July-August 1980:milestones

April 1980

9 Soviets launch Soyuz 35 from Baikonur cosmodrome with cosmonauts Lt.Col. Leonid Popov and Valery Ryumin. (Spacecraft docked with Salyut 6,forward airlock on 10 April and crew transferred supplies from Progress 8 which had docked automatically 30 March 1980. The cargo craft, undocked on 25 April, reentered the atmosphere over the Pacific the following day).

12 Tass reports that Progress 8, docked to Salyut 6. was used to raise the orbit of the space station complex prior to the arrival of the Soyuz 35 cosmonauts.

14 NASA announces that it is studying options “to re-structure Landsat-D project because of increasing engineering and managerial problems encountered in the manufacture of the spacecraft's instruments and general systems." Difficulties have been encountered by Hughes Aircraft Company in building an advanced scanning device called the thermic mapper which should define Earth imagery in more spectral bands and with twice the resolution (30 metres) of multispectral scanners of earlier Landsats. Also, mission system coordinator, General Electric Company, is experiencing problems and delays resulting in greater than anticipated costs for development of both Landsat-D and ground systems.

14 A Space Shuttle main engine is successfully tested at 109% of rated power in the second such test in two weeks at NASA’s National Space Technology Laboratories,Bay St. Louis. The test was the second successful sustained.

16 A planned 10-minute test of the Space Shuttle's main engine cluster is terminated automatically after about six minutes at NASA’s National Space Technology Laboratories, Bay St. Louis. Mississippi. Probable cause of the shutdown is identified as a discharge overtemperature on the high pressure fuel tubopump of engine no. 2 of the three-engine cluster. There was no apparent damage to the engines or the test stand.

18 Soviets launch Cosmos 1174, a satellite interceptor, by F-1 vehicle from Tyuratam at approximately 0040 UT. Over the next two orbits, Cosmos 1174 “chases" Cosmos 1171 and intercepts it shortly after 0400 UT about 1,000 km above East Germany. Several objects which appeared after the interception were still inorbit at the end of the month. Cosmos 1171 was launched from Plesetsk into a 966 X 1009 km, 65.84 deg orbit on 3 April, using a C-1 vehicle. On 27 March,Cosmos 1169, also launched from Plesetsk, entered a 476 X 515 km, 65.84 deg orbit to act as a radar calibration target, heralding the next test of a satellite interception system.

19 Static test of a Space Shuttle Main Engine at the National Space Technology Laboratories, Bay St. Louis, is described as “highly successful". It ended series of tests with simulated power levels necessary for an "abort to orbit" during a Shuttle launch.

23 NASA issues $70,000,000 follow-on fixed price incentive contract to McDohnell Douglas Astronautics Company for Delta expendable launch vehicle services. Contract calls for continuation for two years of launch services work performed by the company for the past 19 years for Delta including mission peculiar vehicle changes, checkout and launch.

25 Progress 8 is undocked from Salyut 6 for disposal over the Central Pacific.

27 Soviets launch Progress 9 from Tyuratam-Baikonur at 09.24 hr (Moscow time) to carry additional supplies to the two cosmonauts aboard Salyut 6. Initial orbit is 119 X 171 miles (192 X 257 km) X 51.6 deg.

29 Soviets launch Cosmos 1176 from Tyuratam-Baikonur into orbit of 162 X 165 miles (260 X 265 km) X 65 deg; believed to be a radar ocean surveillance satellite of the kind previously powered by a nuclear reactor (as Cosmos 954 which disintegrated over Northern Canada in 1978).

May 1980

1 NASA announces that the three Space Shuttle Main Engihes designated for the maiden flight of the Orbiter "Columbia” will be re-tested to assure operational readiness. Each engine will be operated on the test stands of the National Space Technology Laboratories. Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. Afterwards, the engines will be returned to KSC for re-installation in "Columbia”. About six weeks before the first flight, the engines will be fired once again, for 20 seconds, on the launch pad. The testing (says NASA) "is expected to have no effect on the timing of the Shuttle’s first flight, now anticipated between November 1980 and March 1981.”

8 NASA and the European Space Agency select 37 experiments to be conducted on the first flight of Spacelab, scheduled for launch aboard the Space Shuttle in late 1982. The experiments fall into broad categories: atmospheric physics and Earth observations; space plasma physics;material sciences and technology; astronomy and solar physics, and the life sciences. Thirteen are sponsored by NASA and the remainder by ESA. The Spacelab 1 mission is to be conducted jointly by the two agencies. Five Payload Specialists, two Americans and three Europeans, are now training for the first mission. Two of this group, an American and a European, will fly aboard Spacelab 1. The other three will operate ground-based experiment equipment and assist the pair in orbit.