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Show taunchings to Continue At SE Utah Sites The Army last Wednesday, Wednes-day, informed Sen. Wallace F. Bennett, R-Utah, that present plans call for continued con-tinued use of the Black Mesa and Green River missile mis-sile launching sites near Moab. The announcement came ishortly after the spread of rumors locally, that the bases would be shut down and the. operations transferred trans-ferred to Cape Kennedy in Florida. ! Black Mesa, in San Juan County, has been the launch laun-ch site- for intermediate range firings of the Army's Pershing Missile. Green Ri-fver Ri-fver is the launch site for the' Air Force's Athena Missile and, more recently, for long-range Pershing tests. The missiles impact at White Sands, N.M. In answer to Sen. Ben- ' nett's query, an Army Department De-partment spokesman said "Black Mesa site was placed pla-ced in stand-by condition, following the last of the intermediate-range Pershing Persh-ing tests in December, 1970. Since Pershings now requires no intermediate-range intermediate-range testing until the fall of 1972, Black Mesa site is not expected to be utilized . until then, barring unforeseen unfore-seen contingencies." The spokesman explained explain-ed that long-range Pershing Persh-ing firings were moved from. Gilson Butte, to Green River, Riv-er, "to decrease logistical and administrative costs." Pershing firings from the site, which also handles Athena, began on April 27, 1971. The Army spokesman said it is anticipated the level le-vel of Army testing in Utah during the 1972 fiscal year, beginning July 1, will remain re-main approximately the ,same as during the past two years. Earlier, the Air Force informed in-formed Sen. Bennett it (plans to launch between seven and nine Athena missiles mis-siles . during fiscal 1972 from the Green River facility', facil-ity', and that launching will continue "for the fore-seable fore-seable future." The newest version of Athena is 61 feet long, weighs 32,000 pounds, and carry a payload of 200 pounds. Pershing is a two-stage, solid-fueled tactical missile. mis-sile. It is about 33 feet 'long. |