Harold W. Zancanata; Pioneer of Space Program

Harold W. Zancanata, 70, a scientist and pioneer in the U.S. space program who developed some of the first booster rockets for testing the atmosphere. For more than 30 years, Zancanata developed rockets and launched them from sites in several states, including Cape Canaveral in Florida and White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico. “He was the project officer responsible for instrumenting rockets used to study the physics and chemistry of the upper atmosphere,” said William Dean, a retired Army mathematician who worked closely with Zancanata. In 1952, Zancanata combined a German V-2 rocket captured during World War II with a U.S. Corporal rocket and fired the missile 250 miles, a record at the time, said his son, Rodney. Zancanata and a team of scientists launched rockets in the early 1960s from Christmas and Johnson islands in the Pacific Ocean to study the effects of nuclear blasts on the atmosphere. In Fort Lauderdale, Fla., Dec. 28 of a heart attack