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VOICE ONE:
This is Faith Lapidus.
VOICE TWO:
And this is Steve Ember with EXPLORATIONS from VOA SpecialEnglish. Today we tell about some of the important space news duringthe past year.
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The year two-thousand-three began with the terrible accident thatdestroyed the Space Shuttle Columbia and its crew. On Saturdaymorning, February first, the seven astronauts on the Space ShuttleColumbia were returning to Earth. They had performed a successfulsixteen-day science flight.
At eight-fifteen that morning, the Columbia and its crew beganflying down into Earth’s atmosphere. Forty-five minutes later, NASAlost all communication with Columbia.
The shuttle was flying six times faster than the speed of soundand sixty-two kilometers above the Earth. It began to break apart.People in three states reported hearing an extremely loud noise andseeing fire in the sky.
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Within minutes the American space agency confirmed that somethingwas terribly wrong. Within an hour NASA announced that the Columbiaand its crew had been lost.
The seven astronauts were Shuttle Commander Rick Husband, PilotWillie McCool, Payload Specialist Ilan Ramon and Mission SpecialistsMichael Anderson, David Brown, Kalpana Chawla and Laurel Clark.
In addition to Americans, people in India and Israel had followedthe flight with special interest and were now filled with sadness.Astronaut Kalpana Chawla was born in India. Ilan Ramon was the firstIsraeli to fly into space.
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In August, the special Columbia Accident Investigation Boardreported on the causes of the accident. The committee had spentseven months gathering information for the report. It said the maincause of the accident was a piece of lightweight protectivematerial. During the launch, this material came loose from thesupport structure that connects the shuttle to the large rocket. Theobject hit the edge of Columbia’s left wing. This created a smallhole in the wing’s protective material.
The report said that extremely hot air passed through the holeand into the wing when the shuttle began its flight into Earth’satmosphere. This heat caused the wing to fail. The shuttle went outof control and broke apart.
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The investigation committee also reported that NASA officialsmust accept much of the responsibility that led to the accident. Thecommittee said management failed in several areas that involvedsafety. And it said safety must be the first concern of all NASAworkers.
Soon after the report was released, NASA took steps to improveall safety requirements involved in the Space Shuttle program. InNovember, NASA announced it hopes to begin launching the threeremaining Space Shuttles in two-thousand-five.
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In September, NASA controllers sent commands to the Galileospacecraft that caused it to fly into the atmosphere of the planetJupiter. NASA experts say the extreme pressure of Jupiter’satmosphere destroyed Galileo, breaking it into small pieces.
Hundreds of former Galileo project team members and theirfamilies were present at NASA’s Jet propulsion Laboratory inPasadena, California. They came to honor and celebrate the Galileospacecraft and to say goodbye.
NASA officials ordered Galileo to fly into Jupiter’s atmospherebecause its fuel was almost gone. Without fuel, the spacecraft wouldnot have been able to change direction or to point itscommunications equipment toward Earth.
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Galileo was launched from the cargo area of the Space ShuttleAtlantis in nineteen-eighty-nine. It had been one of the mostsuccessful spacecraft ever launched.
The discoveries made by Galileo began even before it reachedJupiter. It took close photographs of a comet hitting a planet. Thecomet was Shoemaker-Levy. The gravity of Jupiter broke apart thecomet and huge pieces exploded into the planet’s atmosphere.
Galileo sent more than fourteen-thousand photographs back toEarth. These included thousands of photographs of Jupiter and itsmoons, Io and Europa.
The Galileo spacecraft continued its work in space for six yearslonger than had been planned. NASA extended its life three times.The only thing that stopped it was the end of its fuel supply.
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The month of October becameimportant in the history of the People’s Republic of China. China’sfirst astronaut, Yang Liwei, returned safely after fourteen orbitsof our planet. His spacecraft landed in the Gobi Desert, in InnerMongolia, on October sixteenth.
He was in flight for twenty-one hours. China is now the thirdcountry after Russia and the United States to send a human in orbitaround the Earth. China’s first astronaut is a thirty-eight-year-oldpilot in the Chinese Air Force. Yang Liwei was one of more thanone-thousand air force pilots who competed to be China’s first humanin space.
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October was also an important month for America’s NationalAeronautics and Space Administration. The agency celebratedforty-five years of space exploration. On October first,nineteen-fifty-eight, the agency began the work of civilian researchlinked to space flight and aeronautics. The agency immediatelystarted a study that would result in a human space flight project.It was later named Project Mercury. That project continued foralmost five years.
Project Mercury was only a beginning. On July twentieth,nineteen-sixty-nine, NASA astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrinbecame the first people to walk on the moon.
NASA’s major successes in forty-five years include the HubbleSpace Telescope and the work on the International Space Station. Ithas launched more than one-hundred successful space shuttle flights.NASA has placed advanced communications satellites in space. Theyprovide immediate television and voice communications around theworld.
NASA also launched two spacecraft that are now farther into spacethan any other human- made objects. Those spacecraft are Voyager Oneand Voyager Two.
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The United States launched the Voyager One and Voyager Twospacecraft in nineteen-seventy-seven. Some scientists believeVoyager One is now at the farthest edge of our solar system. It hasbecome the first human-made object to travel past the influence ofour Sun.
In the past twenty-six years, it has traveled more thanthirteen-thousand-million kilometers from our Sun. NASA scientistssay it is now entering an area where the Sun’s influence ends and anarea between stars begins.
Voyager One and Two were the first spacecraft to fly near andsend back information about the planets Jupiter, Neptune, Saturn andUranus. They have finished their main work but continue to send backuseful information about the edge of our solar system. NASAscientists say the fuel in the two Voyager spacecraft should lastuntil the year twenty-twenty.
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The planet Mars was in the news several times in the past year.The red planet came close to Earth in August — closer than it hasbeen in the past sixty-thousand years. This led to increased salesof telescopes and new interest in the science of astronomy.
The end of this year saw the beginning of a scientific invasionof Mars. The European Space Agency’s Mars Express with its BeagleTwo lander device arrived this month.
However, earlier this month, Japanese officials reported theirNozomi Mars Orbiter failed to move into orbit above the red planet.Japan’s first planet exploration device had been traveling towardMars for five years. Its electrical and communications equipmentwere damaged by solar flares.
America’s effort in Mars exploration are the vehicles calledSpirit and Opportunity. They will search for evidence of water andcollect and study minerals. Spirit is expected to land on MarsJanuary third. Opportunity will land January twenty-fourth. Nextmonth we will report about these new efforts to explore the redplanet.
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VOICE ONE:
This program was written by Paul Thompson. It was produced byMario Ritter. This is Faith Lapidus.
VOICE TWO:
And this is Steve Ember. Join us again next week for EXPLORATIONSin Special English on the Voice of America.