The Nome Nugget

Space Agency to Launch at Least A Dozen "Discoverer" Satellites From Its New California Base

WASHINGTON. (AP)- The United States will begin firing a series of big satellites from the new Vandenberg Base in California in the next few weeks. Some of them will carry mice and monkeys.

The Defense Department's advanced research projects agency announced today that the "Project Discoverer" program will try to put up a 1,300-pound device in its first launching attempt "late this year or early next year."

At least a dozen satellite launchings will be attempted, as fast as one a month, Roy Johnson, ARPA director, told newsmen.

Johnson also said that an attempt will be made next year to recover a capsule from a satellite, bringing it back through the atmosphere.

He said that the program, for the present, does not include sending up a man.

The satellites launched from Vandenberg will be aimed in a southerly direction over the Pacific Ocean. Their orbit would be around the world over the North and South Poles.

The first Discoverer vehicle will be a two-stage rocket. The booster will be a Thor IRBM produced by Douglas Aircraft Co.

The second stage, the announcement said, is a new vehicle produced by the Lockheed Aircraft Corp. and powered by a Bell Hustler engine.

This latter engine is a liquid fuel rocket.

"The first Discoverer-launched satellites are expected to weigh approximately 1,300 pounds," the announcement said. "This includes the weight of the second-stage vehicle which will orbit as an integral part of the satellite after burnout."

Johnson was asked if bigger boosters will be used later for even larger satellites. Proposals have been made to use the Atlas intercontinental missile as a booster.

He said that with the Atlas It might be possible to put up a satellite weighing 10,000 pounds or more, using new high-energy fuel.

With a rocket cluster booster, it would be possible to send up satellites weighing "thousands and thousands of pounds."