Astronautical and Aeronautical Events of 1962 - NASA's History Office

ASTRONAUTICAL AND AERONAUTICAL EVENTS OF 1962 163
modified versions of the equipment now under development by
NASA. . . .
“Fourth, to support the establishment of military launching
and vehicle development programs, our astronaut training program
will have to be stepped up, and military personnel will
have to be trained in the use of the complex monitoring and control
systems that constitute the brain of our entire space vehicle
effort.
“Fifth, our defense program in space will have to be provided
with whatever money may be necessary to achieve its objectives,
and to overtake the Soviet lead in manned space vehicles.
“Sixth, the machinery of cooperation between NASA and
Defense will have to be overhauled in a manner which gives due
consideration to the requirements of defense as well as to the
requirements of science. . . .”
August 24: NASA issued proposal requests to 23 industrial firms for
research, development, delivery, and installation of two separate
shock-heating, free-flight wind tunnel structures and gun development
facilities. Proposals were due at NASA hes Research
Center by September 17.
Balloonist Don Piccard set new altitude record in ascent of 17,000
ft. during two-hr. and two-min. balloon flight from Sioux City to
Kennebec, Iowa.
Laser (narrow and intense beam of light) had been sent through 28
miles of haze over the Chesapeake Bay, from Tilghman’s Island
to Patuxent, Md., in recent nighttime experiment by USN scientists.
August 26: Launch of NASA’s Mariner Venus probe, scheduled for
August 26, postponed until August 27 because of technical difficulty
encountered during prelaunch countdown on Atlas-Agena
launch vehicle.
0 Astronomers released photographs of the Humason comet in recent
collision with solar wind of magnetic particles. Jesse L. Greenstein
of Mt. Wilson and Palomar observatories said: “When
comets are close to the sun, the disintegrating effects of solar
radiation can be observed on them. This is the first time such
effects have been observed at anywhere near this distance from
the sun.” Humason comet was about 240 million miles from the
sun, traveling in a solar orbit billions of miles long.
Congressman George P. Miller, Chairman of House Committee on
Science and Astronautics, said in press interview that the greatest
accomplishment of Soviet VOSTOK 111 and IV flight was putting
two men in orbit and bringing them close together. “They’re
well ahead in that respect. But we can meet that in a couple of
years.
We’ll be ahead when Titan 3 is ready.”
AEC announced two U.S.S.R. nuclear tests in the atmosphere had
been detected, one with a yield of several megatons in the Novaya
Zemlya area and the other test of low yield at the Semipalatinsk
test site in central Siberia, the sixth and seventh Soviet tests re-
ported by AEC in the current series.
0 U.S.S.R. made unsuccessful attempt to launch Venus probe, the
launch vehicle failing to achieve escape trajectory and remainin
in arking orbit, NASA Administrator James E. Webb reportef
in 8 ept. 5, 1962, letter to Congress.