Exploring the Unknown - NASA's History Office

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in the months following the launch of the first ERTS, NASA found that providing the specific data
required by the users was in many ways more difficult than building the hardware. NASA’s limited
knowledge of many fields hindered its ability to specifically tailor data. Nontechnical communities,
particularly state agencies, did not understand the technology well enough to realize its capabilities
and limitations. Many potential users, unable to effectively communicate their precise needs to NASA
and unaware of what was available, were not profiting from ERTS data. A note on Senator
Anderson’s letter to NASA Administrator James Fletcher refers to a “Chuck” and “Frank.” “Chuck”
was Charles Matthews, the NASA Associate Administrator in charge of the ERTS program, and
“Frank” was Senator Anderson’s aide Frank DiLuzio.
[1] October 14, 1972
Dr. James C. Fletcher, Administrator
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Washington, D.C. 20546
[handwritten note: “Chuck, I’m inclined to think Frank is right here. $ is a problem but
I’m afraid NASA has to take the leadership here—JGF”]
Dear Jim:
OBSERVING THE EARTH FROM SPACE
For quite some time, this office has been following the progress of the ERTS-A
Program, and, specifically, the transferring of information gathered by the cameras and
sensors on board ERTS to end users. It is obvious from testimony, news stories and public
news releases of NASA that the initial users of the data will be the Corps of Engineers, the
Environmental Protection Agency and the Departments of the Interior, Commerce and
Agriculture. These are Government agencies with statutory mission assignments that can
utilize the data. It is also true that to a great degree, they have within their agencies the
needed expertise to interpret and apply such data to specific programs. This is a talent
which I do not believe exists in other potential user groups which need assistance and
which are not being given the proper attention. These groups include state planning
agencies, state regulatory agencies, regional compacts, state and regional industrial and
educational groups and resource planning groups.
I firmly believe that full and profitable utilization of ERTS data will only be accomplished
when it is made available to individual states, regional compacts and consortia. I
further believe that unless there is a more concentrated effort to make the information
available to the end users, nothing dramatic is going to happen regardless of how valuable
and useful the collected data is for land use planning, flood plan control, forest land management,
resources identification and development, etc.
This problem was perhaps best illustrated at a recent meeting of the Federation of
Rocky Mountain States in Boise, Idaho. It was very evident that while NASA has done a fair
job in setting up sources to which users could write for “imagry,” [sic] the locations and
capabilities of these centers were not well known. Also, the potential users did not seem
to know what was available and, therefore, could not ask for specific “imagry” [sic] with a
precise reference.
[2] I do not mean to criticize NASA, but merely to reiterate that it has always been very difficult
to take new technology and make it easily available in understandable and useful
forms to the end users. This has been true with many new technologies, and it also is true
with ERTS. It is very difficult to initially inform and keep informed the several different ultimate
users, and it also is difficult at times to even identify the ultimate user of such data.