Word: spaceships
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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Triumphant music blared across the land. Russia's radios saluted the morning with the slow, stirring beat of the patriotic song, How Spacious Is My Country. Then came the simple announcement that shattered forever man's ancient isolation on earth: "The world's first spaceship, Vostok [East], with a man on board, has been launched on April 12 in the Soviet Union on a round-the-world orbit...
...flight is proceeding normally. I feel well." At 10:15 he checked in over Africa: "The flight is normal. I am withstanding well the state of weightlessness." At 11:10 a report was broadcast that at 10:25 Gagarin had completed one circuit of the earth and that the spaceship's braking rocket had been fired. This was the perilous point when the Vostok, its nose white-hot from friction with the earth's atmosphere, began its plunge to a landing. All Russia waited nervously-and the government-controlled radio milked every moment for suspense. Not until...
Blue Band. "From the spaceship," said Gaga, "I could not see as well as from an airplane, but still I could see very well. I saw with my own eyes the spherical shape of the earth. I must say that the view of the horizon is unusual and very beautiful. I could see the unusual transition from the light surface of the earth to the blackness of the sky. There is a very narrow band that makes the transition. This band is a delicate blue color...
...into a "braking zone" of gradually thickening air. There the ship was heated by friction and suffered tremendous strain, but the braking effect was distributed over thousands of miles of flight. "At the height of several tens of kilometers [one kilometer-.62 miles] above the earth." said Fedorov, "the spaceship's speed is reduced to a few hundred meters [one meter-1.094 yards] per second. With a shriek, it cleaves the air, rushing toward its preselected landing place. Parachutes open and the speed is reduced to a few meters per second...
...species is young, and it is the bumptious master of a fruitful planet. More men will always yearn to travel in Major Gagarin's wake, to see the blue band around the curve of the earth. Eventually, perhaps 10, 100, or 1,000 years from now, a great spaceship will carry men far out in the solar system. They will learn whether the moon and the planets have value as real estate. They may tinker with the offensive atmosphere of Venus, perhaps making it suitable for human breathing. They may develop human subtypes that will enjoy Venus...