bo a —

Dr. Alan E. Slater, a member of the council
of the British Interplanetary Society, gave
this interview to a poe Daily Worker

reporter.

PHIN a comparatively
WwW short time man: will be
' in space.

Scientific instruments have,
of course, been sent into space
by the United States and the
Soviet Union, but there are
good reasons why instruments
are not enough.

The first. reason is that in-

struments can deal only with}

the expected.

Outer space is still a great
unknown and man must travel
in it—to deal with the unex-
pected situations which wil
arise, to take decisions and to
report back information.

The second reason, I think,
is the pure love of adventure
and man’s natural desire to
conquer the unknown.

It is technically possible to
send a man into space at the
“moment—the Russians have
proved that they can get a
Satellite into orbit which is
_big enough and heavy enough
to take a man.

But can the human body
stand it?

The biggest physical stress
involved is that of accelera-
tion on take-off, which is
measured in Gs (for gravity).
The greater the acceleration,
the less fuel you use; so it is
necessary to find the limit
that man can stand.

It has been found that in a
sitting position a man can
stand only about 4-5 G. This
means that he weighs four or
five times as much as usual,
and his blood, weighing more
also, will drain from his brain
and produce unconsciousness.

In a lying position — where
the blood doesn’t drain away
—the limits vary with the in-
dividual, but are somewhere
between 7 and 10 G. At this
point his chest becomes so
heavy that it is difficult to lift
it up and down to breathe, so
he is in danger of suffocation!

A similar problem arises
when the rocket comes back to
earth again, because it slows
up so quickly that you get the
same effect as on take-off.

There is, however, another
problem associated with re-
entry into the earth’s atmo-
sphere, and this is the heat
arising from the friction of
the air.

There are various ways of
tackling this.

We can insulate the rocket
cabin; slow down the speed of
re-entry; radiate the heat away
into space; or put a thick shell

round the rocket’s nose, which.
can melt away.

By experiments we are find-
ing out just how much heat
the body can stand.

@ If he keeps absolutely
still in calm air man can stand
a temperature of 158 degrees
Fahrenheit for 70 minutes.

One of the problems which
cannot be tested on the ground
is, that of weightlessness, ex-
perienced when the rocket
motor stops.

It is possible to
weightlessness for a few mo- |

-|ments (up, tea one minute) by |{

flying an airplane in a para-
bolic curve. ©

Out of 16 American trainees |
who experienced this, eight ac: |

tually enjoyed the sensation, |

three were indifferent, and
five felt ill—which makes it
seem likely that some people
will suffer from ‘“‘space travel
sickness.”

Weightlessness itself leads to
many other problems.

Try to drink water from a
cup and it will float out ail
over your face, get into your
nose and its connecting air
cavities, and so produce a sen-
sation of drowning.

Use a straw, and it picks up
a lot of air bubbles because
they stay suspended in the
weightless water.

Solid food particles hang
around in the mouth and get
up into the nose from behind.

Thick liquids out of a
“squeeze bottle’ can, however. “|
be got down into the stomach;
but if you take more than a
little at a time, it is liable to
come up again.

Another hazard faced by
man. in space is radiation.
Here the information relayed
by the American and Russian
satellites has been very useful.

@ We have learnt that there
is a belt of intense radiation
round the earth, just over the
Equator, beginning at about
600 miles up.

The latest information given
out at the International Astro-
nautical Corigress, held recent-
ly in London, was that little
harm would result from pass-
ing through this belt at the
normal speed of a spaceship,
but it would be dangerous to
stay within it while circling
the earth.

imitate |

There may also be sudden
bursts of radiation in outer

Russian Ecientitic worker VY. A. Smirnov is shown giving last instructions before a
“flight” to be made inside an altitude chamber in Moscow.

space, such as solar flares.

But, by watching the sun,
astronomers can give us a
day’s warning before the dan-
gerous ‘particles arrive and we
shall just have to delay take-
off until they are clear.

Then there is the effect of
space travel on the human
mind to be considered.

There is no outside sound to
be heard, nothing nearby to:
see (we may even be unable
to have windows in the space-
ship because of the possible
radiation effects on the eyes).

Even feeling is lacking be-
cause of weightlessness.

In America reactions to this |
sensory deprivation are being
tested by isolating trainess in
a sound-proof darkened room.

Most people can’t stand it
for more than a day or two,
and begin to have hallucina-
tions.

Some people, however, have
stood it for quite a long time;
and, in any case, things would
not be quite so desperate on a
space-ship, because you could
at least have light and some-
thing to do.

Sleeping is another prob-
lem, on which the Americans
have done an interesting ex-
periment.

A man was deprived of
sleep for 48 hours, then taken

up in an airplane.

He immediately went to
sleep, but when he became
weightless, he woke up at

once, feeling as if his arms
and legs had floated away
from him. ‘

So it seems that space-crews
will have to be trained either
to do without sleep or to sleep
in conditions of weightlessness.

Breathing and eating is no
problem on a short journey.
The spaceship can carry
enough food and oxygen for
the trip to the moon and back.

® But the journey to Mars
will take about 21% years in
all (two eight-month journeys
plus a waiting period for the
planets to get into the righi
relationship for the return).

One possible solution is to
take enough green plants io
manufacture oxygen for you,
and perhaps to provide food as
well,

What sort of men will be
the first in space? They must,
of course, be healthy, but
health is not everything.
Athletes, for instance, cannot
withstand as much extra G as
other healthy people.

Light-weight people need
less rocket fuel to get them
off the ground, and for this
reason women might be pre-
ferred to men.

As to psychological fitness
to live in close confinement

for long periods—perhaps with
other people — an American
doctor at the recent congress
considered that the ideal space
crew would consist of two
men and one woman!

100th

Anniversary

of the birth of

Sholem Aleichem

UJPO Drama Workshop
presents
SHOLEM ALEICHEWM’S

“TEVYA AND HIS
DAUGHTERS”

By Arnold Perl

Saturday, Nov. 28
Sunday, Noy. 29

at the

YORK THEATRE

639 Commercial Drive
Curtain Time 8:30 p.m.
Tickets Available At

PEOPLE’S CO-OP
BOOKSTORE

307 West Pender Si.
MU 5-5836
Admission $1.25

November 13, 1959—PACIFIC TRIBUNE—Page 5

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