Since 30 years, the number of men and women who went in space is always increasing. With the MIR russian space station and soon with the ALPHA international space station, the human beings are closed to reach a permanent presence in low terrestrial orbit. We now ask ourselves if the space access will one day tend towards "democracy" enough to be reachable for most of us in a near future. Could it be possible that we, passionately fond of the space adventure, could feel the weightlessness joys? admire continents and oceans, observe the Moon and the stars from an orbital module where we could have the role of mere tourists? A dream? A reality still too far? This article tries to take stock of this question which still often makes smiling... But so many people never believed that mankind would once reach the space, that some of us would walk on the Moon, or assemble some modules of a space station around the Earth...So many people was wrong....
During the 70ies, it was thought that the space shuttle will reduce the access fees to low terrestrial orbit. It has not been the case, and since then, every project of industrialization and economical development in space had to suffer from it. Thanks to the technological improvements acquired since the 70ies, it is now possible to believe in the realization of launchers able to reduce these fees at last. But there is no guaranty that it will really be, and only the future (10 years?) will tell us if the actual hopes were realistic or not. Anyway, since a few years, in relation with these new launchers projects, several new abreviations appear in the litterature, like: ELV, EELV, SSTO, RLV, DC-XA, X-33, X-38... Enough to no more be able to make head or tail of it! This article takes stock of all what hide these abreviations, wishing you to clarify your ideas...
Permanent manned presence in space, having begun on board Mir space station, should go on with the international space station (ISS), which construction will start in 1998.
This article is dedicated to the inaugural flights of this program, and will perhaps help you to get accustomed to the flight nomenclature and the abreviations used for the future station different modules.
Serge Chevrel calls to think over the place of mankind in space..., and Georges Anderlini gives us some thoughts raised up by this latter article.
This article deals with a lunar sample collected during Apollo 15 (sample 15499,10), which has been leased by the Cité de l'Espace in Toulouse(France) to be exposed in its museum for the general public. In this article (in two parts), you will learn the story of this lunar rock, from its collection on the Moon by Scott and Irwin, to its coming to Toulouse. It will also be an occasion to deal with some lunar geology.
The general public will certainly be charmed by by this very nice 160g sample, which will constitute a master piece of the Cité de l'Espace 's show. The aim of this article is for you to know more about this sample so that you could appreciate it in a special way...
Exactly one year ago, in May 1997, the "A300 Zéro-G" was flying for the first time in its final configuration. This plane is the new microgravity laboratory of the CNES, replacing the famous "Caravelle Zéro-G" after six years of campaigns.... It is a good occasion for us to rediscover this exceptional means to reach conditions allowing astronauts to be trained to microgravity feelings, to test new technologies to be used in space, and providing a very special facility for applied and fundametal research.
This special issue, dedicated to the Shuttle, begins with a general article, providing a good technical introduction about the Shuttle.
The three following articles deal more particularly with the launch, as seen from three different views: technics, with an overview of the different steps that the launcher goes through from the countdown to the orbit injection, the astronaut's feelings on board the Shuttle, thanks to Jean-François Clervoy's witness during mission STS-84 in may 1997, and at last a mere spectator observing Discovery launch for STS91 at Kennedy Space Center in june 1998.
Understand how a rocket works is not very easy, especially if one's knowledge in physics is not very large and that one does not understand a word about equations.... Through questions close to those that the Little Prince could have been asking, this three-part article explains with simple concepts, only referring to basic principles, the mecanism of this huge machine...
Thirty years ago, three men reached out of the terrestrial gravity for the first time, and went round the Moon... (in two parts)
Return to the
Astronaut's
presentation page
Return to
A25
home page
