In the words of those who trod the void and those at mission control, here are over 50 of the greatest true stories of suborbital, orbital and deep-space exploration. From Apollo 8's first view of a fractured, tortured landscape of craters on the 'dark side' of the Moon to the series of cliff-hanger crises aboard space station Mir, they include moments of extraordinary heroic achievement as well as episodes of terrible human cost. Among the astronauts and cosmonauts featured are John Glenn, Pavel Beyayev, Jim Lovell, Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, Valery Korzun, Vasily Tsibliyev and Michael Foale.Includes• First walk in space by Sergei Leonov and his traumatic return to Earth• Apollo 13's problem — the classic, nail-biting account of abandoning ship on the way to the Moon• Docking with the frozen, empty Salyut 7 space station that had drifted without power for eight months• Progress crashes into Mir — the astronauts survive death by a hair's breadth• Jerry Linenger's panic attack during a space walk, 'just out there dangling'.
A-4: Aggregate 4, the prototype German rocket
LOX: Liquid Oxygen
NACA: National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics
NASA: National Aeronautics and Space Administration
V-2: Vergeltungswaffe 2 (Vengeance weapon 2)
ASCS: Automatic Stabilization and Control System
EOR: Earth Orbit Rendezvous
G: Gravity, normal gravity on earth is IG
ICBM: Intercontinental Ballistic Missile
JPL: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
LOR: Lunar Orbit Rendezvous
LOS: Loss Of Signal
LOX: Liquid Oxygen
MA: Mercury-Atlas
MIT: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
MPT: Mercury Procedures Trainer
M-R: Mercury Redstone
Q: Aerodynamic stress
SARAH: Search and Rescue and Homing
SECO: Sustainer Engine Cutoff
V-1: Vergeltungswaffe 1 (Vengeance weapon 1)
VfR: Verein fuer Raumschiffahrt (Space Travel Association)
USSR: Union of Socialist Soviet Republics
ALSEP: Apollo Lunar Surface Experiments Package
AM: Airlock Module
AMU: Astronaut Manoeuvring Unit
ATDA: Augmented Target Docking Adapter
Capcom: Capsule communicator
CONTROL: Lunar Module flight control officer
CSM: Command Service Module
DOI: Descent orbit insertion
DSKY: Display & Keyboard
EECOM: Electrical & Environmental command officer
EGIL: Flight Controller for electrical and environmental systems at the launch
EST: Eastern Standard Time
EVA: Extra Vehicular Activity or spacewalking
FDI: powered descent initiation
FIDO: Flight dynamics officer
GET: Ground Elapsed Time
GNC: Guidance, Navigation and Control
GUIDO: Guidance officer
INCO: Instrument & Communications Officer
J-2: engine of the Saturn booster S-IVB third stage
LEM: Lunar Excursion Module
LLRV: Lunar Landing Research Vehicle
LM: Lunar Module
LOI: Lunar orbit insertion
LRL: Lunar Receiving Laboratory
MDA: Multiple Docking Adapter
MET: Modularised Equipment Transporter
PC+2: Two hours after Perycynthion (the closest point to the far side of the moon)
PLS S: portable life support system
PTC: Passive Thermal Control
RETRO: Retrofire officer
S1C: a variant of the Saturn booster (first stage)
SII: Saturn booster (second stage)
S-IVB: a variant of the Saturn booster (third stage)
S-WB: the Saturn stage which contained the LEM
SCE: Signal Condition Equipment
SM JETT: Service Module Jettison (switch)
SPS: Service Propulsion System (the CSM’s engine)
SWS: Saturn Workshop (Skylab)
TEI: TransEarth Injection
TELMU: Telemetry, electrical, EVA, mobility unit officer
BPS: Automatic docking equipment on board MIR’s unmanned supply vessels
CCD: Charged Coupled Detectors
COSTAR: Corrective Optics Space Telescope Axial Replacement
DSD: a Depressurization Sensor
FA: First Aid
HST: Hubble Space Telescope
ISS: International Space Station
IVA: Intra Vehicular Activity (a spacewalk inside a depressurized space craft)
KURS: A radar/guidance system used when docking spaceships to space stations
LiOH: solid cylinders of Lithium hydroxide which filter CO2 out of the air
MOD: Missions Operations Directive
NCS: NICMOS Cooling System
OMS: Orbital Maneuvering System
OPM: Optical Properties Monitor
PS: Payload Specialist
SAMS: calibration device aboard MIR, used to study vibrations and structural stress
SEP: calibration of power levels remaining in MIR’s batteries
SFOG: Solid Fuel Oxygen Generator
SUD: MIR’s motion-control system
TDRS: Tracking and Data Relay Satellite
TORU A: remote control system for docking unmanned spaceships
TsUP: Soviet then Russian Mission Control
WFPC: Wide Field and Planetary Camera
ESA: European Space Agency
MER: Mars Exploration Rover
SMART: Small Missions for Advanced Research in Technology
The quest to conquer space is packed with stories of triumph and disaster. The Mammoth Book of Space Exploration and Disasters presents over 50 of the most remarkable first-hand accounts of sub-orbital, orbital and deep space adventure, from the development of the rocket to the present day.
The accounts tell exactly what it was like to be “a man in a can” – in the astronauts’ and the cosmonauts’ own words. Share Alan Shepard’s exhilaration at being the first astronaut in space. Ride with Scott Carpenter as he describes how he had to correct instrument malfunctions which would have prevented his re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere.
The collection is divided into five chapters. Chapter 1, entitled “At Heaven’s Door – Testing the Limits”, covers the development of jet and rocket propulsion from the end of the Second World War to the penetration of the upper atmosphere. These early accounts include Chuck Yeager breaking the sound barrier with a broken arm, and the test pilots’ own explanations of the dangerous new technology of rocket-propelled craft.
