Space & Astronomy/Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso/pc/text/spacedig/v09_3/v9_396.txt

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Subject: SPACE Digest V9 #396

SPACE Digest                                      Volume 9 : Issue 396

Today's Topics:
        Barium Cloud Experiment (Update 2) (Forwarded)
               Barium Cloud Experiment
         Re: US citizen - ET contact legal penalties
            Re: NSS Hotline Update
      NASA Aircraft to Support Int'l. Global Ocean Study
     Associate Deputy Administrator Hinners to resign (Forwarded)
       Odom announces retirement from NASA (Forwarded)
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: 25 Apr 89 23:09:16 GMT
From: trident.arc.nasa.gov![e-mail]  (Peter E. Yee)
Subject: Barium Cloud Experiment (Update 2) (Forwarded)

Dwayne C. Brown
Headquarters, Washington, D.C.                    April 25, 1989


ADVISORY


     NASA's rocketborne scientific experiment that will create
colorful artificial clouds at high altitudes above NASA's Wallops
Island, Va., range has been postponed for 24 hours because of
unfavorable weather conditions.  The earliest launch time is
approximately 9:31 p.m. EDT tomorrow, pending a 1:30 p.m. weather
briefing.

     Almost perfect weather conditions are needed at the optical
observation sites.  The cloud is expected to be visible along the
East Coast.

------------------------------

Date: 25 Apr 89 20:53:45 GMT
From: bbn.com![e-mail]  (Dick Koolish)
Subject: Barium Cloud Experiment


There is a recorded message about the barium cloud experiment launch
at the Wallops Is Audio News Service.  Phone is 804-824-2050.

------------------------------

Date: 22 Apr 89 23:39:39 GMT
From: uhccux![e-mail]  (Larry Osborne)
Subject: Re: US citizen - ET contact legal penalties

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Mike Van Pelt) writes:
> In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Larry Osborne) writes:
> >1211.101) is headed "Applicabil
>
> Some of the message seems to have been cut off.
>

Yes, it does seem so.

Your speculation that this is moon-mission inspired seems well founded.
The source is given as "SOURCE 34 FR 11975, July 16, 1969, unless
otherwise noted."  Several times the document refers to the Lunar
Receiving Laboratory at the Houston Manned Spacecraft Center.

To summarize what seems to have been deleted from my previous message,
the applicability is stated as "...all NASA manned and unmanned space
missions which land on or come within the atmospheric envelope of
a celestrial body and return to the Earth."

This limitation is comforting, considering some of the other provisions.

Section 1211.102 (Definitions), defines "extraterrestrially exposed" as
anything that touches or comes within the atmospheric envelope of any
other celestial body, or has "touched directly or been in close proximity
to (or been exposed indirectly to) any person, property, animal or
other form of life or matter [!] which has been extraterrestrialy exposed...".

Section 1211.104  (Policy), gives NASA the right to:

     "Determine that a particular person, property, animal, or other form
of life or matter whatever is extratrestrially exposed and quarantine such
person, property, animal, or other form of life or matter whatever.  The
quarantine may be based only on a determination, with or without the benefit
of a hearing, that there is probably cause to believe that such person,
property, animal or other from of life or matter whatever is
extraterrestrially exposed."

     It also gives NASA the authority to put quarantine stations
anywhere in the US and to hire guards.

     Comfortingly, the last paragraph of the section says that if
you're quarantined you can call your lawyer "at the earliest practicable
time".

Section 1211.107 says that NASA can refuse to release you even if you
have a court "request, order, or demand".

Frankly, every time I read a law or federal regulation I get the same
reaction I do to medical journals.  It's a wonder we aren't all dead
or in jail. :^)  Mostly I take it on faith that the government won't
run hog-wild with all the authority we give them, and that my liver
won't pack up just because I can't see why it keeps on working.

--
[e-mail] (preferred)      | Larry N Osborne
[e-mail]                           | SLIS, 2550 The Mall
                                                | University of Hawaii at Manoa
or via W.A.S.T.E                                | Honolulu, Hawaii  96822

------------------------------

Date: 24 Apr 89 21:08:48 GMT
From: unmvax!indri!polyslo!usc!orion.cf.uci.edu!uci-ics!venera.isi.edu![e-mail]  (Craig E. Ward)
Subject: Re: NSS Hotline Update

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (steve emmerson) writes:
>In article <246900022@cdp> [e-mail] writes:
>
>One way to provide those desirable qualities is to have a political
>consensus; we don't seem to have one.  Another way is to insulate the
>agency from political forces.  Appointing a policy committee which has
>the vice president as its chair guarantees, in my opinion, the reverse.

It requires political force to isolate an agency from political forces.  In
Washington, it usually requires either a strong congressional coalition
(consensus is an illusion) or a strong president.

With regards to space, we have not had a strong president with vision since
Johnson.  Where would we be if he had not mucked up his foreign policies?

        Craig
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------------------------------

Date: 24 Apr 89 17:54:48 GMT
From: ccnysci![e-mail]  (Patt Haring)
Subject: NASA Aircraft to Support Int'l. Global Ocean Study


Ported to UseNET from UNITEX Network
                      201-795-0733
          via Rutgers FidoGATEway


*NASA AIRCRAFT TO SUPPORT INTERNATIONAL GLOBAL OCEAN STUDY

Paula Cleggett-Haleim
Headquarters, Washington, D.C.                     April 19, 1989
(Phone:  [phone])

Joyce B. Milliner
Goddard/Wallops Flight Facility, Wallops Island, Va.
(Phone:  [phone])

     NASA's highly instrumented, remote sensing aircraft will
participate in an international oceanographic experiment, called the
Global Ocean Flux Study (GOFS), to determine the capacity of the world's
oceans to assimilate and store excess carbon dioxide (CO2) from Earth's
atmosphere.

     The study results are critical to predicting potential temperature
increases in world climate due to the large increase in atmospheric CO2
caused by the burning of fossil fuels.  The increased atmospheric carbon
dioxide may lead to a warmer Earth through the "greenhouse effect."

     The ocean is an important reservoir for CO2.  Some estimates
indicate that the ocean has absorbed nearly half of the increased CO2
produced.  Additionally, CO2 constantly is being exchanged between the
ocean and atmosphere.  A vital input needed for climactic research is
predicting the portion of the CO2 entering the ocean that will be
effectively trapped or removed.

     In polar regions, the cold ocean surface layer sinks in some areas
and becomes part of deep ocean bottom water where the entrained CO2 is
effectively removed from contact with the atmosphere for long periods of
time.

     A second important process is removal of CO2 by biological
processes.  Carbon dioxide from the surface layer is utilized in the
marine photosynthetic process where CO2 is combined with water to form
biomass.  Some of this biomass is consumed in the marine food chain
where a portion is released back into the water column and potentially,
to the atmosphere through respiration.

     An unknown amount of plant and animal biomass sinks through the
water column to the sea floor.  Knowledge of these processes and rates
also will provide scientists with information to make improved estimates
of climactic changes.

     The NASA four-engine, P-3A turboprop aircraft, from Goddard Space
Flight Center's Wallops Flight Facility, Wallops Island, Va., is
equipped to measure the concentration of phytoplankton biomass in the
upper ocean layer.  The primary instrument, the airborne oceanographic
lidar (AOL), will use a blue-green laser to stimulate fluorescence from
chlorophyll contained in phytoplankton, the microscopic plants at the
bottom of the marine food web.

     Previous aircraft chlorophyll fluorescence measurements have been
shown to be highly correlated with chlorophyll concentration
measurements made on board ships with standard pigment extraction
techniques.  In addition, other instrumentation associated with -- the
AOL will be used to measure solar induced responses associated with
phytoplankton in numerous bands spread across the entire visible
spectrum.

     Over the past decade, remote-sensing scientists have been
increasingly successful in deriving reliable chlorophyll concentration
values from certain combinations of these passive spectral bands.  The
combination of laser-induced fluorescence measurements and the passive
spectra will be used to further improve the potential for measuring
chlorophyll from solar induced ocean color alone.

     The Global Ocean Flux Study efforts include scientists and research
vessels from West Germany, Canada, Great Britain, the Netherlands and
the United States.  The study is expected to continue over the next 10
years, each year concentrating on resolving unknown aspects involving
the marine carbon and related biogeochemical cycles.

     The initial experiment involves studies of the spring phytoplankton
bloom in the eastern North Atlantic Ocean.  The U.S. research vessel,
the Atlantis II from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, has placed
instrumented moorings at two sites along the 20 west meridian.  The
Atlantis II, along with research vessels from the other participating
nations, will study related phytoplankton productivity as the bloom
moves northward in response to increasing solar radiation and the
development of thermal stratification in the upper ocean.

     The NASA aircraft will participate in the spring bloom study for a
6-week period beginning April 20.  The aircraft surveys will be staged
from Lajes, Azores; Shannon, Ireland; and Keflavik, Iceland.

     The NASA aircraft will be used to map 62 to 124 mile areas of the
ocean surrounding each of the moorings.  Maps showing the regional
concentration of chlorophyll and sea surface temperature will be sent to
the research vessels through a satellite transmission.


     Knowledge of the distribution of phytoplankton and sea surface
temperature will be used by the scientists on board the research vessels
to position the ships during the experiment and thus, optimize the
time-series sampling conducted from the ships.  Following the completion
of aircraft deployment, the surface layer chlorophyll maps, developed
from the airborne data, will be used to aid in the interpretation of the
observations made from the individual research vessels.

     Launches of satellite ocean color scanners, proposed for the
mid-late 1990's, will enable remote sensing scientists to gauge surface
layer phytoplankton and production over wide areas of the ocean on a
continual basis, considerably augmenting measurements made from ships
and aircraft.

     Similar chlorophyll estimates made from the coastal zone color
scanner, an ocean scanner on NASA's Nimbus 7 spacecraft which functioned
for an 8-year period beginning in 1978, have allowed scientists from
Goddard Space Flight Center's Laboratory for Oceans to provide maps of
world-wide chlorophyll distribution which have been very valuable in
planning the Global Ocean Flux Study.

     There currently are no ocean color satellite sensors in orbit.  The
earliest that such a satellite could be placed in orbit is late in 1992,
which is the proposed launch date for the Compact Wide Field
Spectrometer ocean color sensor.

* Origin: UNITEX --> Crime Stoppers Against the New Age Hustle (1:107/501)

--
unitex - via FidoNet node 1:107/520
UUCP: ...!rutgers!rubbs!unitex
ARPA: [e-mail]


--
Patt Haring
rutgers!cmcl2!ccnysci!patth
[e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: 24 Apr 89 18:18:39 GMT
From: trident.arc.nasa.gov![e-mail]  (Peter E. Yee)
Subject: Associate Deputy Administrator Hinners to resign (Forwarded)

[I wonder how these next three release are going to look. -PEY]

Jeff Vincent
Headquarters, Washington, D.C.                     April 24, 1989


RELEASE:  89-60

ASSOCIATE DEPUTY ADMINISTRATOR HINNERS TO RESIGN


     Dr. Noel W. Hinners, third ranking official of NASA and the
principal senior assistant to the administrator and deputy
administrator, today announced his resignation from the agency,
effective May 14, 1989.

     "I regret leaving before the transition to the new NASA
administration is complete," Hinners said, "but uncertainty in
interpretation of new post-employment laws led me to move the
date forward.  I am heartened, however, by knowing that the
incoming administrator and his deputy will provide excellent
leadership and advocacy of NASA and its institution."

     Hinners also serves as the NASA chief scientist and oversees
the institutional management of the agency.  As NASA chief
scientist, he is the principal adviser to senior management on
agency-wide aspects of NASA's scientific activities.

     Before his appointment to senior headquarters management in
June 1987, Hinners served 5 years as director of the Goddard
Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.  From 1979 to 1982, he was
director of the Smithsonian Institution's National Air and Space
Museum, Washington, D.C., and from 1974 to 1979 he served as NASA
associate administrator for space science.  Hinners joined NASA
in 1972 as deputy director of lunar programs, Office of Space
Science, NASA Headquarters.

     Hinners began his career in space exploration in 1963 with
Bellcomm, Inc., working on the Apollo program with emphasis on
the selection of lunar landing sites and design of scientific
tasks for the astronauts.

     He received NASA Distinguished Service Medals for his
leadership of the space science program and for contributions to
the Viking and Voyager programs.  He also has been awarded the
Presidential Rank of Meritorious and Distinguished Executive.

     Hinners was educated at Rutgers University, California
Institute of Technology and Princeton University, where he
received his doctorate in geochemistry and geology in 1963.  He
is a member of Phi Beta Kappa and Sigma Xi, the American
Geophysical Union, the American Association for the Advancement
of Science and the American Institute of Aeronautics and
Astronautics.

------------------------------

Date: 24 Apr 89 18:19:25 GMT
From: trident.arc.nasa.gov![e-mail]  (Peter E. Yee)
Subject: Odom announces retirement from NASA (Forwarded)

Mark Hess
Headquarters, Washington, D.C.                   April 24, 1989


RELEASE: 89-61

ODOM ANNOUNCES RETIREMENT FROM NASA


     James B. Odom, associate administrator for the Space Station
Freedom program, announced today he will retire from NASA on
April 30.  "After 33 years, I've decided to make a career
change," Odom said.  "I regret the timing of my decision, but the
impact of some upcoming changes on government retirees made it
such that I did not get to pick the most desirable or optimum
time to retire."  Tom Moser, deputy associate administrator for
the Freedom program will serve as acting associate administrator
until Odom's successor is named.

     Odom was appointed associate administrator for the space
station program in April 1988.  He came to Washington, D.C., from
the Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC), Huntsville, Ala., where
he had served in a number of key positions over the past 30
years.  Among the positions he held at Marshall were director of
the Science and Engineering Directorate, manager of the Space
Telescope Project and manager of the External Tank Project.

     He has received numerous awards in recognition for his
contributions to the space program, including the NASA
Exceptional Service Medal for work on the second stage of the
Apollo Saturn rocket and the NASA Distinguished Service Medal for
work on the Space Shuttle program.  Odom was twice awarded the
Presidential Rank of Meritorious and Distinguished Executive for
his efforts on the External Tank program and was most recently
recognized by the National Space Club with the Astronautics
Engineer Award for his engineering and management leadership.

     Odom began his engineering career with the Chemstrand Corp.,
Decatur, Ala.  In 1956 he joined the U.S. Army's rocket research
and development team as a systems engineer at Alabama's Redstone
Arsenal, and transferred to the MSFC in 1959 prior to its formal
establishment in July 1960.

     Odom was educated in Alabama at Troy State College and
Auburn University where he earned a bachelor of science degree in
mechanical engineering.  He and his wife June will return to
Alabama upon his retirement.

------------------------------

End of SPACE Digest V9 #396
*******************