Project SCORE- The First Communication Satellite

Date: December 18, 1958

Project SCORE was the world’s first communication satellite.  SCORE stands for “Signal Communication by Orbiting Relay Equipment”. It was launched with an Atlas rocket on December 18, 1958 from Cape Canerval. The Atlas rocket was one of the first missiles made by the U.S. to become an ICBM.

“In late June 1958, the U.S. Army Signal Research and Development Laboratory at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey was directed to construct a communications satellite with a maximum weight of 150 pounds…The entire rocket was to be placed into orbit and, therefore, it was decided that the communications equipment would be integrated…The orbit was expected to be low… was only 2 to 3 weeks. The low orbit and short life would limit opportunities for real time relay between two ground stations, therefore, a store and forward mode was added by including a tape recorder. This would also give the satellite a worldwide broadcast capability. Since reliability was a concern, a second tape recorder was added to the communications package” (Space Policy Project).

By December, the SCORE was ready to become of use and would be launched. When it was launched and in orbit, a tape recording was played from the satellite that played a messaged from the President to the world. From there on, it responded to all other forward voice and teletype transmissions coming from stations on earth. On January 21, 1959, the satellite ended up falling into the atmosphere after its batteries had died, and it burned on reentry.

Though this satellite demonstrated a way to send and receive transmissions to and from space, it had really been create because of the competition between the U.S. and the USSR. Things would become more tense as each country would put out their next missions into space.