The online magazine Redstone Science Fiction was recognized last week by the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America as a professional-level publication.
Redstone Science Fiction logo.
RSF published my story, “Memorial at Copernicus,” last August in their third issue. That story now counts as my second “pro” sale, even though it was published before my first pro sale to Analog.
Thanks, Redstone, and may you have many more years of success!
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Fifty years ago today — May 5, 1961 — Alan B. Shepard, Jr., became the first U.S. astronaut launched into space.
(Freedom-7 launch. NASA image.)
Shepard had named his capsule Freedom-7, though the flight was also known as Mercury Redstone-3.* The mission had several objectives:
(1) familiarize man with a brief but complete space flight experience, including the lift-off, powered flight, weightless flight (approximately 5 minutes), re-entry, and landing phases of the flight;
(2) evaluate man’s ability to perform as a functional unit during space flight by demonstrating manual control of spacecraft attitude before, during, and after retrofire and by use of voice communications during flight;
(3) study man’s physiological reactions during space flight; and,
(4) recover the astronaut and spacecraft.
Shepard’s launch from the Eastern Space & Missile Center was only 23 days after Yuri Gagarin had become the first human in orbit. Shepard’s flight was suborbital, however, so the honor of being the first U.S. astronaut in orbit would eventually go to John Glenn.
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*Speaking of Redstone rockets, why not pop over to Redstone Science Fiction and see what they have to offer? They recently posted their twelfth issue!
by I don’t know that the question has a single “true” answer, but in this Pajamas Media article, SF legends Orson Scott Card* and Jerry Pournelle, along with relative newcomers Tom Kratman and Larry Correia, provide some interesting insights.
It was no surprise that Baen Books (for whom I read slush) should be mentioned so prominently, but I particularly liked this bit, from OSC:
Back when I cared, most of the writers of my generation were so extremely leftist in their formal opinions, and so extremely elitist in their practices, that it would be difficult to discern where they actually stood on anything. It’s as if the entire Tsarist aristocracy fervently preached Bolshevism even as they oppressed their peasants. But that view is based on observations back in the mid-1980s. Since then, my only exposure to their views has been the general boycott of mine. In short, I’m their Devil, but I have no idea who their God is anymore.
The last sentence is hyperbole, as I think Kratman, John Ringo, and a few other Baen authors may have better claim to being the real bugaboos of the SF left.
One last thought, speaking of becoming more conservative … or at least seeming more conservative: I thought last night’s State of the Union speech was quite good. I appreciated the tone and the balance, and look forward to seeing whether both continue.
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* Full Disclosure: OSC is a former employer of mine. I attended his “Literary Boot Camp” and later had the pleasure of reading slush for his magazine, Intergalactic Medicine Show.
by Thirty-five years ago today — September 9, 1975 — the Viking-2 orbiter and lander were launched on their way to Mars by a Titan-IIIE booster out of Cape Canaveral.
(First color image of Utopia Planitia taken by the Viking-2 lander. NASA image.)
The first Viking lander had been launched a few weeks earlier, as noted in this blog post.
Viking-2 landed about a year after launch at Utopia Planitia. Fans of many Star Trek iterations will recognize Utopia Planitia as the place starships are built — with facilities on planet and in orbit above. For more information on the science fictional Utopia Planitia Shipyard, try this Memory Alpha page or this starship guide.
by Forty years ago today — August 17, 1970 — the USSR launched the Venera-7 mission from the Baikonur Cosmodrome.
(Venera-7 capsule. Image from the National Space Science Data Center.)
Venera-7 landed on Venus on December 15, 1970, and was “the first man-made object to return data after landing on another planet.”
by Forty-five years ago today — July 16, 1965 — the Soviet Union launched their first Proton rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome.
(Proton launch from July 2000. NASA image from Wikimedia Commons.)
The Proton went on to become one of the most reliable launch vehicles in operation today.
I was able to see Proton operations “up close and personal” during the 2002 launch campaign for the Canadian Nimiq-2 satellite; however, I did not get to see the launch itself because I rotated back to the U.S. when my relief arrived. My observations at Baikonur eventually became the inspiration for my short story, “The Rocket Seamstress,” which was published in Zahir and is now available on Anthology Builder.
by Thirty-five years ago today — July 15, 1975 — the two spacecraft of the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project were launched.
(Soyuz spacecraft, as seen from the Apollo spacecraft. NASA image. A higher-resolution image is available here.)
The Soviet Union launched Soyuz-19 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, carrying cosmonauts Alexei A. Leonov and Valeri N. Kubasov.
The USA launched its ASTP contribution from Cape Canaveral atop a Saturn-1B launch vehicle. Astronauts Thomas P. Stafford, Vance D. Brand, and Donald K. Slayton docked with Soyuz-19 two days later in the first-ever international space docking.
Unfortunately for space enthusiasts, it was also the final flight of an Apollo spacecraft flight.
[BREAK, BREAK]
In tangentially related news, Donald K. “Deke” Slayton plays an important role in my alternate history story, “Memorial at Copernicus,” which is slated to appear in an upcoming issue of the online magazine Redstone Science Fiction.
by Sixty years ago today — June 27, 1950 — “Destination Moon” premiered in New York. Produced by George Pal and partly written by SF Grand Master Robert A. Heinlein, it was one of the first films to realistically depict a trip to the moon. This Wikipedia article goes into more detail about the movie and its influence.
Forty-five years later, on this date in 1995, the Space Shuttle Atlantis launched from the Kennedy Space Center on mission STS-71, to a destination no shuttle had ever visited before: the Russians’ Mir space station. U.S. astronauts Robert L. Gibson, Charles J. Precourt, Ellen S. Baker, Gregory J. Harbaugh, and Bonnie J. Dunbar traveled to Mir along with cosmonauts Anatoly Y. Solovyev and Nikolai M. Budarin.
(STS-71 launch. NASA image.)
STS-71 was the 100th human spaceflight launched by the U.S., and represented the first time part of a shuttle crew changed out while in orbit: Solovyev and Budarin as the crew of Mir increment 19, while the Mir 18 crew — astronaut Norman E. Thagard and cosmonauts Vladimir Dezhurov and Gannady Strekalov — boarded Atlantis for the ride back to Earth.
Now, if we could only get back to heading for destinations like the moon …
by Thirty-five years ago today — June 8, 1975 — the Soviet Union launched the Venera-9 mission to Venus. Venera-9 was the first mission to successfully return an image of the surface of Venus; specifically, the rocky terrain in the immediate vicinity of the lander.
(Photographs of the surface of Venus: top, from Venera-9, and bottom from Venera-10. From http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/photo_gallery/photogallery-venus.html.)
A Proton rocket out of the Baikonur Cosmodrome sent the Venera-9 probe on its way. Its sister ship Venera-10 launched six days later, on June 14th. Each carried an orbiter section and a lander.
The Venera-9 lander descended successfully to the surface on October 22, 1975, and operated for nearly an hour before the heat (485 degrees Celsius) and pressure (90 atmospheres) destroyed it. The Venera-10 lander followed its sister to the surface on October 25, 1975, and landed over 2000 km away from the Venera-9 landing site. Venera-10 operated for over an hour before it, too, succumbed to the harsh Venusian environment.
If only they had found the tropical paradise envisioned by classic science fiction writers, instead of fields of heat-blasted rocks, we might have developed more motivation to get out there and explore….
by Fifty years ago today — May 15, 1960 — the Soviet Union launched Sputnik-4 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome.
The mission was designed to test the systems for launching men into space, but sources conflict about the design and operational details. It is clear that Sputnik-4 was launched by a modified SS-6 ‘Sapwood’ intercontinental ballistic missile, the same rocket that would become known (if it wasn’t already) as the Vostok. But spacecraft details vary.
Sputnik-4’s mass is listed on the National Space Science Data Center page (above) as 1477 kg, but this fascinating page, complete with detailed illustration, lists its mass as over 4500 kg. Some sources say the spacecraft carried a pressurized cabin in which sat an instrumented mannequin, others that it only carried a mock-up of the manned cabin.
The sources agree that the orbiting spacecraft malfunctioned when its retro rockets fired while the vehicle was oriented incorrectly. Instead of descending into the Earth’s atmosphere, it was actually boosted into a higher orbit. The effect of the malfunction became the subject of some controversy, as the spacecraft did not re-enter the atmosphere where it was supposed to. It is said to have de-orbited in October 1965, but this Wikipedia page mentions that debris from the spacecraft impacted in Manitowoc, Wisconsin in September 1962.
But the biggest controversy about this launch is the theory that it contained a living person rather than a mannequin or mock-up. Radio calls were apparently overheard between the spacecraft and the ground that had the character of distress calls, but they were attributed to taped transmissions meant to test the communications equipment.
This final controversy also includes an unlikely witness: author Robert A. Heinlein, the science fiction Grand Master.
This Wikipedia page about the so-called ‘lost cosmonauts’ reminded me that Heinlein had been touring the Soviet Union in the same timeframe as this launch (and of Francis Gary Powers’s crash in his U-2). Of course I pulled my copy of Expanded Universe down off the shelf to find this tidbit in the article “‘Pravda’ Means ‘Truth'”:
I am sure of this: At noon on May 15 a group of Red Army cadets were unanimously positive that the rocket was manned. That pravda did not change until later that afternoon.
You must decide on your own, of course, if you believe the official version.
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