JOURNEY TO MOON

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 154, 22 February 1932, Page 6

JOURNEY TO MOON

TREMENDOUS POSSIBILITIES FORESHADOWED BY PROFESSOR. CONQUERING SPACE. Six days' trips to the moon is the possibility foreshadowed by Professor John Stewart, of Princeton University in his new book, "Science To-day." Professor Stewart believes that within the next 100 years our descendants will be able to travel to the moon in rocket-propelled ships, and that the journey will take about six days. A vehicle for carrying men to the moon, he explains, must be designed for a speed of- several miles a second, and must be equipped with a power plant developing billions of kilowatts. If the present trend of in'crease in vehicular speed continues, the journey to the moon will offer no difficulties that science cannot solve. "The principle of the skyrocket is the only suitable one known for propelling the moon ship through empty space above the earth's atmosphere," Professor Stewart explains. "A lunar flight in the next few decades is definitely out nf question. One principal difficulty is tha't no known ftiel yields the enormods energy required. The preparation of an adequate fuel is not a matter for simple engineer development, but primarily for fundamental research in physics." Professor Stewart estimates the cost of the rocket ship at £400,000,000. Into Far-Off Heavens. "Such a journey," he prophecies, "is only a step within the cramped confines of the solar system," and should be the beginning of far more ambitious adventures into the far-off heavens. Man travelling from the earth to the moon must adjust himself to the altered gravity upon his arrival on the moon, for a person weighing 1751b on earth will weigh only 291b on the moon. Looking at the earth from the moon the cosmic traveller will see this globe low on the lunar horizon and about four times as large as the full moon seen from the earth. The earth, Profesdor Stewart adds, will appear bluer and much brighter than we usually consider it. The earthly explorer of the moon will find it a 'mineral jungle." Steep spines of bright rock, level expanses of darker slag, tumbled masses of ore, ashes from ancient volcanoes and wrecks of meteorites will cover most of the lunar landscape. The scientist further explains that the traveller will find no soil, no water, no clouds, no air, and no animal life.