‘Star Wars’ Test Fails as Laser Misses Shuttle

The Air Force today fired a laser beam at the orbiting Discovery in what was to have been the first shuttle test of the “Star Wars” program, but the test failed because the shuttle was out of position when it passed over the laser facility on Maui.

“Looks like we got some bad numbers in the digital autopilot,” commander Daniel C. Brandenstein reported when he found the shuttle 180 degrees out of position when the laser was triggered from atop a mountain on Maui.

“It’s obvious we’re not pointing at the ground,” he said.

The astronauts had mounted an 8-inch reflector in a shuttle window as a target for the low-power laser, but it was on the wrong side of the craft at firing time. Brandenstein said the starboard wing was pointed toward the Earth, when it should have been the port wing.

Control Center Message

Mission Control had radioed a series of numbers for the ship’s computer that would have directed the autopilot to align Discovery properly. The control center said it apparently had sent a wrong number, confusing the flight control system.

Brandenstein said it appeared that the numbers were sent to the astronauts in statute miles instead of nautical miles. Mission Control concurred.

“Sorry about that,” Mission Control said. ‘Looks like we’ll have to try later in the flight.” Another opportunity will be available Saturday.

The Air Force said that despite the out-of-position shuttle, the laser did illuminate it. This, a spokesman said, might provide some data.

Communications Success

The failed effort followed the successful deployment of the third communications satellite in three days from Discovery’s cargo bay.

“We’re glad to be three for three,” astronaut John M. Fabian reported as the satellite, Telstar 3D, spun away from the shuttle’s cargo bay, giving the crew a perfect record on the trio of launches.

Forty-five minutes later, a satellite motor ignited to propel it toward a permanent outpost 22,300 miles higher.

Telstar 3D joins a fleet of AT&T; satellites that beam telephone, television and other communications services to the United States and Puerto Rico. It is capable of handling 21,600 long-distance calls at once.

The deployment left one satellite in the cargo hold: Spartan 1, which will be released Thursday to examine what may be a “black hole” in the center of Earth’s Milky Way galaxy. Black holes form when a massive star or a galaxy exhausts its nuclear fuel and suddenly collapses into an object so densely packed that its gravity prevents even light from escaping.