Word: salyut
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...increasingly sophisticated unmanned Mars probes that they hope will culminate in a joint U.S.-Soviet manned mission to the Red Planet by the year 2010 ... While the American space program has been crippled since the Challenger disaster in January 1986, Soviet cosmonauts have been gaining invaluable experience aboard the Salyut and Mir space stations. And though U.S. astronauts are scheduled to return to space this September, NASA administrator James Fletcher concedes that the Soviets are now "way ahead of us in manned flight." If each nation goes its own way, he predicts, the Soviets would land humans on Mars...
While the American space program has been crippled since the Challenger disaster in January 1986, Soviet cosmonauts have been gaining invaluable experience aboard the orbiting Salyut and Mir space stations. And though U.S. astronauts are scheduled to return to space this September in the shuttle Discovery, which was wheeled to its Kennedy Space Center launching pad last week, NASA Administrator James Fletcher concedes that the Soviets are now "way ahead of us in manned flight." If each nation goes its own way, he predicts, the Soviets could land humans on Mars at least five years before the U.S. could...
...does Mir compare with earlier Soviet space stations? "There is much more space," said Romanenko. "There is even room that can be used for living room. Atmospheric conditions are better, and all the instruments provide for good fresh air. It's much better than Salyut." Before another question could be asked, the light left the Moscow circle; the window had closed. Though all too brief, it was an extraordinary, exclusive exchange between an American journalist and an orbiting Soviet cosmonaut...
Nonetheless, says Nicholas Johnson, author of the book Soviet Year in Space, "the Soviets still have much to learn before they can reasonably responsibly put together a Mars mission." They need, for example, a reliable propulsion system for their interplanetary space capsule; at least two of the later Salyut systems had propulsion failures. The Soviets are weak, Johnson says, in communications technology. "They know they do not have the best technology," he observes. But they are working...
Last February the Soviets put up a new space outpost called Mir (Peace). In March they docked a crew on the station, then fired up a couple of supply payloads. Next the crew taxied out to Salyut 7, another of their space redoubts. They returned to Mir and landed back on earth a few weeks ago. A maneuver like that by U.S. astronauts would have made even the Senate windbags look...