Scrapbook 3: Telstar is in trouble

TELSTAR, the beachball-sized aluminium satellite that gave the world the first TV pictures from Space, is in trouble.

The Space messenger—Telstar can handle phone calls and telegrams via Space as well as TV—is no longer obeying on-and-off commands bleeped to it from its United States ground control HQ at Andover, Maine.

News of this setback to one of the most brilliant Space ventures attempted by the United States was given last night by a spokesman of the Bell Telephone Company, one of the firms closely connected with the satellite.

Damage

One cause of the trouble could be that equipment aboard the satellite has been damaged by excessive man-made radiation from the United States H-blast in Space last July.

Telstar was launched on July 10. It had an estimated working lifetime of at least six months.

British viewers saw the first two-way transatlantic TV programme via the satellite about a fortnight after the launch.