The events on this day in history for our heritage companies are noted below.
The earliest event was in 1960, the latest event was in 2017
Two milestone events (5 to 65+ years ago)
Human Spaceflight:
NONE
Military and Classified Programs:
1965 – LAUNCH FAILURE (partial): OV2, LCS1, LCS2, MM Titan IIIC/Transtage, LC40, CCAFS – Transtage exploded at the start of deployment of magnetosphere spacecraft and radar calibration targets
2017- LAUNCH: USA 279, ULA Atlas V 421, LC41, CCAFS
Exploration and Interplanetary Programs:
1973 – NASA buys three additional MM Titan IIIE/GD Centaur vehicles
1997 – LAUNCH: Cassini/Huygens, LM Titan IVB (401)/Centaur, LC40, CCAFS – Mission to Saturn and its moons; Titan lander (Huygens)
Earth-Monitoring and Civil Weather Satellite programs:
1972 – LAUNCH: RCA NOAA-2 (also Oscar 6), Delta 0300, SLC2W, VAFB
Commercial Programs:
NONE
Test, ICBM, FBM programs:
1960 – LAUNCH (2): Lockheed Polaris A1, SSBN599, ETR
1963 – The Ballistic Missile Division re-evaluated upgrading Titan II ICBMs with changes from the Gemini program, allowing those changes to be incorporated (lifting a halt to program deployment)
1969 – LAUNCH (2): Lockheed Polaris A3m SSBN624, ETR – MILESTONE: 55 years ago
1974 – LAUNCH (5): Lockheed Polaris A3, SSBN601, WTR – MILESTONE: 50 years ago
Other:
NONE
The photos today are of the Titan IVB-33 launch of the Cassini/Huygens mission and the spacecraft being assembled at JPL. Also included is a diagram of Cassini and a chart of the milestones of the mission. Finally, there is a splendid photograph of Saturn (see details below). This was a major event for the Titan program 27 years ago. Cassini/Huygens reached Saturn on July 1, 2004, Huygens was deployed and landed on the moon of Titan in January, 2005 and the mission ended with a controlled descent into the atmosphere of Saturn on September 15, 2017. LM built the propulsion system for the Cassini spacecraft as well. Photo Credits: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute.
Photo of Saturn: This was Cassini’s view from orbit around Saturn on Jan. 2, 2010. In this image, the rings on the night side of the planet have been brightened significantly to more clearly reveal their features. On the day side, the rings are illuminated both by direct sunlight, and by light reflected off Saturn’s cloud tops.This natural-color view is a composite of images taken in visible light with the Cassini spacecraft’s narrow-angle camera at a distance of approximately 1.4 million miles (2.3 million kilometers) from Saturn.
