English practice 23

The Space Race

[1]

Writer and political commentator Robert Heinlein, writing³¹ about politics,³¹ stated that mankind needs to venture out into space as a matter of necessity: "The Earth is just too small and fragile a basket for the human race to keep all its eggs in." In the 1960s, the Russians and the Americans were in a fierce political competition with one another, and this competition was the backdrop for the explosive race to the moon. However, this was only the first step from our inner world³³ on Earth toward outer space. A longer-lasting, and some say more important, achievement has been the development of the International Space Station.

[2]

However, the International Space Station was not created overnight. It can trace it's³⁴ lineage back to Salyut 1, the³⁵ very first space station launched in 1971 by the Russians. In most respects, Salyut 1 was actually a failure. For example, before plummeting, to Earth, it orbited³⁶ the planet for less than six months and was plagued by mechanical problems that ultimately resulted in the deaths of three cosmonauts. Yet, the Salyut experiment proved that extraterrestrial habitation was possible and allowed the Russians to develop other, more technically successful space stations in the years that followed, the most famous of which was called Mir.

[3]

Not to be outdone, the Americans looked to the mixed success the Russians enjoyed with Salyut 1 and launched their own space station in 1973 called Skylab. Like the Russian space station, however, Skylab too had operational difficulties. Hit by debris, severe damage was suffered by it³⁹ during the launch and was inoperable until astronauts repaired it during numerous spacewalks. Once it was repaired, however, astronauts focused on conducting mainly⁴⁰ scientific experiments, and three separate crews successfully docked there throughout 1973 and 1974. Though⁴¹ additional missions were planned, none were ever launched, and Skylab fell back to Earth in 1979 after about six years in orbit.

[4]

[1] This space station was successful and⁴² launched in 2000 and has hosted more than 17 crews from numerous countries since then. [2] The end of the Cold War in the 1990s meant that both nations⁴³ could work together on the goal of achieving a sustainable habitat in outer space. [3] Ultimately, the Russian stations Salyut and Mir and the American Skylab laid the groundwork for the International Space Station.