Sputnik

Today is the 53rd anniversary of the successful launch, and orbit of Sputnik 1.

That single act by the Soviet Union changed the world forever. Sputnik was the first artificial satellite to orbit the earth. It was not like one might imagine. This satellite was not big and amazing, in fact it was rather small. It was 22.8 inches in diameter and weighed 183.9 pounds.

The world, especially the United States, started to panic. Were the Russian's going to attack from outer space? How did they come to have such technology? What would this mean for the future?

The United States reacted immediately. For the years following World War II America had been the leading nation technologically and everyone rested assured that they would not be surpassed anytime soon. In fact in 1955 the United States had already started plans on launching their own satellite into space. After the launch of Sputnik the miniscule space program the United States had started grew drastically along with its funding.

Now the race was on. The race for space.

Sputnik in the making.

My Man Goddard

Man! I can't get the SPACE RACE out of my head. Every single time I lay down to go to bed or take a nap or watch a movie or read a book my mind starts wandering back to the 50s and 60s and wishing I could have been alive for the beautiful days.

But thinking this I remind myself that there are some very specific people that were VERY important in the Space Race before the Space Race even began. One being Robert Goddard.

In the late 19th century in Massachusetts a young man had the huge dream of flying in space. This young man's name was Robert Goddard. For years Goddard worked on making rockets. However he was much made fun of for his crazy dreams. The New York Times mocked young Goddard saying he should retake high-school science. Didn't he know there is no air in space? Had he ever read the law of physics? To move in space you have to have something to push against and without air there is nothing to push against! However, none of this discouraged Goddard in the least. He continued dreaming and designing rockets.

One day Goddard and a group of his friends decided to launch a rocket they had built. It tragically ended in a small disaster when the rocket went farther horizontally than it did vertically and landed in his aunt's cabbage patch. The results of this accidents was the passing of a law forbidding anyone to launch a rocket in the state of Massachusetts. But this did not dissuade Robert Goddard. If one state wouldn't let him launch rockets then he would simply move to another state that would. Goddard moved to Roswell, New Mexico where he continued and experimenting and launching.

Dr. Robert Goddard made many important discoveries and invented many great things, useful for spaceflight. Goddard patented all his inventions. However after his death in 1945 the US government took all his patented work upsetting Goddard's wife, Esther Christine Goddard. She sue the US government and was given one million dollars. A virtual steal for the government considering all Goddard's work was worth well over sixty-million dollars. All his life's work was an important contribution to the American space program. And to correct what they had originally said about Goddard the New York times made a formal apology, of a successful rocket launch into space, saying it was indeed possible to fly in space.

Near Disaster

Forty-one years ago today Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin landed on the surface of the moon.

On July 16th 1969 Apollo 11 launched and broke orbit with the earth, headed straight to the moon. Oddly enough going to the moon is considered deep space exploration. This was the fourth mission to the moon, but only the first to land on the moon and the first for a man to walk on the moon.

July 20th Armstrong and Aldrin bid the pilot of the command module, Mike Collins, adieu and the two entered the LEM and started their decent towards the lunar surface. As they were headed to their destination landing several alarms went off inside the LEM but after the ground crew gave the "OK" Armstrong and Aldrin continued their decent. However another adrenaline rush was about to hit both the LEM's crew and the ground crew as Armstrong looked at the window and realized where they were headed was strewn with many boulders. He had to maneuver the craft around, which appeared to be a dangerous problem as the men were beginning to run out of fuel. If problems persisted they would have to abort the mission and return to earth, having to face the public about a failed mission.

With only seconds to spare before they would have abort the Eagle safely landed in the Sea of Tranquility.

The two astronauts were told to rest before the scheduled lunar walk. Restless and unable to sleep Armstrong requested being allowed to do the walk hours before schedule. Upon descending the latter Armstrong spoke these famous words, "That's one small step for man. One giant leap for mankind."

Across the world people heard these words, cried, celebrated and partied. America was the first to land on the moon. Who knew we would also be the last?

The Beginning of Rocketry

I can't help it, but I absolutely LOVE the Space Race. However we wouldn't have been able to get to the moon if it weren't for the Chinese. Maybe, eventually, we would have gotten there in a different way but it happened this way and this is the what I'm going to tell you about.

There is a story from the early 16th century suggesting that a Chinese man, by the name of Wan Hu, tried to reach the moon by using some of these Chinese rockets. Legend has it that Wan Hu strapped 47 rockets to a chair. He believed the moon was only a few miles away and would be fairly easy reach. So with the help of 47 servants who lit all 47 rockets at the same moment Wan Hu was launched -somewhere-not to the moon- and never heard from again.



There is a story from the early 16th century suggesting that a Chinese man, by the name of Wan Hu, tried to reach the moon by using some of these Chinese rockets. Legend has it that Wan Hu strapped 47 rockets to a chair. He believed the moon was only a few miles away and would be fairly easy reach. So with the help of 47 servants who lit all 47 rockets at the same moment Wan Hu was launched -somewhere--not to the moon- and never heard from again.

Space! The Final Frontier

There are several reasons I am writing this post today. 1) I absolutely love Star Trek: The Original Series. 2) I am with my aunt who just had surgery and we've already watched five episodes and are on our sixth episode right now. 3) I just found out that a friend of mine has a friend that works for NASA in Russia has an astronaut staying at their house and they are going to be sending me some NASA stuff which is so incredibly awesome I'm speechless with happiness! 4) I have grown up watching this show and they mean so much to me, even if the sets are cheesy, the acting is bad and Kirk always has his shirt off.

So! Some facts about this fantastic show that I love so much:
Star Trek was created by Gene Roddenberry. It first aired in September of 1966. The pilot episode is completely different than the rest of the show. It has a different captain, Captain Pike, and Spock is not the first mate, in fact the actress that later plays Nurse Chapel, Majel Barret, is the first mate in the pilot episode. The ship is even different, too, without all the bright colors, and the women aren't wearing their usual too short dress uniforms.
Later the captain of the U.S.S. Enterprise is Captain James T. Kirk, played by William Shatner. In the first episode with Kirk his middle initial is R not T, as odd as this is I've thought often about the fact that it changed.
My favorite character is Spock played by Leonard Nemoy. Spock is an emotionless, half-human, half-vulcan alien from the planet Vulcan.
He's a good balance with the very emotional Doctor Leonard McCoy played by DeForest Kelley. McCoy wasn't introduced till the third or fourth episode of Star Trek. In The Cage the doctor is Philippe Boyce played by John Hoyt. In Where No Man Has Gone Before the doctor is Doctor Mark Piper portrayed by Paul Fix. But best of all of them was definitely Kelley. His constant emotional bickering with feelingless Spock makes for some good comic relief.

Another of my favorite characters is the gorgeous Lieutenant Uhura played by Nichelle Nichols. She was the beautiful communications officer that spoke English as well as Swahili.

The first captain of the Enterprise: Captain Pike.

Captain James T. (or is it R?) Kirk

Second in Command Spock

Paul Fix playing Dr. Piper

The very amazing Dr. McCoy.

Majel Barret playing the first officer in the Star Trek's pilot episode The Cage.

Nurse Chapel, with one of her better hair styles.

Lt. Uhura, lovely as always.

There were 79 episodes of Star Trek. It ended in 1969. The following ten episodes were voted the most loved, the are in no particular order:

The City on the Edge of Forever

Space Seed Mirror,
Mirror The Doomsday Machine
Amok Time
The Devil in the Dark
The Trouble With Tribbles
This Side of Paradise
The Enterprise Incident
Journey to Babel

There have been many spin-offs of the original series and sci-fi show writers are no longer afraid to put a little humor into their sci-fi shows. In fact you see much humor that is similar to Star Trek's in Stargate SG1 and Stargate Atlantis.

Star Trek: Next Generation the first spin-off of Star Trek the Original Series.

And just because I LOVE Stargate and because they are sci-fi like Star Trek here are a few pictures of both Stargate SG1

and Stargate Atlantis.

Stargate: SG1

Stargate: Atlantis

Photo of the Week... June 13th, 2010

Houston, We've Had a Problem

April 17th, 2010 was the 40th anniversary of Apollo 13 returning safely home. If you haven't already read it, I suggest that everyone reads Apollo 13 by Jim Lovell. It's a truly amazing, and fascinating story. On April 11th, 1970 three astronauts, Jim Lovell, Fred Haise and Jack Swigert were launched toward the moon. On April 13th something exploded on their ship and they started to lose oxygen. They could no longer stay alive in the command module and had to move and over, and learn to survive in the lunar module. The lunar module was not for flying in but for landing on the moon so they three men had to make some adjustments. After 4 days of living in a freezing cold ship the three men finally splashed down on April 17th, safe and sound.




Picture of Apollo 13's service module.




Celebrating the return of Apollo 13's crew.