"SOMETHING NEW UNDER THE SUN, Satellites and the Beginning of the Space Age"
Copyright:Copernicus/Springer Verlag (New York)
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Book description.
10th November, 1955: An ad hoc meeting of the technical panel on Earth satellites (TPESP) convened to discuss the budget for the program, which
had to be ready for a presentation to Congress and the Bureau of the Budget (predecessor to the current Office of Management and Budget) by March 1956. Homer Newell said that important things to be budgeted for were radio and optical tracking and scientific instrumentation. The NRL who were the experts at radio tracking, wanted stations distributed between latitudes of 35 degrees north and south of the equator. The TPESP wanted to add two more tracking stations to extend coverage to 45 degrees. These tracking stations eventually became known as mini-track.
The optical tracking program was discussed in greater detail at the second meeting of the TPESp, on November 21, 1955. Fred Whipple, director of .be Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, presented a report prepared by himself and Lyman Spitzer (a correction). The TPESP recommended that up to that up to $50 000 be awarded to the SAO immediately to set up a series of observing stations. At the time, Whipple's proposal was for twelve observing stations and an administrative and computer analysis center. He also called for collaboration with amateur observers.
Durinng the third meeting of the TPESP, on January 28, 1956, the difficulies of tracking began to emerge. A letter from Homer Newell on the problems of visual and photographic tracking of Earth satellites was read. It was not known whether radio tracking would work (see page 36). The expectation at the time was that there was only a fifty percent likelihood of minitrack succeeding; hence the need for optical tracking.
June 1957: The twelfth meeting of the USNC pointed out that there were still problems with the tracking system.
At the seventh meeting of the TPESP on September 5, 1956,John Hagan and Fred Whipple respectively updated the panel on radio and optical tracking. By now, Whipple had made contact with amateurs in an attempt to improve the chances of acquiring the satellite optically. The army, for example, had four hundred binocular elbow telescopes that volunteers, like Florence Hazeltine, could use at military bases.
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