An astronout is a person trained for flight beyond the earth's asmosphere.(in Russia, this spaceman is called Cosmonaut). The United States of Amerika and Russia have been sending astronout and cosmonauts into space several times every year since 1958. They leave the earth in large rocket ships,but when they are outside the atmosphere their small space capsules leave the ships. They go into orbit around the earth or continue their journey to the moon or,by the time some of you read this perhaps, to a planet.
Both country have space programmes,and the two programmes are about the same. First they want to learn everything that they can about the new science of astronautics. In this sciencethey try to find ways to send man up in ships,to fly the ships in spsce and then to bring them back to the earth.
In the other parthof the programmes the astronouts experiments and explore space. Through their explorations and experiment we are learning more about space, the other planets in our solar system, the moon, and the sun. But we are learning much more about our planet earth, too. For we can say that the earth itself is a big space ship, carrying us thousands of miles through space every second.
In 1959 the United States selected a total of 73 astronauts. The NASA (The National Aeronautics and Space Administration) selected the astonaut candidates. 43 of these astronauts flew in the Gemini, Apollo, Mercury, and skylap programme,the space laboratory programme. When 35 new astronaut candidates where selected in 1978 for for the space Shuttle programme, 26 of the astronauts chosen earlier still had flight status. Six women were among the 35 new candidates selected for the space shuttle programme.
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