Astronautics and Aeronautics, 1967 - NASA's History Office

June 25 ASTRONAUTICS AND AERONAUTICS, 1967
involvement in current Middle East crisis. (NASA Ann, 6/20/67; NET
Proj Off)
During week of June 25: Ceremonies at NASA% Rocket Engine Test Site at
Edwards AFB marked delivery of the millionth ton of cryogenic rocket
propellants and pressurants. Fluids were used by North American Avia-
tion, Inc.’s Rocketdyne Div. to test fire F-1 engines prior to shipping
them to MSFC for use in Saturn v 1st stages. (MSFC Release 67-139)
June 26: NASA’s
Mariner V spacecraft successfully completed two scheduled
functions in preparation for Oct. 19 Venus flyby mission by switching its
amplifiers to increase radio transmitting power and, 30 min later, turning
off its battery charger on commands from Goldstone, Calif., Deep
Space Network station. All systems onboard spacecraft, launched from
ETR June 14, were continuing to operate satisfactorily. (NASA Release
67-165)
KSC awarded Federal Electric Corp. a one-year, cost-plus-award-fee contract
containing provisions for four additional one-year renewals to
provide operational communications and instrumentation support services
at KSC. Estimated value for five-year period beginning July 1 was
$85 million. Federal Electric would operate and maintain instrumentation
for telemetry, tracking, instrument calibration, and computation
equipment and would provide computer programming services. (NASA
Release 67-167)
June 27: Both House and Senate considered NASA FY 1968 authorization
bills. Final votes would be taken June 28. (NASA LAR VI/68)
* NASA Deputy Administrator Dr. Robert C. Seamans, Jr., visited MSFC and
MTF to discuss progress in AA and Saturn launch vehicle programs.
He would visit MSC June 28. (MSFC Release 67-132; Marshall Star,
6/28/67, 1)
* The wife of Soviet Cosmonaut Aleksey Leonov, first man to walk in space,
gave birth to their second daughter, Soviet press reported. ( UPI, W Post,
6/28/67, A18)
9 Survey by New Yorlc Times correspondents indicated that Western Europe
had taken little action to close the “technology gap” with the US., Brendan
Jones reported. Discussions and meetings had helped clarify the
problems but had also caused discouragement about achieving any
quick solutions. Survey, which covered 10 countries, also indicated that
increases being made in research spending in Western Europe were
still comparatively small. Plans for combining technical knowledge by
Common Market countries or increasing exchange of technology with
U.S. through NATO were in only the proposal stages. (Jones, NYT,
6/27/67,51)
France exploded a nuclear device of “low yield” near Mururoa Atoll in
the Pacific. (AP, NYT, 6/28/67,3)
June 28: House and Senate both passed NAS.4 FY 1968 authorization bills
which were less than the $5.1 billion originally requested by NASA.
Senate bill (S. 1296) authorized $4.851 billion: $4.136 billion for R&D;
$648 million €or administrative operations; and $67 million for construction
of facilities. House bill (H.R. 10340) authorized $4.791
billion: $4.076 billion for R&D; $648 million for administrative operations;
and $67 million for construction of facilities.
Senate defeated two amendments by Sen. William Proxmire (D-
Wis.) to reduce NASA authorization-one by $317 million; one by
$98 million. An amendment by Sen. Charles Percy (R-Ill.) which would
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