| Original Contents (English Translation) | The Way Up
The article deals with space flight, astronauts and the footrace between America and the Soviet Union regarding the dominance in space.
At the beginning the tortures are described that an astronaut goes through before he can actually fly into space. The article states that Jurij Alexewitsch Gagarin was the first man, for whom it was worse to accept the tortures, because he was the first man to round the earth on 12 April 1961.
It is pointed out that the Soviet Union won the race about the first man to round the earth, and thus manifested its dominant position regarding space exploration. Several achievements of the Soviet Union are enumerated, inter alia the first earth satellite in 1957, the first Moon racket in 1959, the first Venus racket in 1961 and the proof that a living being can survive in space when bringing the dog Laika up in space in Sputnik II.
The article states that all these incidents already showed the dominant position of the Soviet Union, but that the biggest ignominy for the Americans was that the Soviet Union was to first round the earth.
The article reasons this by the loss of excuses for the Americans: As earlier projects where not followed emphatically, it was not too bad that the Soviet Union had prevailed every time; if the Americans would put all their effort in a project, the politicians stated, they would easily prevail the Soviet Union. But according to the article this was different for the first rounding of the earth: All power was concentrated, the NASA was founded and the technical and human race began.
While in November 1958 the aircraft plant McDonnell won the advertisement regarding the building of the rackets, medicines began to explore if humans are at all able to survive the space at all. The scientists were faced especially with the unknown factors of weightlessness, pressure drop and acceleration
The article explains that a lot of tests on humans and animals took place, e.g. on explosive decompression, on acceleration in the desert of New Mexico, on the ability to stay in big alltitudes in balloons, tests in dark cells, noise cells, water tests, tests in centrifugals, etc. The article states that the tests justified the assumption that humans can survive in outer space.
Further, it is pointed out that the tests delivered the outline for the perfect astronaut: calm, intelligent and rational, but no adventurer. The article emphasises that Jurij Alexewitsch Gagarin exactly suited those criteria.
It is stated that for the Americans not the human, but the technical side became the problem: the racket was changed to the older and less effective Redstone racket, after the Atlas racket proved to be too unstable; the start had to be disarranged over and over; the starts ended catastrophically, if it took place; the budget was exceeded.
The article is closed with the comment that Jurij Gagarin’s earth surrounding shows how far the American space exploration was behind: the date for the American earth’s surrounding was set for December 1961.
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