The Orbiting Geophysical Observatory 4 (OGO 4) was a large observatory
instrumented with experiments designed to study the interrelationships between
the aurora and airglow emissions, energetic
... particle activity, geomagnetic
field variation, ionospheric ionization and recombination, and atmospheric
heating which take place during a period of increased solar activity. After the
spacecraft achieved orbit and the experiments were deployed into an operating
mode, an attitude control problem occurred. This condition was corrected by
ground control procedures until complete failure of the tape recording systems
in mid-January 1969. At that time, due to the difficulty of maintaining
attitude control without the tape recorders, the attitude control system was
commanded off, and the spacecraft was placed into a spin-stabilized mode about
the axis which was previously maintained vertically. In this mode, seven of
the remaining experiments were turned off since no meaningful data could be
observed by them. On October 23, 1969, the satellite was turned off. It was
reactivated again in January 1970 for 2 months to obtain VLF observations.
[Summary provided by NASA.]