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EDITORIAL INFORMATION

Today we think of manned space flight as almost routine... Despite this, the fact is that the human exploration of space has always pushed the boundaries of science and technology and once in a while things can go terribly wrong. NASA's rare major disasters and near-misses - like the explosion of the Challenger space Shuttle with the lost of its crew, and the nerve-wracking flight of the crippled Apollo 13 - hit the headlines but many other accidents, particularly in the Russian space programme, have gone mostly unreported. David Shayler presents, for the first time, a detailed but inmensely readable review of accidents in human space flight from the beginnings of stratospheric travel to the present day. This wide-ranging durvey also features nine detailed case histories, reviews the theory of risks and accidents, and looks forward to the next developments in space travel, with the construction of the International Space Station. Manned spaceflight will never be risk-free, but the lessons learnt from the past mistakes so graphically described here can certainly make it safer.

(Extracted from the back cover).

GENERAL TABLE OF CONTENTS

 

-Table of Contents.

-Foreword.

-Author's Preface

-Acknowledgements.

-List of Illustrations and Tables.

-Prologue.

-The Quest for Space.

-Overview.
-Pioneers of the Stratosphere.
-The Lost of the X-15, November 1967.
-Summary.

-Training for Space.

-Overview.
-The Apollo 1 Fire, January 1967.
-Summary.

-Launch to Space.

-Overview.
-Soyuz Launch Aborts, 1975 and 1983.
-The STS-25 (51-L) Launch Explosion, 1986.
-Summary.

-Survival In Space.

-Overview.
-Gemini 8 In-Flight Abort, 1966.
-The Apollo 13 Explosion, 1970.
-Mir: Fire and a Collision, 1997.
-Summary.

-Return from Space.

-Overview.
-The Soyuz 1 Landing Accident, 1967.
-Soyuz 11 Decompression, 1971.
-Summary.

-The Future In Space.

-Overview.
-Summary.

-Conclusions.

-The Lessons Learned.

-Appendix 1. Milestones in the History of Human Spaceflight.

-Appendix 2. Selected Chronology of a Difficult Road to Space.

-Appendix 3. Astronaut and Cosmonaut Deaths.

-Bibliography

-Index.