N EWS R ELEASE

NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION

A400 MARYLAND AVENUE, SW, WASHINGTON 25, D.C.
TELEPHONES: WORTH 2-4155 WORTH 3.6925
FOR RELEASE: A.M.'s TUESDAY
April 30, 1963
RELEASE NO: 63-83

NASA TO LAUNCH ANOTHER AT&T TELSTAR

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration

will attempt to launch, no earlier than May 7, another
Telstar experimental communications satellite for the
American Telephone and Telegraph Company. A Delta rock-
et is scheduled to boost the satellite into orbit from
Cape Canaveral.

The orbit of Telstar II is designed for an apogee

of 6,559 statute miles and a perigee of 575 statute miles.
The spacecraft will be launched into an orbital plane
having an inclination of 43 degrees to the equator.

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The new Telstar will be the fourth experimental ac-

tive repeater communications satellite launched to date

by NASA to further research on spacecraft systems and

operating techniques potentially applicable to future

operational worldwide satellite network.

Two have been low orbit satellites: the first Telstar--

593 to 3502 miles above the earth--and Relay--820 to 4600

miles. Syncom was the first spacecraft to achieve a near-

synchronous orbit 22,300 miles above the earth.

The first Telstar, launched from Cape Canaveral on

July 10, 1062, captured the world's imagination in the same

way as did Echo, TIROS and the Project Mercury manned space

flight missions. Telstar I functioned almost perfectly in

the initial weeks of its orbiting the earth. It was exten-
sively used for trans-Atlantic television broadcasts, tele-

phone calls, radio and facsimile demonstrations.

The Telstar launches are unique in that this is the

first time that a private company has built a satellite and

paid for cost of launching with its own funds. Telstar I

also marked the first international attempt to communicate

by using an active repeater satellite.

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The Project Telstar cooperative agreement was signed

on July 27, 1961 by Dr. Robert C. Seamans, Jr., Associate

Administrator of NASA, and Frederick R. Kappel, then Presi-

dent and now Chairman of the Board of the American Telephone

and Telegraph Company. The agreement provided for:

1. The Bell Telephone Laboratories to design and

build the Telstar satellites at its own expense, test them

according to NASA specifications and deliver them Go the

launch site at Cape Canaveral. Two launchings and two op-

tional backup launchings were accounted for in the agreement.

2. AT&T to reimburse NASA for the Delta launch vehicles,

launch and tracking services. Cost amounts to approximately

$3 million per launch.
3. Bell System engineers and scientists to conduct the

communications experiments--television, voice and high-speed

data--using the company's ground stations at Andover, Maine

and Holmdel, New Jersey. Results to be reported to NASA.

4. NASA to provide Bell Telephone Laboratories with telem-

etry and spacecraft acquisition information, including data

from a radiation experiment aboard the satellite, received by

its worldwide Satellite Instrumentation Network. (These sta-

tions are located at Blossom Point, Md.; East Grand Forks,

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Minn.; Ft. Myers, Fla.; College, Alaska; Mojave, Calif.;

St. Johns, Newfoundla:id; Wooghera, Australia; Winkfield,

England; Johannesburg, South Africa; Antofagasta and San-

tiago, Chile; Lima, Peru; and quito, Ecuador.)

5. Bell Telephone Laboratories to analyze the data and

all results to be made available by NASA to the world scienti-

fic community.

Results of the Telstar experiment will be applied to the

overall NASA communication satellite research and development

program, the objective of which is to provide the technology

necessary to permit establishment of an operational system of

communication satellites at the earliest possible date.

NASA's responsibilities in the Telstar project are under

the direction of the Office of Applications, NASA Headquarters.

Management of these responsibilities is carried out by the

Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland, including

tracking acquired by the tracking network.

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GROUND STATION FOR TESTING EXPERIMENTAL

COTMTNICATION SATELLITES

A cooperative program For testing experimental communi-

cation satellites has been undertaken by the National Aero-
nautics and Space Administration and communications organiza-
tions in the United States, Europe and South America.. and
Japan. The American Telephone & Telegraph Co., International
Telephone & T4legraph Co., United Kingdom General Post Office,
French National Center for Telecommunication Studies, West
German Post Office, Brazilian Department of Posts and Tele-
graphs, Japanese Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications,
and Telespazio of Italy are providing ground stations to con-
duct communications experiments.

The organizations in England, France, Germany, Brazil,

Italy, and Japan are participating on a voluntary basis.
Technical agreements were negotiated with NASA and concurred
in by the respective governments. No exchange of funds is
involved. Orbital data necessary for conducting the communica-
tions tests are provided to the stations by the NASA Goddard
Space Flight Center's tracking network operations center and
the Bell Telephone Laboratories, Inc.

The station at Andover, Maine, and those in Englana,

France, Germany, and Italy are employed for trans-Atlantic
experiments with AT&TVs Telstar and with Relay, NASA's active
repeater communications satellite.
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The British station, located at Goonhilly Downs in

Southwestern Cornwall, England, is equipped with a steer-
able parabolic antenna approximately 85 feet in diameter
and a MASER amplifier. The station is also equipped to
transmit and receive television and still pictures using
British, European, and American line standards as well as
telephone and data communications. The site was selected
to obtain a maximum period of mutual visibility to the
United States via the satellites and because it is re-
mote from sources of radio interference.

The French station, located at Pleumeur-Bodou on the

Brittany peninsula is almost identical to the AT&T facili-
ty at Andover, Maine, and is equipped to conduct television,
voice and data experiments.

Telespazio has a large facility at Fucino (about 50

miles northeast of Rome). However, the organization will
participate with an interim station this year by receiving
voice signals from the satellite with a 30-foot parabolic
antenna.

The Deutsche Bundespost (Post Office of the Federal

Republic of Germany' has awarded contracts for construction
of a station near Raisting, about 30 miles south of Munich.
The wide-band antenna will be a 75-foot diameter parabolic

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dish with a horn-reflector feed. The performance will be

similar to the stations at Andover, Pleumeur-Bodou, and Goonhilly.

It is scheduled to be in operation late in 1964. In the interim

a smaller ground station utilizing a 30-foot diameter parabolic

dish will be placed into operation during the latter part of 1963.

Voice and data transmissions via NASA's Relay satellite

are being conducted from IT&T's 40-foot dish at Nutley, New

Jersey, and a 30-loot dish near Rio de Janeiro, In 1963.

NASA negotiated contractual agreements with the American

Telephone & Telegraph Co., and the International Telephone and

Telegraph Co. to conduct the Relay communications tests at their

facilities in the Urited States.

Technical requirements and plans ?or conducting the experi-

ments are coordinated by a Ground Station Committee. The Chair-

man is Leonard Jaffe, Director of Communications Systems, NASA

Headquarters. Daniel Mazur of the NASA Goddard Space Flight

Center is Alternate Chairman. Members are: J. H. H. Merriman,
General Post Office. United Kingdom; R. Sueur, National Center for

Telecommunications Studies, France; Ernst 0. Dietrich, West German

Post Office; Lt. Col. G. Bandeira de Mello, Department of Posts

and Telegraphs, Brazil; Dr. Hiroyuki Uyeda, Ministry of Posts and

Telecommunications of Japan; Dr. P. Fanti, Telespazio of Italy;

E. F. O'Neill, Telstar Project Manager, Bell Telephone Laboratories;

R. H. Moseley, Jr., American Telephone & Telegraph Co.; Louis

Pollack, International Telephone & Telegraph Co.; Charles P. Smith

and Joseph Berliner, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center.
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THE DELTA LAUNCH VEHICLE

Telstar is scheduled to be launched by a three-etage,

NASA-developed Delta launch vehicle which has scored 16

successful satellite orbits in its last 16 launchings.

This record is unmatched in the history of U.S. rocketry.

Project management of the Delta program is charged to the

Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland. NASA

contractor for the Delta is the Douglas Aircraft Company,

Santa Monica, California.

The 90-foot Delta earmarked for Telstar has the same

characteristics as the vehicle used to orbit the Explorer

XVII, Atmospheric Structure Satellite, April 2, 1963.

These are:

First Stage

Douglas Aircraft Co., Thor, DM-21

Propellants: RJ-1, Liquid Oxygen
Thrust: 170,000 pounds plus
Loaded Weight: 107,700 pounds
Thrust Duration: 160 seconds

Second Sta.e

Aerojet General AJ 10-118A

Propellants: Unsymmetrical Dimethylhydrazine
UMDH~ and Red Fuming Nitric Acid
RFNA
Thrust: 7,500 pounds
Loaded Weight; 6,000 pounds
Thrust Duration: 160 seconds
Coast Period After Burnout: 10 minutes

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Third Stage

Naval Propellant Plant, X-248-A-5(D), Altair

(Modified Vanguard)
Propellant: Solid Fuel
Thrust: 2,750 pounds
Loaded Weight: 515 pounds
Thrust Duration: 38 seconds

Guidance

First & Second Stage Powered Flight: Bell

Telephone Laboratories
Radio Command Series 300

Third Stage: Spin Stabilized

Flight Sequence

The Thor first stage falls away after burnout. The

second stage ignites immediately and the nose fairing cover

over the third stage and the payload is jettisoned. After

second stage burnout, the second and third stages coast for

a period of ten minutes. Then, the third stage is spin

stabilized and the second stage falls away. The third stage

ignites, reaches an orbital velocity of about 17,000 miles an

hour, ejects the payload and follows it into orbit.

TELSTAR PROJECT OFFICIALS

N.A.S.A.

NASA Headquarters

Morton J. Stoller, Director, Office of Applications

Leonard Jaffe, Director of Communication Systems

Office of Applications

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Joseph R. Burke, Project Officer for TELSTAK

T. B. Norris, Chief of Delta Program

Launch Vehicle & Propulsion
Office of Space Sciences

GODDARD SPACE FLIGHT CENTER

Charles P. Smith, Telstar Project Manager for NASA

William Schindler, Delta Program Manager

Robert Gray, Goddard Field Projects Branch at Cape

Canaveral

Roger V. Tetrick, NASA Tracking and Data Manager for

Telstar

Joseph P. Corrigan, NASA Communications Manager

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