5 million miles from Earth and
closing toward its December 8 second flyby at a rate of nearly
one-and-a-half million miles a day.  Spacecraft performance continues
to be excellent.

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

The Consortium for Materials Development in Space, University of
Alabama, Huntsville, is sponsoring the suborbital flight of the Consort
5 commercial vehicle tomorrow at 10:30 am.  The launch is set to occur
from the White Sands Missile Range.  NASA Select will replay the launch
at a date and time to be announced.  The payload consists of nine
materials science and biotechnology experiments.  The consortium is one
of the NASA Centers for the Commercial Development of Space.

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

Flight safety researchers at Langley Research Center report their
series of windshear-detection flights with the NASA 737 aircraft has
now been completed.  The program involved deliberately flying the 737
into windshear conditions at the Denver and Orlando airports.  The 737
was equipped with onboard sensing devices which provided the pilots
with as much as half-a-minute's warning time to avert the windshear or
microburst downdraft.  The series of research flights took the 737
researchers through more than 50 such microburst conditions.  The
Federal Aviation Administration has mandated airlines to install
advance-warning sensors on their aircraft by the end of 1995.  NASA and
the FAA have been testing various sensor systems for the past two
years.

In another related program, Langley researchers are presently
investigating a "synthetic vision" system to provide aircraft flight
crew with cockpit information, including 3-D color images, which could
obviate concerns about poor visibility.  The program is investigating
new ways of sensing and displaying information to pilots.  One possible
beneficiary would be a supersonic transport aircraft, which could use
the synthetic vision system and eliminate cockpit window requirementsPa
change which could make unnecessary the "droop" nose of the Concorde.

  
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.  Live indicates a program is
transmitted live..

Thursday, September 10, 1992
Live   9:00 am  Countdown status briefing from 
                Kennedy Space Center, featuring Al Sofge, Shuttle Test 
                Director, Glenn Snyder, STS-47 Payload Processing 
                Manager, and Ed Priselac, Shuttle Weather Officer.

Friday, September 11, 1992
Live   8:30 am  Countdown status briefing from 
                Kennedy Space Center, featuring Al Sofge, Shuttle Test 
                Director,  and Glenn Snyder, STS-47 Payload Processing 
                Manager.
Live   9:00 am  Spacelab-Japan briefing from Kennedy 
                Space Center, featuring Fred Leslie, Marshall Space 
                Flight Center Mission Scientist, Aubray King, MSFC 
                Mission Manager, and Yoshinori Fujimori, Japan National 
                Space Agency Project Scientist.
Live  10:00 am  Get Away Special briefing from 
                Kennedy Space Center, featuring Clarke Prouty, Goddard 
                Space Flight Center GAS mission manager, Kenneth Loth, 
                Swedish Space Corporation, Stephen Goodman, British 
                Aerospace, George Thomas, TRW, Jeff Slostad, University 
                of Washington, Diane Chenevert, Spar Aerospace, and David 
                Francisco, Lewis Research Center.
Live  11:00 am  ISAIAH briefing from Kennedy Space 
                Center, featuring Gary Gutschewski, Johnson Space Center 
                Mission Manager, Marvin George Klemov, Israeli Aircraft 
                Industries, and Jacob Ishay, Tel-Aviv University.
Live   11:30 am  Pre-Launch Press conference from 
                Kennedy Space Center, featuring Lennard Fisk, Associate 
                Administrator for Space Science and Applications, Leonard 
                Nicholson, Space Shuttle Manager, Robert Sieck, Kennedy 
                Space Center Launch Director, Mike Adams, US Air Force 
                Weather Liaison Officer, and a representative from the 
                Japan National Space Agency.

Saturday, September 12, 1992
Live   10:23 am  Scheduled launch time for Endeavour 
                 or STS-47 Spacelab-Japan mission.

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.