rjnoe@ihlts.UUCP (Roger Noe) (11/16/84)
Space shuttle Discovery touched down on runway 15 at the Kennedy Space Center at 7:00 a.m. EST this morning, November 16. Tucked away inside the cargo bay of the orbiter were Palapa B-2 and Westar VI, two com- munications satellites rescued from useless orbits and being returned to Earth for repair and reuse. The mission was a success by any measure. Next launch of a space shuttle will probably not be until January 22, 1985 at the earliest. Shuttle Challenger was to have lifted off with a secret Defense Department payload December 8 but that flight (and subsequent ones) has been postponed because of a recently discovered problem with a material underlying about one tenth of that orbiter's thermal tiles. If Discovery can be turned around before Challenger can be made ready, the shuttles might trade some missions and Discovery would then lift off in January. The Washington Post quoted unnamed sources at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas as saying that plans are being made for a joint U.S.- U.S.S.R. astronaut rescue demonstration mission, which could occur as early as October, 1985. No agreement has yet been signed but both countries appear to agree that such a demonstration is very desirable and long overdue. -- Roger Noe ihnp4!ihlts!rjnoe