One small step: the inside story of space exploration

260 Pages·2009·10.08 MB·English

by  David Whitehouse

New York • London
© 2009 by David Whitehouse
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For my late father-in-law Bernard Carey. With thanks.
Contents
INTRODUCTION
“Soviet rockets must conquer space!”
REALIZING THE DREAM
1903–1957
“Man will conquer space soon”
THE FIRST SPACE TRAVELERS
1957–1958
“I can see the clouds, everything. It’s beautiful”
ASTRONAUTS RACE COSMONAUTS
1959–1961
“Let’s go and get the job done”
AMERICA REACHES SPACE
1961–1962
“Gagarin in a skirt”
THE FEMALE FACE OF THE COSMOS
1962–1963
“Friends! Before us is the Moon”
TEMPTING FATE
1964–1965
“They want you to get back in”
FLYING IN PAIRS
1964–1965
“They’re in a roll and it won’t stop”
EMERGENCY IN SPACE
1965–1966
“We’re on fire! Get us out of here!”
DEATH AND THE ASTRONAUT
1967–1968
1967–1968
“That was a real kick in the pants”
RETURN TO FLIGHT
1968
“Apollo 8, you’re go for TLI”
LEAVING THE CRADLE
1968
“We’re actually going to fly something like this?”
DANGEROUS AND UNPLEASANT MISSIONS
1969
“We is down among ’em Charlie”
REHEARSAL FOR A MOON LANDING
1969
“Houston. Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed”
FIRST LANDING ON THE MOON
1969
“Houston—we’ve had a problem”
SUCCESS AND SUCCESSFUL FAILURE
1969
“I cried a little”
THE RETURN OF ALAN SHEPARD
1970–1971
Ten to 15 seconds of agonizing consciousness
DEATH IN SPACE
1971 AND 1973
“Their majesty overwhelmed me”
BRINGING BACK MOONBEAMS
1971–1972
“There’s something on the telemetry that doesn’t look quite right”
THE FIRST AMERICAN SPACE STATION
1973–1974
1973–1974
“We actually came to have a very close relationship with the Soviet crew”
EAST MEETS WEST IN ORBIT
1975
“Hey, there’s some tiles missing back there”
THE MOST DANGEROUS MISSION OF ALL
1981
“It marks our entrance into a new era”
LAUNCH OF THE SPACE SHUTTLE PROGRAM
1982–1983
“You could see the Sun lighting the desert way up ahead”
FIRST COMMERCIAL SHUTTLE FLIGHTS
1984
“The most important thing for us was to dock”
RESCUE OF A CRIPPLED SPACE STATION
1985–1986
“Uh oh”
THE CHALLENGER DISASTER
1986
“My God, that’s a lot of damage”
FREQUENT SHUTTLE DAMAGE
1988 AND BEYOND
“It’s serious. It’s serious”
FIRE AND COLLISION
1994–2001
“Off-scale low”
END OF AN ERA
2003
Largest structure in space
LIVING IN ORBIT
1998–
“The flight was spectacular”
A TICKET TO RIDE
2004
INDEX
Introduction
An American president lays down a challenge to his nation that he will never
live to see fulfilled. A Russian despot curses his rocket engineers and urges them
to greater effort. A giant rocket explodes in a deadly fireball seconds after liftoff,
ending the lives of those on board and the dreams of those watching on the
ground. One moonwalker takes mankind’s first steps on another world, while
another writes his daughter’s name in the lunar dust. A German SS soldier
dreams of space, while at the same time a prisoner digs a grave in a Soviet death
camp, never thinking that he will ever see space travel—let alone be one of its
key pioneers. A crew of astronauts come close to a lonely death on their journey
to the Moon. Another crew, at another time, know they will never reach home
again.
These are just a few of the multitude of momentous events that have come to
symbolize our enduring fascination with space travel and space exploration.
When do such events become legends? When does our history turn to something
more than merely moments in time? How long does it take for us to appreciate
the true significance of the times we have lived through? Without doubt, when
the history of the 20th century is written, one of its the major landmarks will be
the journey into space. In many years to come, when much of today’s modern
history will be footnotes, Sputnik, Gagarin, Armstrong and his “one small step”
will still be headlines. Across the growing centuries future historians will look
upon the 20th century as the time when things changed forever, the time when
mankind left its home planet and ventured out but a short distance into space.
When, for a while, we achieved greatness.
Strange then that it is a story so few know in any detail. In schools we teach the
voyages of Columbus, Vasco da Gama, Marco Polo and Amundsen, but seldom
the greater voyages of Gagarin, Borman, Lovell or Anders, or even those of
Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins.
There are many threads that can be drawn through the story of the astronauts,
and each time the story is told, it is a slightly different weave. This is one story
about the great things spacemen and space women have done for us; of the way
they wrote history. Dreams and tragedies, pride and mourning, conflict and
immortality—all are intertwined in the story of mankind’s steps in space. It is
not just a technological tale of rockets, satellites and spaceships. It is much more
a story of special human beings overcoming all obstacles and setbacks to fulfill
their dreams and the dreams of others. It is, I believe, our greatest story, and it is
best told in the words of those who were there.
Over the years I have been fortunate enough to meet many astronauts,
cosmonauts and others involved in this great adventure, and they have been kind
enough to share their stories with me. I am also indebted to NASA for its
extensive history program that is a rich source of interviews, analysis and
technical data.
David Whitehouse