Year: 1988

Categories
Atlantis Crewed Spaceflight Space Shuttle

STS-27

  • December 2, 1988

AtlantisSpace Shuttle Atlantis lifts off on the 27th shuttle flight, a four-day mission to launch a classified Defense Department payload. The crew aboard Atlantis for this flight consists of Commander Robert Gibson, Pilot Guy Gardner, and mission specialists Richard Mullane, Jerry Ross, and William Shepherd. All other information about this flight, including launch weight and even Atlantis’ orbital altitude, remain classified to this day.

Categories
Franchises Television Twilight Zone

Twilight Zone: Acts Of Terror

  • December 3, 1988

The Twilight ZoneThe 46th episode of a revival of Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone airs in syndication. Melanie Mayron (thirtysomething) stars in an episode written by J. Michael Straczynsi (Babylon 5, Jeremiah, Sense8).

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Categories
Television

Superboy: The Alien Solution

  • December 3, 1988

SuperboyThe ninth episode of the syndicated Alexander and Ilya Salkind-produced Superboy series, starring John Haymes Newton and Stacy Haiduk, airs. The episode is written by Eisner Award-winning comic writers Mike Carlin (currently editor of DC’s Superman comics) and Andy Helfer.

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Categories
Atlantis Crewed Spaceflight Space Shuttle

Damaged goods: Atlantis returns

  • December 6, 1988

STS-27 landingSpace Shuttle Atlantis returns to Earth from a classified four-day mission to deploy a payload for the Department of Defense, and on only the second flight since the Challenger disaster, most of Atlantis’ crew are surprised to return to Earth at all. During the mission, they note that Atlantis is missing numerous heat shield tiles along the vehicle’s right side and its wing – a post-landing damage survey counts over 700 missing tiles, making Atlantis the most-damaged orbiter to return safely from space. The damage had been pointed out to ground controllers by the crew, but when NASA asks permission from the Defense Department to allow the crew to send a live TV signal to Earth so engineers can survey the damage in orbit, that permission is refused. A slow-scan encrypted video system is used instead, and its low resolution doesn’t reveal the extent of the damage. The damage is believed to have been caused by insulation vibrating loose from the solid rocket booster and the external fuel tank and striking the shuttle during launch, an almost identical cause of damage that proves catastrophic to another shuttle 15 years later.

Categories
Television

Superboy: Troubled Waters

  • December 10, 1988

SuperboyThe tenth episode of the syndicated Alexander and Ilya Salkind-produced Superboy series, starring John Haymes Newton and Stacy Haiduk, airs. Stuart Whitman and Salome Jens (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine) guest star as Jonasthan and Martha Kent.

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