Welding done in space

Press, Volume CXIII, Issue 33251, 14 June 1973, Page 17

Welding done in space

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter— Copyright) HOUSTON, June 13. The Skylab mission commander, Captain Charles (“Pete”) Conrad, will return to his weightless welding shop in the sky today, after his first successful effort at manufacture in space.

“We have a weld,” he exclaimed delightedly yesterday as his electric furnace and electronbeam welder produced America’s first outer space weld, after he had been frustrated for two hours by problems in obtaining the proper vacuum level in the workshop chamber. Space agency officials think that there may be a future for orbital bases where certain products could be manufactured, some products can be made better in weightless conditions than under the gravitational forces of the earth. Another earth-resources photographic experiment is due to begin today, over the Rocky Mountains of Montana, the Cape Kennedy area, and off the coast of Brazil—a 7400-mile picture-taking path along which the effect of growth will be studied. Dr David Pitts, a scientist who studies the effects of storms, said today that the photographs the astronauts took of severe storms along the Oklahoma-Texas border on Monday would be of great value to research workers such as himself. A number of balloons were sent aloft during the same period, to gather information on temperature and pressures —information w r hich will be correlated with Skylab data later. Captain Conrad and his companions, Dr Joseph Kerwin and Commander Paul Weitz, seemed to be concentrating yesterday on getting as many experiments as possible completed before they return to Earth on June 23. The astronauts remained high and dry in orbit while fellow-astronauts and flight controllers on the ground had difficulty in reaching the Johnson Space Centre because of torrential rains which had turned streets into rivers, and had increased one nearby creek from 10ft to 300 yards wide. NEW SATELLITE A Titan 3C rocket roared into the sky from Cape Kennedy in the early-morning hours today, taking a superspy satellite to an orbital outpost.

Spokesmen gave no warning of the launching, and issued only a short statement afterwards. The rocket, the most powerful in the United States Air Force space inventory, is carrying a satellite which is expected to give split-second notice of missile launchings in Russia. Weighing thousands of pounds, it will take a stationary position 22,300 miles above the Indian Ocean.