Minutes of Senior Staff and Center Directors’ Meeting November 29, 1999

The following documents the discussions addressed at the Senior Staff and
Center Directors’ Meeting on November 29, 1999. Mr. Goldin attended the
meeting. Action assignments have been placed in brackets [ ] for easy
identification.

1. AA Reports

K/Diamond: Mr. Diamond reported that Mr. Thomas will be the keynote
speaker on Tuesday, November 30, at the Annual Awards Recognition Luncheon
of the Minnesota Project Innovation Group, which assists small businesses
to obtain SBIR contracts. NASA exceeded all of its direct small business
socioeconomic goals for FY 1999. The Centers are to be congratulated for
their efforts. Subcontract goal accomplishments will be reported by the
end of December.

S/Weiler: Dr. Weiler reported that the fourth Trajectory Correction
Maneuvers (TCM) for the Mars Polar Lander will take place November 30. The
burn will start at 10:24 Pacific Time for a duration of 13 seconds at 0.6
of a meter. The targeted adjustment of entry interface point will be about
160 kilometers. If achieved to within about plus or minus 6 kilometers,
that will satisfy the “no TCM-5 needed” criteria. If a fifth TCM is
required, it would be 6 hours prior to landing.

AJ/Tam: Mr. Tam reported that he has a meeting on the commercial lab with
the House Science Committee staffers today and with OMB tomorrow, November
30. Michael Hawes from the Office of Space Flight will accompany him.

J/Sutton: Mr. Sutton reported that by now, each Center Director should
have received his November 17 memorandum regarding audits of NASA Exchange
operations and followup on resulting recommendations. The memo was
prepared by his staff, in conjunction with Codes B and G, in response to
concerns expressed by the OIG. In particular, each Center Director should
take steps to ensure that independent audits are obtained for that
Exchange, that any audit recommendations are properly addressed, and that
any issues unresolved for 6 months or more are elevated to the Center
Director for resolution. If there are any questions, please call either
him or Allan Harding.

2. AI/Gen. Dailey

General Dailey reported on the following: 1) We are still holding December
8 for a the next Senior Management Council meeting. 2) The topic for the
Capital Investment Council meeting, scheduled for December 9 from 8:30 to
10:30 a.m., has been changed. We will address the FY 2001 OMB passback
which we expect to receive December 6. We will schedule another CIC
meeting to discuss ownership of the Crosscutting Technology Program. 3)
There will be a Program Management Council meeting on December 6 on SIRTF
and Earth Probes. 4) The NASA Advisory Council will meet at Headquarters
December 14 and 15. 5) Twenty-five years ago, on December 3, 1974, NASA
and the USSR began a 15-day joint tracking rehearsal of Soyuz 16, a
spacecraft identical to the one that would fly during the upcoming
Apollo-Soyuz Test Project mission. After the mission, the U.S. and Soviet
tracking stations compared data. ASTP Technical Director, Glynn S. Lunney,
conveyed his congratulations “for the brilliant rehearsal before the
Soviet-U.S. flight.”

3. Center Reports

ARC/McDonald: Dr. McDonald congratulated Gen. Dailey on his new position
as Director of the National Air and Space Museum and thanked him for all of
his help.

DFRC/Petersen: Mr. Petersen reported on the following: 1) Mr. Petersen
also congratulated Gen. Dailey. 2) DFRC’s DC-8 will be departing today for
Kiruna, Sweden, to support the Earth Science Enterprise’s SAGE III Ozone
Loss and Validation Experiment (SOLVE). This intense winter mission has
three phases and includes overflights into Russian airspace. The NASA ER-2
will join the DC-8 in January.

GRC/Barna: Mr. Barna congratulated Gen. Dailey.

GSFC/Diaz: Mr. Diaz reported on the following: 1) Mr. Diaz also
congratulated Gen. Dailey. 2) The Center is getting ready for both HST and
Terra which are on course.

JPL/Stone: Dr. Stone reported on the following: 1) Dr. Stone also
congratulated Gen. Dailey. 2) JPL is focused on the landing scheduled for
Friday.

JSC/Abbey: Mr. Abbey reported on the following: 1) The International
Space Station General Design Review in Russia, to review the Service
Module, has been slipped to December 16 or later, depending on the Proton
investigation report. 2) The STS-103 mission is targeted for a launch at
1:10 a.m. Eastern Time on December 9, following a delta Flight Readiness
Review on December 1 to close out additional items.

KSC/Bridges: Mr. Bridges congratulated Gen. Dailey.

LaRC/Freeman: Mr. Freeman reported on the following: 1) Ms. Anna McGowan
of the Aeroelasticity Branch, Structures and Materials Competency, has been
selected to receive the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics
Lawrence Sperry Award for 2000. This award honors Lawrence B. Sperry,
pioneer and inventor, and is presented for a notable contribution made by a
young person to the advancement of aeronautics and astronautics. Ms.
McGowan is being honored “for significant contributions to the
DARPA/AF/NASA smart wing program, enabling successful wind-tunnel
demonstrations of the world’s two most advanced wings with embedded smart
materials.” 2) LaRC received the First Place Best K-12 distance learning
program from the U.S. Distance Learning Association for NASA CONNECT which
is an award-winning, integrated math, science, and technology distance
learning program for grades 4 to 8. Produced by LaRC’s Office of
Education, NASA CONNECT is used Nationwide for 75,000 educators and 4.7M
students. This year, seven 30-minute TV shows were shown on 62 PBS
stations.

MSFC/Stephenson: Mr. Stephenson reported on the following: 1) He
congratulated Gen. Dailey on his new position. 2) The Center’s thoughts
are with JPL for the Mars Polar Landing this week. 3) They are looking
forward to a good Shuttle launch on December 9.

SSC/Estess: Mr. Estess also congratulated Gen. Dailey.

4. A/Mr. Goldin

Mr. Goldin had just returned from a meeting with the President’s Science
Advisor, Neal Lane, in which Mr. Goldin again emphasized Shuttle Safety,
giving Mr. Lane additional information. Mr. Lane is very interested and
will be coming to NASA in January to fly the Shuttle simulator.