Looking down at the earth from space.

196 1 year, Gagarin circled the earth in an orbit with a maximum height of 30 1 km, which was the first time that human beings were launched into earth orbit, breaking the restriction that human beings only lived on the surface of our earth home.

Sixty years later, on June 17, the Shenzhou 12 manned spacecraft was launched, and astronauts Nie Haisheng, Liu Boming and Tang Hongbo entered the Tianhe core cabin, becoming the first "check-in personnel". This is the first time that China people have entered their own space station.

Every time mankind conquers space, it is exciting. What makes mankind fly to the star universe despite difficulties and obstacles? What should be the significance of human beings appearing in space? What is its limit? What is its responsibility?

In this reading, we will take manned space flight and astronauts as the theme, and explore the mystery of manned space flight and the different life of astronauts from the space theme book list published by Hunan Science and Technology Publishing House in recent years.

Astronauts have spent most of their working lives on earth.

"The ship's porthole may show you a miracle at any time. Every 92 minutes, there will be another sunrise: the sky is like a cream cake, with a layer of orange below, a thick layer of blue above and a thick darkness above. All the secrets of our planet are displayed in front of us ... "

The Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth depicts a spectacular and little-known space exploration experience. The author Colonel chris Hadfield is one of the most experienced and accomplished astronauts in the world. He has been a pilot since he was nine years old. 1995, hadfield went into space for the first time. 20 13 in may, he returned to earth after serving as the commander of the international space station for five months.

Hadfield will always remember his first spacewalk. Drifting outside the capsule, completely immersed in the wonder of the universe, tying himself to a spaceship and flying around the earth at the speed of 17500 miles per hour (about 28 163 kilometers)-this is his lifelong dream and goal. It turned out that the extravehicular action he envisioned was somewhat similar to the scene in the movie-with the melody of the movie soundtrack reaching its climax, he gracefully pushed open the hatch and entered the dark space. But at that moment, he had no intention to think about those magical scenes, and he could only concentrate and awkwardly twist his body to avoid the spacesuit being entangled in the tether. He showed his head carefully first, and only dozens of people in the world showed their heads like this. Then enter the space like a calf tied by a cable.

"Simply flying into space doesn't make me a real astronaut at once. Now, anyone can go into space as long as he is rich and healthy. This kind of people can be called' space flight participants', usually called' space tourists'. They can leave the earth for about 10 days, and spend 20 million to 40 million dollars per capita to arrive at the International Space Station by Soyuz spacecraft. This is not as simple as boarding a plane. They need to complete the basic safety training for half a year. But being a space tourist is really different from being an astronaut. " Hadfield said.

In the book, he tells about many years of training experience. Like everyone who wants to be an astronaut, he studies in the same place: on the earth.

When people meet astronauts, they always ask, "What do you do when you are not flying in space?" People's impression of astronauts is like this, as if they are either in space or on their way to space, and the truth that hadfield told everyone is: "We train on the earth, and most of our work and life are trained on the earth."

"If you just like flying around the earth in a spaceship, you will definitely hate being an astronaut." The ratio of preparation time to on-orbit time is several months, which is equivalent to a day in space. This means that if you want to go into space, you have to train for at least a few years, and then you may not be assigned to a space mission. The training of specific tasks takes 2-4 years, and this kind of training is more intensive and strict than usual. You need to practice difficult and repetitive tasks, but also challenging and exhausting tasks. These times are very, very long.

Fundamentally speaking, astronauts are engaged in the service industry. The essence of this job is not to seek personal stimulation in space, but to make the exploration of space safer and get more scientific achievements. Therefore, although it is necessary to learn the key technologies needed to enter space, such as spacewalking, there are also many other problems, such as training, attending classes-especially many classes-and exams. We should also study at night and on weekends. Besides, we should work on the ground and support other astronauts' missions, which is also very important to improve our ability.

A long simulation experience may never happen.

Six years after he first went into space, in April 20001year, when hadfield went into space again to complete the STS- 100 mission, he had a deeper understanding of the whole complex space flight. He trained for STS- 100 for four years before the planned launch. When they started training, their destination, the International Space Station, didn't even exist. The first part of the space station was sent into space on 1998. Their main task is to transport and install Canadian Arm-2, which is a huge mechanical arm that can catch satellites and spaceships, transport materials and personnel, and most importantly, it can be used to assemble the rest of the International Space Station. The spacecraft will continue to transport functional modules and laboratories, and Canadian Arm-2 will help to place them in designated locations. This is the most expensive and complicated building tool in the world. It takes more than one extravehicular activity to lift it up and make it work, but twice-and hadfield is EV 1, the main spacewalker, although he has never been out of the capsule before.

Hadfield practiced spacewalking in the neutral buoyancy laboratory for many years. Spacewalk is like climbing mountains, lifting weights, repairing small engines and performing complex ballet for two-wearing heavy spacesuits and rubbing your joints, fingers and collarbone from time to time. In a weightless environment, many simple tasks become extremely difficult. Just unscrewing bolts with a wrench is as difficult as changing tires with skates and hockey goalie gloves. Therefore, every spacewalk requires years of careful preparation, including hundreds of staff and a lot of unknown unremitting work, to ensure that all details-and all emergencies-are taken into account. Super careful planning is very important, because every spacewalk is dangerous. You must venture into a vacuum that is completely unsuitable for survival. If you are in trouble, you can't run into the boat at once.

In the training of astronauts, many contents are mysterious and once-in-a-lifetime experiences, which makes it hard not to fall in love with this activity. In the summer of 20 10, hadfield worked with an international research team in Lake Pavel. The bottom of Pave Lake is covered with microbial rocks, which are grotesque and look like coral reefs. Looking at these microbial rocks at the bottom of the lake is a bit like exploring another planet. The international research team thought that astronauts should also participate in this matter, so hadfield obtained the pilot qualification of the DeepWorker small submarine.

When you are alone in a small waterproof bubble, about 6 1 m underwater, shooting and collecting some structural samples related to the origin of life on earth, you will feel far away from this world. This kind of work is absolutely suitable for astronauts. Their training requires their eyes, hands and feet to work in a dangerous environment and not to bump into anything. At the same time, DeepWorker itself is like a vehicle for collecting samples on the moon, asteroids and Mars. Astronauts who finally have the opportunity to do this job can learn how to be the hands and eyes of scientists on earth and how to train astronauts into geologists-although they are not great geologists, they are just enough geologists. Because it is more practical than trying to train first-class geologists into astronauts.

Obviously, these are long-term goals. As astronauts, a lot of training is like this: "We are learning how to do something, which is only a little contribution to a bigger task and not helpful to our career prospects." Some experiences will take us a long time to learn and simulate, but we may never have such an experience. In fact, these are hypothetical scenarios, but we will all study hard. "

How to deal with inner fears?

"How do you deal with your inner fears?" This is one of the questions that astronauts are often asked.

When people think of space exploration, they don't just imagine neil armstrong walking down the steps of the lunar module and stepping on the moon with his feet. They will also remember the amazing flames of the disintegration of the space shuttle Columbia after re-entry, as well as the floating metal fragments and the remains of the crew. These tragic scenes and joyful moments of success in space flight are deeply imprinted in the public consciousness.

Therefore, naturally, when people try to imagine sitting on a rocket with a roaring engine, they think it must be a terrible experience. Moreover, if you are stopped from the street and tied into a rocket ship and told to launch in four minutes, you should know that once you make a mistake, you will not only lose your own life, but also kill everyone around you, and you will be scared to death.

However, hadfield is not afraid of these, because they have been training for many years. The training is conducted by several expert groups, who help astronauts think clearly about how to deal with various situations that may occur between launch and landing. Like all astronauts, hadfield experienced many space flights simulating real scenes, so when the rocket engine finally roared out, his main emotion was not worry, but relaxation.

Feeling ready to do something does not mean that you are sure that you will succeed, but that you know what problems may arise and have a prepared plan to solve them. Trainers of the space program will specially design all kinds of bad situations and let astronauts practice over and over again in an increasingly complex simulation environment. For example, you should practice what to do in case of engine failure, computer crash or explosion. For example, it is really effective to be forced to calmly face the failure, research failure, analyze all possible situations that follow, split all components, and analyze all possible consequences. Do this training almost every day. After several years in a row, it's like putting on the strongest armor, which can fight against fear. This kind of armor is an ability gained through hard work.

Astronauts' training makes them form a new set of instinct: in the face of danger, they no longer consider whether to fight or flee, but immediately consider the priority of threats and then find an orderly solution.

Facing the crisis, they don't want to escape directly, but how to act, find out the problem and then solve it.

Fire is the most dangerous disaster that can happen on a spaceship, because astronauts really have nowhere to go. At the same time, the performance of flame in weightlessness is unpredictable and more difficult to extinguish. In his first year as an astronaut, hadfield thought that if he heard the alarm, his reaction would be to grab the fire extinguisher and immediately put himself into battle to save himself.

However, after 2 1 year of training, this instinct became another group of reactions after training, which can be described in three words: warning, gathering and working. "Dealing with problems" is the mantra of NASA, which means to follow the decision tree in turn and find solutions to problems in an orderly way until the oxygen is exhausted. They often practice the code of "alarm, assembly and handling" to deal with fires, so these reactions have not only become the second nature of astronauts, but have actually replaced their natural instinct.