speaking of probes & such, heeeeere's Sputnik!

[mckitterick]

In a little over a week, it'll be the 50th anniversary of the launch of Sputnik and the ensuing Space Age.

Click the image for the full story.

I wonder how many people back then would have believed how the Space Race and the Cold War ended. Neither with bangs. Well, except on occasion. I wonder how many of those people would gape in disbelief if they learned how little we made of our Man in Space investments?

On the other hand, we have a wide diversity of robotic probes exploring our Solar System and the universe beyond, and indeed those are more direct descendants of Sputnik after all.

Chris

Comments

[kalimeg.livejournal.com]

I suppose you could count me among "those people" inasmuch as I was about 10 when Sputnik launched.

I'm glad private companies can launch things now, because "Government science" is just way too cautious. As I have said before, 3 accidents in 40 years means more paranoia than exploration. Caution is good. Caution that translates to freezing in place isn't so good. It's too bad that the moon was touched and then abandoned.

[mckitterick.livejournal.com]

Perhaps, though 10 is still an age where everything in the world is new, anyway. I'm really glad that Scaled Composites didn't stop building SpaceShipTwo for Virgin after the deadly blowup this summer.

[kalimeg.livejournal.com]

Well as I said somewhere, that explosion was pretty much a straight industrial accident. It had almost nothing to do with a launch or any part of the process of sending someone up. When you stockpile volatiles, sometimes there are accidents.

It would be pretty strange if they had abandoned their efforts for that particular accident.