To commemorate the momentous 50th anniversary of Yuri
Gagarin's pioneering journey into space on 12th April 2011, a
series of five books - to be published annually until 2011 - will
explore this half century, decade by decade, to discover how humanity's
knowledge of flying, working and living in space has changed. Each
volume will focus not only upon the individual missions within 'its'
decade, but also upon the key challenges facing human space exploration
at specific points within those 50 years: from the simple problems of
breathing and eating in space to the challenges of venturing outside in
a pressurised spacesuit and locomotion on the Moon.
The first volume of this series will focus upon the 1960s, exploring
each mission from April 1961 to April 1971 in depth: from the pioneering
Vostok flights to the establishment of the first Salyut space station
and from Alan Shepard's modest sub-orbital 'hop' into space to his
triumphant arrival at the Moon's Fra Mauro foothills almost a decade
later.
The Introduction sets the scene with early plans to explore space,
balloon flights and such details as the development of pressure suits.
Each of the Vostok missions is then covered in depth, together with
unmanned precursor flights, subsequent plans and the development of
Voskhod. Chapter 2 studies the Mercury missions together with unmanned
and monkey flights, the development of the Redstone and Atlas boosters
and the ill-fated Dyna-Soar, while the twin Voskhod missions, including
the first three-man space crew, first spacewalk and plans for subsequent
Voskhods to extend time in space are covered in the third chapter. Each
of the Gemini missions are
then described, as well as why and how the United States managed to
achieve such a 'lead' over the Soviet Union, practising techniques for
lunar landings, the development of spacesuit technology for
extravehicular activities, 'Blue Gemini' and the Manned Orbiting
Laboratory. The Soyuz 1 and Apollo 1 tragedies and aftermath, including
redesign, changes to future plans and the effect of Korolev's death
precede a chapter on the United States' drive for the Moon, up to Apollo
14, including the challenges facing the first lunar explorers, the
consistency of lunar soil and the development of spacesuits to handle
locomotion. This first volume ends with an analysis of Soviet direction
changes from lunar exploration to long-term space stations (Soyuz 3 to
10 and the development of Salyut 1) and the progress of the human space
program in the 1960s and plans for space exploration in the next decade.
Each of the next four volumes will follow at yearly intervals, the final
one coinciding with the 50th anniversary of Gagarin's epic
journey:
