7 Sound Decision The Martian Queen

The program you are about to hear is fiction. Science fiction. We make no guarantees however, how long it will remain fiction. Next floor! Tomorrow! Here is your guide to these adventures of the mind, the editor of a astounding science fiction magazine, John Campbell Jr.

Let's consider the proposition that interplanetary space flight has become a commercial proposition. There are regular liners running between the planets. And the Martian Queen, we'll say, is such a liner. A spaceship making a short-run orbit from Mars to Earth.

This time, she's carrying 150 passengers and a crew 30 or so. She made a long, uneventful trip from space, and now she's approaching the last leg of her voyage, the deceleration for landing. At the appointed time, gyros cut in, slowing the spin on the ship.

And the rotation in stop the skipper of the Martian Queen is navigator already to begin the actual landing As I close them get our captain there. We're approaching Earth with over 60 miles per second I need to land at this speed How much time do we have 15 seconds?

The rocket tools are aligned properly with respect to worth the timer is set ready Strap in the ready keep our automatics in the last 5000 feet. I'll bring her down from there manual right sir That she goes. Yes, you know get engineering. I need a camarader control. We're dropping straight toward Earth The Martian Queen had been hitting towards White Sands Space Port,

and as a matter of course the radar teams at White Sands had been alerted to the landing. But they had the ship pinpointed in their screens, and when the Martian Queen stopped decelerating, they knew there was something wrong.