FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

July 27, 1999

Contact:
Kevin R. Brown, Vice President-Business Development
Command and Control Technologies Corporation
(407) 383-5282

NASA's Deep Space 1 probe will perform a fast flyby of asteroid 1992KD at 12:46am EDT this Thursday. In recognition of this event, the asteroid will be renamed "Braille" after inventor Louis Braille. Astronomer Eleanor Helin, lead discoverer of the asteroid, selected "Braille" from hundreds of suggestions submitted to The Planetary Society in a worldwide contest to name the asteroid.

Kerry Babcock, software engineer with Command and Control Technologies and resident of Port Orange, Florida, submitted the idea for the new name, which was subsequently approved by the International Astronautics Union Small Bodies Naming Committee.

"Louis Braille invented the Braille language so those who could not see could obtain knowledge and explore through the ‘written’ word. Likewise, asteroid Braille provides knowledge about our universe and its origin to the people of Earth, who through Deep Space 1, are also able to explore and discover what previously they could not ‘see,’" said Babcock. A few years ago, he began to learn to transcribe the braille system and was very impressed with Louis Braille's achievement. Mr. Babcock gave his daughter the name "Braille," so, as the Planetary Society observes, it is in a sense her namesake that is now traveling through the solar system.

For more information on the mission, please see:
http://planetary.org/news/articlearchive/headlines/1999/headln-072699.html
http://nmp.jpl.nasa.gov/ds1/mrlog.html

Braille flyby presskit:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/

Command and Control Technologies Corporation (CCT) specializes in control systems for launch vehicles, spaceports, and spacecraft. CCT’s signature product, the Command and Control ToolKit™ (CCTK), is based on software technology licensed from NASA. For further information on CCT or CCTK call Kevin Brown at (407) 383-5282, or see www.cctcorp.com/.