Final Frontier

A young reader's guide to space exploration. Final Frontier is an illustrated guide to the past, present and future of space exploration. The book covers the early history of space flight: from the first unmanned missions, to the early manned flights and finally to the Apollo moon missions. Space program successes and failures are covered including the disasters that befell Apollo 1 and the shuttles Challenger and Columbia. The book explains how deep space is explored today with such sophisticated telescopes and space probes as: - Hubble Space Telescope - Manned space stations - Unmanned probes such as Voyager and Pioneer - Space stations such as Mir and Apollo-Soyuz. The proposed International Space Station is described as well as the unique challenges people will encounter in space such as living in a zero-gravity environment. The future of space exploration is discussed including the possibility of alien life on other solar systems. Proposed projects such as an automated lunar mining operation and a scientific base on Mars are also covered. Readers will enjoy Final Frontier for its colorful, abundant illustrations and easy-to-follow text.