Legend has it that during the height of the space race in the 1960s, NASA scientists figured that pens could not function in space. So, they spent millions of dollars developing a pen that could write in space, while their Soviet counterparts used the humble pencil.
This story has been floating around the Internet for way too long. However, it is just a myth.
The truth
According to NASA historians, NASA astronauts also used pencils. In 1965, NASA ordered 34 mechanical pencils from Houston's Tycam Engineering Manufacturing, Inc. at the rate of $ 128.89 per pencil. When the public got to know about these rates, there was an outcry, and NASA had to find something much cheaper for its astronauts to use.
The pencil loses out
The pencil wasn't an ideal choice for writing in space because its tip could flake and break off, drifting in microgravity with the potential to harm an astronaut or an equipment. Apart from this, pencils are flammable, and NASA wanted to avoid anything flammable aboard a spacecraft.
And the pen?
Regular pens that work on Earth did not work in space because they rely on gravity for the flow of ink to the nib. This was understood quite early by scientists and hence astronauts used pencils. But with both the pencil and the pen creating issues, what did NASA finally resort to?
The saviour
Around the time NASA was embroiled in the mechanical pencils controversy, Paul C. Fisher of the Fisher Pen Co. designed a ballpoint pen that could work in space. His company invested one million dollars to fund, design, and patent the pen on its own.
Fisher's pen operated seamlessly, not just in space, but also in a weightless environment, underwater, in other liquids, and in temperatures ranging from -50 F to +400 F.
The company offered the pen to NASA, but the space agency was hesitant to buy it due to the mechanical pencil controversy.
However, a few years later, after rigorous testing, NASA agreed to equip its astronauts with the space pen. The space agency bought 400 pens from Fisher. And a year later, the Russians also ordered 100 pens and 1,000 ink cartridges to use on their Soyuz space missions. Both NASA and the Soviet space agency received a 40 % discount on bulk purchase of the pens, paying about $ 2.39 per pen.
Over the years, Fisher's company has created different space pens, which are still used by NASA and the Soviet space agency.
If you would like to get your hands on one of these space pens, it would cost you approximately $ 50.
Picture Credit : Google
At one time people thought that shooting stars were a sign of coming disasters. Now we make wishes when we see them and hope they will come true. In both cases the reality behind shooting stars is less exciting.
Although we call them stars, they are really no more than bits of space dust which burn up as they enter the earth's atmosphere. Great heat is generated by the friction of their flight through the atmosphere and this causes them to flare up into a brief streak of light as they race across the sky and disintegrate.
On average you can see a shooting star every ten minutes on a clear night. From time to time the earth passes through a cloud of dust left by a comet, and when this happens shooting stars occur much more frequently.
Spacecraft returning to earth have to be fitted with special shields to protect them as they enter the earth's atmosphere. The American space shuttle, for example, has heat-reflecting tiles. Without these it would burn up on re-entry.
Picture Credit : Google
No one has ever seen a black hole and it is unlikely that anyone ever will. They exist only as complex scientific calculations. But evidence obtained from studying the universe suggests that they are out there somewhere.
The principle behind a black hole is that it is an object with a force of gravity so strong that nothing can escape from it not even light! This is not too easy to imagine. But space scientists reckon that anything falling into a black hole would never be seen again - pretty spooky. Their thinking goes that black holes are formed when massive stars, much bigger than even our sun, reach the end of their lives and shrink. As they shrink they squeeze everything inside to an infinite density.
The major clue to the existence of black holes is X-rays which have been detected by satellites outside the earth's atmosphere. These seem to come from gas falling into black holes. The gas gets so hot that it gives off X-rays which help pin-point where black holes might be.
Picture Credit : Google
