Word: rocketeers
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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Russians Shoot Rocket...
Along with all this went a persistent rumor that Red China was determined to fire a rocket that was not a toy-a Russian-supplied missile that might put a Chinese satellite in orbit around the earth. If the rocket failed, there was speculation that Red China might explode an Abomb, also borrowed from the Russians. One way or another, Red China this week plans to overawe its Asian neighbors and to serve notice on the West that it is a nation with the ambitions, if not the substance, of a first-rank power...
...Lunik II's instruments was a moon altimeter designed to measure its faster and faster approach to the lunar surface. Lunik II, the Russians say, landed on the edge of the Sea of Serenity, near the craters Aristillus, Archimedes and Autolycus. They think the last-stage rocket hit the moon too, but they do not know where. Since it was much heavier (3,325 Ibs.) than the instrumented payload (860 Ibs.), it must have splashed a considerably bigger crater...
...wake of the Russian moon triumph, U.S. spacemen had two failures and one success last week. A Jupiter rocket blew up, and a Thor Able navigation satellite failed to orbit. The bright spot was the last of the much-criticized Vanguards, which put a 50-lb. payload in a high orbit expected to last 30 years or more...
...Vanguard was a typical product of U.S. space technology: a small, sophisticated bird strained to the utmost to achieve its purpose. The thrust of its first-stage rocket was only 27,000 Ibs. (v. Lunik's estimated 800,000 Ibs.), and everything in the upper stages had to be meticulously miniaturized to save tiny bits of weight. Its intricately instrumented satellite will send down valuable data from space, perhaps more than the Russians get with their comparative giants, but the U.S. will not match the Russian achievements in bulk or accuracy until a new generation of bigger rockets reaches...