Space History for November 22

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1875
J. Palisa discovered asteroid #156 Xanthippe.

1897
Born, Paul Oswald Ahnert, German astronomer, observed variable stars and solar activity, published an annual calendar of astronomical events
ref: en.wikipedia.org

1898
Born, Wiley Post, pilot who in 1933 became first person to fly solo around the world

Wiley Hardeman Post (22 November 1898 - 15 August 1935) was the first pilot to fly solo around the world. Also known for his work in high altitude flying, Post helped develop the first pressure suits. Post and American humorist Will Rogers were killed when Post's plane crashed on takeoff from a lagoon near Point Barrow, Alaska.
ref: en.wikipedia.org

1906
The International Radio Telecommunications Commission adopted "SOS" as the new call for help.
ref: www.history.uscg.mil

1907
Died, Asaph Hall, astronomer, discovered satellites of Mars (Phobos and Deimos)
ref: en.wikipedia.org

1911
J. H. Metcalf discovered asteroid #726 Joella.

1929
K. Reinmuth discovered asteroid #1138 Attica.

1930
Born, Owen K. Garriott PhD (at Enid, Oklahoma, USA), astronaut (Skylab 3, STS 9; nearly 69d 19h total time in spaceflight) (deceased)

Astronaut Owen Garriott, PhD, NASA photo S71-51299 (21 Sept. 1971)
Source: NASA Johnson Photostream
ref: en.wikipedia.org

1935
The China Clipper took off from Alameda, California in the first delivery of airmail cargo across the Pacific Ocean. It reached Manila 29 November, and delivered over 110,000 pieces of mail.
ref: www.clipperflyingboats.com

1942
Born, Guion Stewart Bluford Jr. PhD (at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA), Colonel USAF, NASA astronaut (STS 8, STS 61-A, STS 39, STS 53; over 28d 16.5h total time in spaceflight), the first black astronaut in space

Astronaut Guion Bluford Jr. PhD, NASA photo S92-48766 (23 Oct. 1992)
Source: NASA Image and Video Library

Dr. Guion Stewart Bluford Jr. (22 November, 1942 - ) was the first black astronaut in space. Dr. Bluford became a NASA astronaut in August 1979, and flew aboard the Challenger Space Shuttle mission STS-8 (30 August 1983 - 5 September 1983) as a mission specialist. Dr. Bluford is an aerospace engineer with a Ph.D. from the Air Force Institute of Technology and is also a colonel in the US Air Force. He later flew on other space missions, including STS-61A (in 1985), STS-39 (in 1991), and STS-53 (in 1992). In total, Bluford logged over 688 hours in space on the flights through 1992.

See also Wikipedia
ref: www.nasa.gov

1944
Died, Arthur Eddington, astronomer, physicist

Sir Arthur Stanley Eddington (28 December 1882 - 22 November 1944) was arguably the most important astrophysicist from the early twentieth century. The Eddington limit, the natural limit to the luminosity that can be radiated by accretion onto a compact object, is named in his honor. He is also famous for his work regarding the Theory of Relativity. Eddington wrote an article, "Report on the relativity theory of gravitation," which announced Einstein's theory of general relativity to the English-speaking world. (Because of World War I, new developments in German science were not well known in England at the time.)
ref: en.wikipedia.org

1951
M. Laugier discovered asteroid #3220 Murayama.

1963
US President John F. Kennedy, who inspired the nation into the Apollo program, was assassinated in Dallas, Texas.
ref: www.jfklibrary.org

1967 19:07:59 GMT
USSR launched Zond 1967B, intended to perform a circumlunar flyby of the Moon before returning to the Earth for landing, but failed to achieve Earth orbit.

Zond 1967B, launched 22 November 1967, was an unmanned test flight of the Soviet Lunar capsule planned for manned flights. The exact intended mission is not known, but may have a flight out to Lunar distance (but in the opposite direction from the Moon, as was done later for Zond 4) and return. The capsule was similar to the Zond 4 and presumably carried instruments, such as the proton detectors that were carried by Zond 4. One of the four rocket engines on the SL-12/D-1-e Proton second stage failed triggering the emergency system, which included disengagement of the cabin and automatic shutdown of the other engines. The Proton crashed 300 km downrange. The Zond cabin was recovered despite a premature firing of the landing rockets.
ref: en.wikipedia.org

1973
USSR's Cosmos 605 (Bion 1) returned from a successful 21.5 day mission to study the effects of space on living organisms (white rats, steppe turtles, insects, fungi), and test life support systems.

USSR launched Cosmos 605 (Bion 1) on 31 October 1973 to study the effects of space on living organisms, and test life support systems. The spacecraft was based on the Zenit reconnaissance satellite, and carried several dozen white rats, six boxes of steppe turtles, a mushroom bed, four beetles, and living bacterial spores. It provided data on the reaction of mammal, reptile, insect, fungal, and bacterial forms to prolonged weightlessness. The successful mission ended with capsule recovery on 22 November 1973.
ref: nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov

1977
Transatlantic passenger service on the Concorde supersonic transport was begun between New York City and London and Paris by British Airways and Air France, respectively.
ref: www.concordesst.com

1979
C. Kowal discovered asteroid #2241.

1983
The joint NASA/British/Dutch infrared telescope satellite IRAS ceased operations.

The Infrared Astronomical Satellite (IRAS) was a joint mission by the United States (NASA), the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom, launched 25 January 1983. The basic goal was to obtain a full-sky survey over the approximate wavelength range 8 to 120 micrometers with four broadband photometry channels. The satellite was a spacecraft with a telescope mounted in a liquid helium cooled cryostat. The telescope was a f/9.6 Ritchey-Chretien design with a 5.5 m focal length and a 0.57 m aperture. The mirrors were made of beryllium and cooled to approximately 4 K.

The focal plane assembly contained the survey detectors, visible star sensors for position reconstruction, a Low Resolution Spectrometer (LRS) and a Chopped Photometric Channel (CPC). The focal plane assembly was located at the Cassegrain focus of the telescope and was cooled to about 3 K.

An array of 62 detectors was used to detect the infrared flux in bands centered at 12, 25, 60, and 100 micrometers. The noise equivalent flux densities were, respectively, 0.1, 0.1, 0.1, and 0.3 Jy (1 Jansky = 1E-26 W/sq m-Hz) in the four survey bands. The positions of galactic and extragalactic sources were determined to an accuracy of 0.5 arc-min. In addition to the focal-plane detector array used for the all-sky survey, a low-resolution spectrometer and a 60-and 100-micrometer chopped photometric channel were included on IRAS.

To scan the sky for the survey, the satellite was rotated at a constant angular velocity perpendicular to the satellite-sun vector. IRAS could also be pointed at a selected celestial object for up to 12 minutes, to permit observations of selected objects with an increase in sensitivity or spatial resolution up to ten times that of the general survey.

From 9 February 1983 to 22 November 1983, IRAS conducted a survey of the sky at thermal infrared wavelengths from a 900 km polar orbit about the Earth. This survey consisted of 5749 scans along lines of constant solar elongation, between 60 and 120 degrees solar elongation. 95% of the sky was covered twice and 72% was covered three times by IRAS. In addition to detailed observations of the zodiacal cloud, IRAS also made over 8000 detections of asteroids.

Further discussion of the IRAS mission can be found in G. Neugebauer et. al., Science, v. 224, pp. 14-21, 1984, and in the entire 1 March 1984 issue of Astrophysical Journal Letters (v. 278, pp. L1-L85).
ref: irsa.ipac.caltech.edu

1989 19:23:30 EST (GMT -5:00:00)
NASA launched STS 33 (Discovery 9, Shuttle 32, 63rd manned US flight) from Cape Canaveral, Florida on a mission dedicated to the US Department of Defense.

STS 33 was launched 22 November 1989, the first night launch since the shuttle Challenger was destroyed during its launch, after the 20 November launch attempt was rescheduled to allow changeout of suspect integrated electronics assemblies on the twin solid rocket boosters. This was the fifth shuttle mission dedicated to the US Department of Defense.

The mission ended when Discovery landed on revolution 79 on Runway 4, Edwards Air Force Base, California, on 27 November 1989. Rollout distance: 7,764 feet. Rollout time: 46 seconds. Launch weight: classified. Landing weight: 194,282 pounds. Orbit altitude: 302 nautical miles. Orbit inclination: 28.45 degrees. Mission duration: five days, zero hours, six minutes, 48 seconds. Miles traveled: 2.1 million. Discovery was returned to KSC on 4 December 1989.

The STS 33 flight crew was: Frederick D. Gregory, Commander; John E. Blaha, Pilot; F. Story Musgrave, Mission Specialist; Manley L. Carter, Jr., Mission Specialist; Kathryn C. Thornton, Mission Specialist.
ref: www.nasa.gov

1992 10:32:00 PST (GMT -8:00:00)
USSR's Resurs 500 capsule landed west of Grays Harbor, Washington and was brought to Seattle by the 680-foot Russian missile-tracking ship Marshal Krylov.

On 16 November 1992, a Soyuz rocket launched the 8-foot-diameter (2.4 m), 5,152-pound spherical Resurs-500 capsule into orbit from Russia's once-secret Plesetsk Cosmodrome, similar to the one flown by Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin in the first human orbital space flight on 16 April 1961. The satellite orbited the Earth for seven days before parachuting into the Pacific Ocean about 120 miles off Grays Harbor on the Washington state coast on 22 November 1992. The space capsule was retrieved and brought to Seattle by the 680-foot Russian missile-tracking ship Marshal Krylov.

Space Flight Europe-America 500 was a goodwill mission conceived to increase trade between Russia and USA, and to promote peaceful use of technology once reserved only for military forces.
ref: en.wikipedia.org

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