Word: astronautical
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...built in West Germany under the auspices of the eleven-member European Space Agency (ESA). Packed with everything from computers to miniature automated factories, it is a major advance over Skylab, the U.S.'s first scientific work station in orbit, which was occupied by three successive teams of astronauts in the early 1970s. Spacelab is also considerably more sophisticated than the current Salyut 7, which the Soviets hint may be the first building block of a larger orbital station. Spacelab's uniqueness lies in the versatility of its three major components: 1) two cylindrically shaped laboratories, where...
They will have some highly experienced companions. Columbia's skipper is Veteran Astronaut John Young, 53, who flew the first shuttle mission in 1981. His total of five space flights, including a 1972 lunar landing, is a world record. Jokes Young: "I love to fly, but all of my parts are starting to wear out." Young's copilot will be Air Force Major Brewster Shaw Jr., 38, a veteran of Viet Nam, who will be making his first space flight...
Rounding out the crew will be Owen Garriott, 53, a specialist in ionospheric physics who spent 59½ days aboard Skylab, and Astronomer Robert Parker, 46, who was a member of the support crews for Apollo 15 and 17. Both are so-called mission specialists: These are career astronauts who concentrate on science rather than flying. By contrast, payload specialists are hired only for a particular mission. In either case, all the crew members will earn their salary (astronaut pay starts at $24,500 a year and goes to more than $50,000) since this is the first flight...
...wait. What about uptight Aurora and that raffish former astronaut, Garrett Breedlove (Jack Nicholson, giving a joyously comic display of just the kind of wrong stuff that appalls and attracts her)? Merely thinking over the possibilities he presents takes some comical time. He has been living next door to Aurora for ten years before she hints that she might entertain a luncheon invitation from him. Five years later she actually accepts it. Thereupon a woman who once told an admirer not to worship her unless she deserved it plunges giddily into a relationship with a man she knows suffers that...
...Moines ("You can't even fail locally," cries Aurora, whose contempt for her son-in-law is her one immutable, hilarious quality), a plaintive note creeps into her obsessive phone calls to her daughter. Parent is now becoming a dependent, in need of a confidante, especially with that astronaut orbiting around...