I turned on the T.V. set. Immediately an advert
came on. “Win a trip into Space by simply answering the following question:
Name the nine planets of the solar system.” I decided to enter for the
crack, so I dialled the number, gave my name, phone number and the answer
to the question. A week later the phone rang when I was in the middle of
my dinner. When I answered it, a voice on the other end told me that I
had won the trip to space. I nearly choked on the carrot in my mouth. Then
the caller gave me more information about my prize.
A fortnight later I got into a taxi, with my bag
packed to go to Shannon Airport. My flight took me to an airport in Florida
and then I took a taxi to Cape Canaveral. Cape Canaveral is a rocket launch
site used by N.A.S.A. I was given a tour of the space station. I saw many
instruments on the tour. Then I was trained for my month-long trip into
space. I was given my spacesuit and backpack to help me move about when
I left the spaceshuttle. The spacesuit has a radio inside the helmet so
that I could communicate with the other six astronauts that were coming
with me on the trip.
There was a lift that took us up to the entrance
of the shuttle. I’ll describe the shuttle to you. It’s shaped like an aeroplane.
In the front is the flight cabin where all the controls are. It takes two
pilots to fly the shuttle. Behind the flight cabin are the laboratory
and the crews quarters. That’s where the crew sleep, eat and drink. At
the very back are the massive engines.
When we were all strapped in our seats in the
flight cabin the spaceshuttle lifted off. The engines roared as flames
and gas gushed out of the engines, pushing the craft upwards. We had to
reach the speed of 17,500 mph to break free of the Earth's gravity. Eight
minutes after we lifted off the booster rocket fell away.
When we finally escaped the Earth's gravity and
entered space we could leave our seats and float about. I felt extremely
light. We visited the Moon first. It took us three days to get to the Moon.
As we couldn’t land the shuttle on the Moon we had to go in a smaller craft.
After putting on my spacesuit I climbed into the craft with two other astronauts.
The other astronauts would stay behind and orbit the Moon. When we landed
on the Moon we climbed out and took a look around. I saw some of the stars
in the distance and the odd meteorite flashing by. I found it quite difficult
to walk so I was glad to have my backpack on to move around with. The other
astronauts took pictures and samples from the Moon's surface. I picked
up a rock and decided to bring it back home as a souvenir. Then we boarded
the small craft again and went back to the waiting spaceshuttle.
Unfortunately, for the next four days I suffered
from what the others called "space sickness". It’s caused by the body adapting
to the weightlessness. So I spent the next few days vomiting. I felt
quite miserable strapped up in my sleeping bag, which was connected to
the wall, watching the others doing experiments on the samples they got
from the moon. But I recovered quickly enough and soon I was feeling better
again. Our next mission was to repair a fault in a satellite. Once again
I put on my spacesuit and I was attached to a long rope in the shuttle
so I couldn’t float away in space. I was afraid of floating away or if
the rope snapped but thankfully it didn’t. The astronauts showed me the
fault in the satellite and how to fix it. I was quite thankful when that
mission was over because I was floating about like crazy and I thought
I was going to float away altogether.
Next we saw Mars in the distance. It was pear
shaped and really red with white polar caps. To my disappointment
we had to go home again. We landed back in Cape Canaveral and I felt like
a chunk of lead because we were so used to the weightlessness in space.
It took us a while to adjust back to normal again on Earth but in spite
of that I was glad I answered that advert one month ago.
