NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center, Wallops Flight Facility, Code 218, Wallops Island, VA 23337

A -- SOUNDING ROCKET LAUNCH SERVICES FROM NORWAY SOL RFO5-59689-608 DUE 020599 POC Judith Jones, Contract Specialist, Phone (757) 824-1419, Fax (757) 824-1974, Email Judith.M.Jones.1@gsfc.nasa.gov WEB: Click here for the latest information about this notice, http://nais.nasa.gov/EPS/GSFC/date.html#RFO5-59689-608. E-MAIL: Judith Jones, Judith.M.Jones.1@gsfc.nasa.gov. This is a notice of intent to issue Request for Offer (RFO)59689/608 on a noncompetitive basis in accordance with 10 U.S.C. 2304(c)(1) -- "Only One Responsible Source," to the Norway Space Centre, Andoya Rocket Range, Andenes, Norway. This procurement will extend contract NAS5-97195, which provides for the facilities and services necessary to launch two NASA Black Brant Sounding Rockets, four Viper IIIA/10D Dart Sounding Rockets, and a series of Viper Dart Meteorological Sounding Rockets from the Andoya Rocket Range, Norway. The required services include the use of office and laboratory space, launcher facilities, wind weighting services, and general support and engineering services. The launch is scheduled for July 1999. NASA, GSFC intends to purchase the required services from the Norwegian Space Centre (NSC) of Oslo, Norway, through modification of contract NAS5-97195. The scientific requirements of these launches can only be fulfilled utilizing a launch site in a high latitude summer mesopause during the occurrence of Polar Mesospheric Summer Echoes (PMSEs) and noctilucent clouds (NLCs), and by studying the relationship to local neutral atmospheric waves and turbulence. Noctilucent clouds occur at the cold mesopause near 83 km altitude during polar summer and can only be observed from the Earth's surface under unique viewing conditions requiring a negative solar declination. The NSC's Andoya Rocket Range is an ideal location for this launch, because it provides a wide array of support instrumentation for evaluating the scientific conditions of the launch. Therefore, only the Andoya launch site meets the required scientific requirements for this mission, while satisfying established range safety criteria; and only NSC has been authorized by the Norwegian Government to provide the required services. Any firm desiring consideration are requested to fully identify their capabilities and qualifications to provide these services within 15 days after publication of this synopsis to the GSFC/Wallops Flight Facility and individual listed above. See Notes 26, 12, and 22. Collect calls will not be accepted. Posted 02/01/99 (D-SN293182). (0032)

Loren Data Corp. http://www.ld.com (SYN# 0006 19990203\A-0006.SOL)