The Space Travelers

For a few days during the summer doldrums, the rocket men came down to earth. Astronomers turned from their telescopes, and physicists came out of the laboratory. In the U.S. and in West Germany, scientists gathered to tell each other how much they had learned--and how little they really knew.

P: At a meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Boulder, Colo., Atom-Smasher Enrico Fermi speculated on the origin of cosmic rays. The high-speed cosmic particles, packed with destructive energy and dangerous for tomorrow's rocketeers, may have wandered into the earth's galaxy from the far reaches of space, said Dr. Fermi. Geologic ages ago, they drifted into the weak, galactic magnetic field. And weak though that field is, it has had millions of years to kick the particles up to a dangerous speed. Space travelers will brave them at their peril.

P: In Duesseldorf, Dr. Wilhelm Meyer-Cords, chairman of the North Rhine-Westphalian branch of Germany's Space Research Society, told fellow rocketeers that U.S. scientists are probably already at work building a space station. In case anyone doubted him, Dr. Meyer-Cords also presented a paper by Space Prophet Wernher von Braun, guided-missile expert for U.S. Army Ordnance. Von Braun already has plans for a man-carrying rocket that can reach the moon. His rocket would carry 20 passengers and make the round trip in ten days. Give him some $4 billion, says Von Braun, who is no man to boggle at minor details, and he will build a 70-man ship that will reach Mars and return.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.