The Press MONDAY, MAY 8, 1961. Pilot In Space

Press, Volume C, Issue 29507, 8 May 1961, Page 12

The Press MONDAY, MAY 8, 1961. Pilot In Space

The United States is to be warmly congratulated on Commander Alan Shepard’s flight into space. From the viewpoint of the propa-

ganda value of giant technological achievements

—especially on lesssophisticated peoples—the United States was unlucky to be forestalled by a mere three weeks in its efforts to secure the honour of being the first nation to put a man into space. Major Gagarin’s full orbit of the earth could have followed Commander Shepard’s parabola in logical sequence: and the magnificence of each achievement would have been fully acclaimed. As these great events have happened in the reverse order, there is a natural tendency to allow Commander Shepard’s more modest flight to be overshadowed by that of his predecessor in space. But it should not be belittled: it is still an impressive confirmation of the truly remarkable progress that man has made in the exploration of his environment—and of his capacity to extend still further the boundaries of his known universe. Both nations have succeeded in breaking man’s physical ties to his own planet, and this only three and a half years after the first space vehicle was sent into orbit around the earth. These 'two assertions of man’s astonishingly rapid progress in new sciences and' new technologies allow of no doubt about his ability to explore at least a part of the solar system: and no-one can now say with certainty where the final boundaries will be drawn.

Commander Shepard’s fl:ght had notable features that will give it a place of its own in history. The Americans’ conception of the function of rockets led them to follow a different line of basic research from the Russian: and as events have turned out this difference has left the Americans far behind in the development of rocket

thrust. It was a rocket with a thrust of less than a tenth of that which powered Major Gagarin’s Vostok that hurled Commander Shepard’s vehicle into space. Working on a narrow margin of power

compared with that at the command of the Russians, American technologists have achieved feats that at present can be fully appreciated only by scientists. Russian reports have made it clear that all control of Major Gagarin’s Vostok was from the ground; the occupant of the space vehicle was a passenger, and to a limited extent an observer. For a brief period Commander Shepard steered ” his vehicle—a fact that history will surely notice, perhaps to the extent of regarding him as the first true “ space “ pilot ”, A third feature of the flight was its astonishing precision. Only the Russians have the means of comparing Commander

Shepard’s flight with Major Gagarin’s; but even they must surely be impressed by the precision with which an object that reached a height of 115 miles and travelled more than 300 miles, some of the time at 5000 miles an hour, returned to earth at a previously determined spot.

The last consideration leads, of course, to the most marked difference between the Russian and American flights. The Americans have conducted their ventures in rocketry in the full glare of publicity. This has meant that the humiliation of failure in what, after all, were radical experiments has been suffered in public. Everyone who appreciates this contrast between Russian and American procedures will be impressed by the fact that the Americans were willing to subject Commander Shepard’s projected flight to the test of publicity, and will rejoice that, because the fundamental facts of the flight are beyond dispute, its triumph is the more emphatically adorned.