Malcolm Ross (balloonist)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Malcolm D. Ross

10,000 feet (3,000 m) above the Mississippi River
Born October 15, 1919(1919-10-15)
Momence, Illinois
Died October 8, 1985 (aged 65)
Birmingham, Michigan
Nationality USA
Occupation Atmospheric Physicist
Employers Office of Naval Research, Washington, D.C.
Title Lt. Commander

Malcolm D. Ross (born October 15, 1919 in Momence, Illinois and died October 8, 1985 in Birmingham, Michigan) was a Commander in the United States Navy, and a balloonist who set several records for altitude and scientific inquiry, with more than 100 hours flight time in gas balloons by 1961. [1]

Contents

[edit] Life

Malcom Ross was born on October 15, 1919 in Momence, Illinois. He received a BS in physics from Purdue University in 1941, and an MS in meteorology from the University of Chicago in 1944.

Malcolm Ross was an officer in the U.S. Navy, from 1943 to 1961 and promoted to Lt.Cmdr. in 1954. During World War II, he served as the aerology officer on the aircraft carrier USS Saratoga (CV-3) from 1944 to 1945.

After World War II, Ross worked at the Office of Naval Research as an atmospheric physicist.

[edit] Strato Lab

In 1951 Ross was assigned to the Navy's plastic balloon research program. He was responsible for initiating the Strato Lab program for upper atmosphere research. Developed from the canceled Helios program, the Strato Lab program lifted the first Americans into the upper reaches of the stratosphere since World War II. This program provided biomedical data that was used for subsequent efforts in space. [2][3]

The Strato Lab program used both open and pressurized gondolas built by Winzen Research. The record-holding 1961 flight, Strato Lab High V, used an open gondola, with the primary purpose of the flight to test the Navy's Mark IV full pressure suit. At 10 million cubic feet (280,000 m³), the balloon envelope was the largest ever launched, expanding to 300 feet (91 m) in diameter when fully inflated. [4]

[edit] Balloon Flights

The following table describes Ross's balloon flights.

Date Altitude Comments
August 10, 1956 40,000 feet (12,000 m) With Lieutenant Commander M. L. Lewis (United States Navy) made the first stratospheric manned flight on polyethylene balloon. The flight was part of Office of Naval Research Project Strato Lab. [5]
November 8, 1956 76,000 feet (23,000 m) With Lieutenant Commander M. L. Lewis (United States Navy) established a world altitude record in a plastic Strato Lab balloon, taking off near Rapid City, SD., and landing 175 miles (282 km) away near Kennedy, Nebraska, breaking the record of 72,394 feet (22,066 m) set in 1935 by O.A. Anderson and A.W. Stevens. The balloonists gathered meteorological, cosmic ray, and other scientific data. [6][7][8]
May 6-May 7, 1958 40,000 feet (12,000 m) Took Alfred H. Mikesell (United States Naval Observatory) in an open gondola Strato Lab balloon from Crosby Minnesota. Alfred Mikesell was the first astronomer to make telescopic observations from the stratosphere. It was also the first flight in which a crew remained in the stratosphere in an open basket after sunset. The purpose of the flight was to discover where the atmosphere created scintillation (twinkling) of starlight. [9] The parameters of the flight were defined by the expectation that the scintillation was introduced at the tropopause. This defined the height and season of the flight, because the height of the tropopause changes seasonally. The flight was therefore designed to go to 40,000 feet (12,000 m)--any higher was deemed unsafe while any lower may not have gotten the necessary data. The findings of this flight are incorporated in modern telescope design.
July 26-July 27, 1958 82,000 feet (25,000 m) With Lieutenant Commander M. L. Lewis (United States Navy) in a Strato Lab High III flight from Crosby, Minnesota which set new unofficial record for stratospheric flight of 34.7 hours. [10] During the flight, the balloonists made the first television broadcast (picked up by NBC) from a balloon in the stratosphere. The balloon landed near Jamestown, N.D.[11]
November 28, 1959 89,000 feet (27 km) Took Charles B. Moore to perform spectrographic analysis of the planet Venus with minimal interference from Earth's atmosphere. [12]
May 4, 1961 113,740 feet (34.67 km) With Lieutenant Commander Victor A. Prather United States Navy, he successfully piloted a manned balloon into the stratosphere, setting an altitude record of 113,740 feet (34.67 km). As of 2007, the 1961 record has not been broken. [13] The flight was successful, but Victor Prather drowned during the helicopter transfer after landing.

[edit] See also

United States Navy Portal

[edit] References

  • Disasters and Accidents in Manned Space Flight, by David J. Shayler, Springer-Verlag, 2007, ISBN 1-85233-225-5
  • The Pre-Astronauts: Manned Ballooning on the Threshold of Space, by Craig Ryan, US Naval Institute Press, 2003, ISBN 978-1-5911-4748-0
  • Touching Space: The Story of Project Manhigh, by Gregory P. Kennedy, A Schiffer Military History Book, Schiffer Books, 2007, ISBN 978-0-7643-2788-9

[edit] Articles

  • A Consideration of the U.S. Navy Strato-Lab Balloon Program and Its Contributions to Manned Space Flight, by Malcolm D Ross, in Proceedings of the Second National Conference on the Peaceful Uses of Space, Seattle, Washington, May 8-10, 1962, NASA SP-8 (Washington, 1962), 261

[edit] Papers

  • Malcolm Ross papers, including photographs, notes, correspondence, and medical records, are archived at the Smithsonian Institution, NASM Archives Accession No. 1998-0048. National Air and Space Museum. Archives Division MRC 322, Washington, D.C., 20560

[edit] External links