abortive launch, the astronomy community played a more active role in the SSB, including having its members placed on the SSB's study group. As a result, in the spring of 1962, the SSB West Ford Study Group recommended that any future dispersion of dipoles occur at an altitude that would ensure that any belt created would be short lived and that information regarding the project would be communicated quickly to the international scientific community, particularly astronomers.[1]
In the meantime, in 1961, the International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU), to which all major countries belong, tasked its Committee on Space Research (COSPAR) to consider problems of contamination in outer space. The ICSU directed that COSPAR take action regarding West Ford. COSPAR deplored West Ford and demanded prior consultation. In May 1962, COSPAR established the Consultative Group of Potentially Harmful Effects of Space Experiments. This committee, consisting of international scientists, would evaluate and make recommendations regarding proposed space experiments. In the face of such opposition and Soviet Union condemnations at the UN, Ambassador Adlai E. Stevenson announced that
The U.S. would conduct no more such experiments until the results of this one were fully analyzed, and in any case none without proper scientific safeguards;
The results of the experiment would be disclosed to interested scientists of all nations; Prior consultations with scientists would precede any further activity of this nature;
Advance notice of the launching of such experiments would be given in accordance with the procedure recommended by the General Assembly.[2]
On 9 May 1963, a second West Ford package was launched and the dipoles successfully dispersed. About eight weeks later, the SSE issued its final report on West Ford concluding that the project had harmed neither optical nor radio astronomy. COSPAR's Consultative Group also issued a report concluding that West Ford had caused no adverse effect on or interference with either optical or radio astronomy. Nevertheless, the consultation provision "hammered out in the course of discussions of
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