Return-path: X-Andrew-Authenticated-as: 7997;andrew.cmu.edu;Ted Anderson Received: from corsica.andrew.cmu.edu via trymail for +dist+/afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr1/ota/space/space.dl@andrew.cmu.edu (->+dist+/afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr1/ota/space/space.dl) (->ota+space.digests) ID ; Fri, 18 Aug 89 00:25:19 -0400 (EDT) Message-ID: Reply-To: space+@Andrew.CMU.EDU From: space-request+@Andrew.CMU.EDU To: space+@Andrew.CMU.EDU Date: Fri, 18 Aug 89 00:25:08 -0400 (EDT) Subject: SPACE Digest V9 #608 SPACE Digest Volume 9 : Issue 608 Today's Topics: Time Urgent: Phone Service to Neptune Voyager discovers 3 additional moons around Neptune (Forwarded) Space Launch Services Purchase Act Corrections to corrections to planetary probe list. Re: Weather newsgroup? Re: Wrap up on "S-Band Beacon on the Moon" Re: Science observations selected for NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope (Forwarded) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 17 Aug 89 11:55 CDT From: Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey Subject: Time Urgent: Phone Service to Neptune Original_To: SPACE From a National Space Society press release: NSS ANNOUNCES PLAN TO OFFER PHONE SERVICE TO NEPTUNE Talk about long-distance phone calls-- the National Space Society (NSS) today announced it will produce "Dial-A-Planet," an AT&T Dial-it 900 telephone service (1-900-909-NASA). This phone link to another world will enable the public to eavesdrop on the Voyager 2 spacecraft's close encounter with the planet Neptune on August 24, 25, and 26. Callers to Dial-A-Planet will hear up-to-the-minute details of Voyager's rendezvous with Neptune as the data is received and interpreted by scientists at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. Dial-A-Planet coverage will include daily NASA press conferences, interviews with key figures on the Voyager project, and continuous updates on the scientific findings gleaned from this historic first close-up look at the planet and its mysterious system of moons and rings. Dial-A-Planet is produced by the National Space Society in cooperation with AT&T's Dial-it 900 service program and NASA. The service will be available live on a 24-hour continuous basis from 6 AM PDT on Thursday, August 24 to 6AM PDT Sunday, August 27. The live broadcasts will originate from mobile Dial-A-Planet studios at the California Institute of Technology (CalTech) in Pasadena, California. CalTech operates the Jet Propulsion Laboratory under a NASA contract. The National Space Society is a nonprofit, publicly-supported membership organization dedicated to the creation of a spacefaring civilization. NSS has more than 20,000 members and 113 throughout the United States and abroad. There is a toll charge for Dial-A-Planet; it is $2.00 for the first minute, 45 cents for each additional minute. National Space Society 922 Pennsylvania Ave, SE Washington, DC 20003 (202)543-1900 ==================================================================== Personal note: I'll be working as an announcer on Dial-A-Planet. Looking forward to it. ______meson Bill Higgins _-~ ____________-~______neutrino Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory - - ~-_ / \ ~----- proton Bitnet: HIGGINS@FNALB.BITNET | | \ / SPAN/Hepnet/Physnet: 43011::HIGGINS - - ~ Internet: HIGGINS%FNAL.BITNET@UICVM.uic.edu ------------------------------ Date: 3 Aug 89 19:59:15 GMT From: trident.arc.nasa.gov!yee@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Peter E. Yee) Subject: Voyager discovers 3 additional moons around Neptune (Forwarded) Charles Redmond August 3, 1989 Headquarters, Washington, D.C. 11 a.m. EDT Mary Beth Murrill Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. RELEASE: 89-128 VOYAGER DISCOVERS 3 ADDITIONAL MOONS AROUND NEPTUNE Images from NASA's Voyager 2 spacecraft have revealed three additional new moons in orbit around Neptune, Voyager imaging team scientists announced today. The discovery brings to six the number of moons known to exist around the blue planet, including one, 1989 N1, discovered by Voyager 2 last month. The spacecraft, launched in 1977, has explored Jupiter, Saturn and Uranus and will come within 3,000 miles of Neptune at 12 midnight EDT, Aug. 24, 1989. Finding so many moons when the spacecraft was more than 22 million miles away from Neptune may mean there are many more to be found in coming weeks, according to Voyager scientists. The three newest Neptunian satellites, temporarily designated 1989 N2, 1989 N3 and 1989 N4, were tracked as candidate moons in images returned by the spacecraft over a 5-day period. When the objects were found to follow predicted orbits, Voyager imaging scientists yesterday were able to confirm them as moons of Neptune. Their temporary names designate the order in which they were discovered. Like 1989 N1, the three new moons occupy nearly circular and equatorial orbits around the planet. All move in prograde orbits (in the same direction the planet rotates), making the large moon Triton, which occupies a retrograde orbit, even more of an oddity in the Neptune system. The innermost of the new moons is 1989 N3, which orbits at a distance of about 32,300 miles from the center of the planet or about 17,000 miles from Neptune's cloud tops. It makes one complete orbit of Neptune every 8 hours, 10 minutes. Next is 1989 N4, orbiting about 38,000 miles from the planet's center or about 23,300 miles from the cloud tops. It orbits the planet every 10 hours, 20 minutes. The outermost is 1989 N2, orbiting at about 45,400 miles from Neptune's center or about 30,000 miles from the cloud tops. It completes an orbit every 13 hours, 30 minutes. The three new moons exist in the region where partial Neptunian rings or "ring arcs" are thought to exist. If ring arcs exist, the new moons might play an important role in "shepherding" and maintaining them, Voyager scientists said. The search for moons and visible ring arcs will continue as Voyager 2 flies toward Neptune. Several sequences of spacecraft activity include plans to point Voyager 2's cameras at any newly discovered ring arcs or moons. The Voyager Mission is conducted by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., for NASA's Office of Space Science and Applications. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 3 Aug 89 10:26:22 EDT From: "GE: WE BRING GOOD THINGS TO LIFE" Subject: Space Launch Services Purchase Act X-Vms-Mail-To: EXOS%"SPACE@ANDREW.CMU.EDU" Could someone be so kind as to send me a copy of the SLSPA? Please don't take the attitude that someone else will, do it yourself. Thanks in advance, Tony Luberecki, STScI, Baltimore (On a clear disk you can seek forever!) ------------------------------ Date: 3 Aug 89 20:28:21 GMT From: frooz!cfa250!mcdowell@husc6.harvard.edu (Jonathan McDowell) Subject: Corrections to corrections to planetary probe list. From article <8908031634.AA01881@decwrl.dec.com>, by klaes@wrksys.dec.com (CUP/ASG, MLO5-2/G1 6A, 223-3283): > Jul 1, 1966 Explorer 33 93 US Lunar orbiter; failed to enter > lunar orbit. Now in Earth orbit This probe went into a very high orbit and may now have been perturbed into solar orbit > Mar 2, 1968 Zond 4 5600? USSR Zond test flight in cislunar > space. Now in solar orbit(?) Although Western tracking lost this probe, there is reason to believe it may have been on a very elliptical orbit which returned it to Earth. One rumour said that it crashed in China. > Feb 19, 1970? Unannounced 5600? USSR Lunar sample return; launch > failure Soviets now confirm Proton launch failure on Feb 6, 1970, but call the payload 'Kosmos'. Probably a Kosmos-382 class payload. Similar launch rumoured for Nov 16, 1969. > Dec 2, 1970 Kosmos 382 5600? USSR Circumlunar probe(?); failed > to leave Earth parking orbit > [... The following year, the Soviets began conducting tests in space > in an attempt to avoid the problems of their past Mars missions. In > November and December of 1970, COSMOS 379 and 382 conducted a series > of various maneuvers in Earth orbit which would later be learned by the > West as being tests of an improved rocket insertion system, designed to > place the new Mars probes on course to their target planet. These tests > were apparently successful in accomplishing their tasks.... ] This craft made a complicated series of maneuvers in Earth orbit and returned scientific data for several days. It is very unlikely that it was a planetary launch failure or related to a rocket insertion system. Many analysts believe it was an automatic Earth orbital test of a Soviet piloted lunar spaceship (LM equivalent?). K-379 is believed to be a lunar Soyuz variant, and was acknowledged prior to reentry as a 'lunar cabin' test. > Oct 13, 1975? Unannounced 5600? USSR Lunar sample return; launch > failure Proton launch failure confirmed by Soviets for Oct 16, 1975; payload confirmed as Luna. > Another Mars probe mission in 1960 was not admitted officially by > the Soviets to have existed until 1989, even though increasing rumors > had been spread about it during the intervening decades. This probe > not only failed to reach Earth orbit, it caused death and serious > destruction on the ground. According to a press release by the Soviet > weekly magazine OGONYOK in April of 1989, a third Mars probe was to be > launched on October 24 when trouble with the rocket booster occurred: > An electrical defect in the rocket had created a fuel leak. I have been trying (with my nearly nonexistent command of Russian) to translate the Ogonyok article in question. As far as I can see, it makes no reference to Mars probes at all, but links the Nedelin explosion to the first test flight of an ICBM designed by the Yangel bureau. If you have further information, I would very much appreciate hearing about it. .----------------------------------------------------------------. | Jonathan McDowell | phone : (617)495-7144 | | Center for Astrophysics | uucp: husc6!harvard!cfa200!mcdowell | | 60 Garden Street | bitnet : mcdowell@cfa.bitnet | | Cambridge MA 02138 | inter : mcdowell@cfa.harvard.edu | | USA | span : cfa::mcdowell | | | telex : 92148 SATELLITE CAM | | | FAX : (617)495-7356 | '----------------------------------------------------------------' ------------------------------ Date: 3 Aug 89 19:19:16 GMT From: ecsvax!uncmed!pelham!pswecker@mcnc.org (Peter St.Wecker) Subject: Re: Weather newsgroup? In article <1256@uvm-gen.UUCP> cavrak@uvm-gen.UUCP (Steve Cavrak,Waterman 113,656-1483,) writes: >From article <8908010047.AA29929@decwrl.dec.com>, by klaes@wrksys.dec.com > (CUP/ASG, MLO5-2/G1 6A, 223-3283): Is there a sci.meteorology > newsgroup on USENET? If not, would anyone like to create one? > Thanks, > > Larry > >Strangely enough, nothing like this show up in the ARPANET or BITNET >listing either. Even stranger considering that NCAR is so "close". >I guess the professionals don't talk about the weather, they do >something about it ! Actually, there IS a mailing list available for those who are interested in weather. Here's a copy of the original posting, giving all the info. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 17 Mar 89 11:55:08 CST From: AXVSCCN%UICVMC.BITNET@UICVM.uic.edu (Chris Novy) Subject: A new LIST for SKYWARN participants The list STORM-L has been created for the purpose of discussing weather-related phenomena such as severe storms, tornadoes, forecasting, interesting local weather events, SKYWARN storm spotter groups, and tornado chasing --to name several. You can subscribe by sending an interactive message to LISTSERV at UIUCVMD as follows: SUB STORM-L Example: SUB STORM-L John D. Doe You can also subscribe by sending the SUB command as MAIL --where the SUB command is the first line in the MAIL. MAIL can be sent to the following addresses: LISTSERV@UIUCVMD LISTSERV@UIUCVMD.BITNET LISTSERV@VMD.CSO.UIUC.EDU You can use these same addresses to send a reply to the list. To unsubscribe send the following command: UNSUB STORM-L This list is not in digested form. A monthly notebook will be maintained. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Chris Novy - WA9V BITNET: axvsccn@uicvmc Southern Illinois Univ. Internet: axvsccn@uicvmc.aiss.uiuc.edu Carbondale, IL 62901 Packet: WA9V@WD9EBQ Phone: (618) 453-1657 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Hope this helps!!! -- Peter ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Peter St.Wecker Internet:pswecker@med.unc.edu (919) 966-1096 UUCP:pswecker@uncmed.uucp Dept. of Physiology, Univ. of North Carolina, Chapel Hill NC ------------------------------ Date: 2 Aug 89 18:47:40 GMT From: peregrine!ccicpg!cci632!dvh@uunet.uu.net (David Hallidy) Subject: Re: Wrap up on "S-Band Beacon on the Moon" In article <1499@xn.LL.MIT.EDU>, wjc@XN.LL.MIT.EDU (Bill Chiarchiaro) writes: > I have finally found the reference to which I alluded in my original > posting. It appeared in QST magazine, November 1981, in the "New > Frontier" column. > > "For EME [Earth-Moon-Earth or moonbounce] work at frequencies > above 1 GHz, transmitted signals should have right-hand circular > polarisation, except on 2.3 GHz where the standard is left-hand > circular. It may be noted that reflection from the moon causes a > reversal in polarisation so that received signals will be left-hand > circular, with again the opposite on 2.3 GHz. The reason for 2.3 GHz > being the odd man out is that advantage can be taken of the 2276-MHz > beacon left on the moon during the Apollo program. This beacon has > already proved useful in testing antennas and 2.3 GHz receiving > systems, but unfortunately it transmits right-hand polarised signals, > and so the standard was reversed for 2.3 GHz." > > From the weight of responses to my original posting, I do, however, > surmise that the beacon was shut down sometime after April 1981. I think your last comment must be correct, because the 2.3 GHz EME guys (myself included) have gone to the IARU standard polarization. Since most of the EME activity has been on the 2.3 GHz band since about 1983 or so, I would imagine that the beacon has been off for at least that amount of time. Paul Wilson, W4HHK, who is credited with the first two-way off the moon on 2304 with Smitty W3GKP (sk) has never mentioned it in any of our many conversations regarding 2.3 GHz EME. We regularly listen on the band for various "beacons" including a couple of the Soviet COSMOS birds, so I feel sure if there were any chance of hearing it, or reactivating it readily, Paul would be working toward that end. After all, it's the only band he "regularly" operates! It's an interesting subject, and I personally wish that those experiments were still operational up there, as they would provide a very constant weak-signal source to use for antenna/preamp performance measurements. My $.02 on the subject. Dave KD5RO ------------------------------ Date: 4 Aug 89 02:49:05 GMT From: jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!utgpu!utzoo!henry@rutgers.edu (Henry Spencer) Subject: Re: Science observations selected for NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope (Forwarded) In article <449caca4.71d0@apollo.COM> rehrauer@apollo.COM (Steve Rehrauer) writes: > [HST's first year] ... why on (or off :-) Earth >are there only 1200 hours of observation time available? Is this the >time that has been allotted for such use, or total available time? If >the latter, why only 50 days' worth? (Hey, I *said* it was naive!) I don't know the details on this one, but one problem is that HST turns *very* slowly, so it spends a lot of its time moving from one observation to another. -- 1961-1969: 8 years of Apollo. | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology 1969-1989: 20 years of nothing.| uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu ------------------------------ End of SPACE Digest V9 #608 *******************