Word: spacecraft
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...lift-off will mark the U.S.'s first nocturnal launch of a manned spacecraft since Apollo 17 roared away in a blaze of fire and smoke shortly after midnight on Dec. 7, 1972. The glow was seen by residents of the Great Smoky Mountains, 500 miles away from Cape Canaveral. The spectacle of the ST58 launch should be even more brilliant: the shuttle's engines and twin solid-fuel rocket boosters will generate a temperature of 6,000° F, double that produced by the Apollo...
...first American woman in space, was some damage to the shuttle's brakes and protective tiles. Yet Challenger's flight ended on a slightly disappointing note. Instead of landing on the new three-mile-long shuttle runway at Florida's Kennedy Space Center, the spacecraft was diverted at the last minute to California's sprawling Edwards Air Force Base. As Mission Control put it to the Challenger crew, there was some very cold beer waiting for them, except "it's 3,000 miles away...
...pioneering U.S. woman space traveler, on her return. But he scrubbed his visit after indications grew that foul weather might interfere with the Florida landing; the White House explained that Reagan did not want his presence to be a factor in deciding when and where to bring down the spacecraft...
...discovery that the boundary of the sun's atmosphere, or heliosphere, the bubble of particles blown into space by the solar wind, is much farther out than supposed. Researchers had expected the region to end near Jupiter's orbit. But even now the spacecraft's instruments show no decline in the heliosphere's strength, only what seems to be a swelling and contraction connected with cycles of solar activity...
...nuclear-powered spacecraft continues its probings of deep space, its findings will be awaited "with intense excitement," says the University of Iowa's James Van Allen, who utilized Explorer I a generation ago to discover the earth's radiation belts. Says Van Allen: "No one dreamed we would still be hearing from Pioneer today." The scientists, however, will have to be patient. At its present distance, radio messages take 4 hr. 20 min. to reach the earth from Pioneer. And the length of time is steadily increasing...