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Ministry Of Space
''Ministry of Space'' is a three-part alternate history mini-series written by Warren Ellis, published by American company Image Comics in 2001-2004. The book's art is by Chris Weston, and depicts retro technology in "British" style. The story is set in an alternate history where soldiers and operatives of the United Kingdom reached the German rocket installations at Peenemünde ahead of the Americans and the Soviets, and brought all the key personnel and technology to Britain, in a mirror of the real world's Operation Paperclip and Operation Osoaviakhim. This leads to the establishement of the Ministry of Space, whose mission is to develop British space technology and establish a firm foothold in space for Queen and Empire. Elements of social commentary are present throughout the book, as is typical of Ellis' work, while the drama of the story is found in the lives of the first pioneers of space exploration (as in '' The Right Stuff''). This social commentary is disguised i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chris Weston
Chris Weston (born 1969) is a British comics artist who has worked both in the US and UK comics industries. Biography Weston was born in January 1969 in Rinteln, Germany, and lived in various countries as a child. His career began when he was apprenticed for a year to work with Don Lawrence, by the end of which he had secured paid work on the major British strip ''Judge Dredd''. He worked with writer John Smith on the ten-part ''Indigo Prime'' story, "Killing Time" in which characters battled Jack the Ripper aboard a time travelling train. Weston's work in America began with on ''Swamp Thing'' during Mark Millar's time as scriptwriter. He has since gone on to be published in ''The Invisibles'', ''Starman'', '' JSA'', ''Lucifer'', and '' The Authority''. He has also worked on '' The Filth'' and '' Ministry of Space''. The former a creator-owned written by Grant Morrison, the latter a "what if?" limited series written by Warren Ellis which saw Britain winning the Space Race. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
British Space Programme
The British space programme is the British government's work to develop British space capabilities. The objectives of the current civil programme are to "win sustainable economic growth, secure new scientific knowledge and provide benefits to all citizens." The first official British space programme began in 1952. In 1959, the first satellite programme was started, with the Ariel series of British satellites, built in the United States and the UK and launched using American rockets. The first British satellite, Ariel 1, was launched in 1962. The British space programme has always emphasized uncrewed space research and commercial initiatives. It has never been government policy to create a British astronaut corps. The British government did not provide funding for the International Space Station until 2011. During the 1960s and 1970s, a number of efforts were made to develop a British satellite launch capability. A British rocket named Black Arrow did succeed in placing a singl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cabin Pressurization
Cabin pressurization is a process in which conditioned air is pumped into the cabin of an aircraft or spacecraft in order to create a safe and comfortable environment for passengers and crew flying at high altitudes. For aircraft, this air is usually bled off from the gas turbine engines at the compressor stage, and for spacecraft, it is carried in high-pressure, often cryogenic, tanks. The air is cooled, humidified, and mixed with recirculated air if necessary before it is distributed to the cabin by one or more environmental control systems. The cabin pressure is regulated by the outflow valve. While the first experimental pressurization systems saw use during the 1920s and 1930s, it was not until 1940 that a commercial aircraft would enter service with a pressurized cabin, when the Boeing 307 Stratoliner joined the Transcontinental & Western Air and Pan American Airways fleets. The practice would become widespread a decade later, particularly with the introduction of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Human Spaceflight
Human spaceflight (also referred to as manned spaceflight or crewed spaceflight) is spaceflight with a crew or passengers aboard a spacecraft, often with the spacecraft being operated directly by the onboard human crew. Spacecraft can also be remotely operated from ground stations on Earth, or autonomously, without any direct human involvement. People trained for spaceflight are called astronauts (American or other), ''cosmonauts'' (Russian), or ''taikonauts'' (Chinese); and non-professionals are referred to as spaceflight participants or ''spacefarers''. The first human in space was Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, who launched as part of the Soviet Union's Vostok program on 12 April 1961 at the beginning of the Space Race. On 5 May 1961, Alan Shepard became the first American in space, as part of Project Mercury. Humans traveled to the Moon nine times between 1968 and 1972 as part of the United States' Apollo program, and have had a continuous presence in space for on the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Morse Code
Morse code is a method used in telecommunication to encode text characters as standardized sequences of two different signal durations, called ''dots'' and ''dashes'', or ''dits'' and ''dahs''. Morse code is named after Samuel Morse, one of the inventors of the telegraph. International Morse code encodes the 26 basic Latin letters through , one accented Latin letter (), the Arabic numerals, and a small set of punctuation and procedural signals ( prosigns). There is no distinction between upper and lower case letters. Each Morse code symbol is formed by a sequence of ''dits'' and ''dahs''. The ''dit'' duration is the basic unit of time measurement in Morse code transmission. The duration of a ''dah'' is three times the duration of a ''dit''. Each ''dit'' or ''dah'' within an encoded character is followed by a period of signal absence, called a ''space'', equal to the ''dit'' duration. The letters of a word are separated by a space of duration equal to three ''dits'', ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
God Save The King
"God Save the King" is the national anthem, national and/or royal anthem of the United Kingdom, most of the Commonwealth realms, their territories, and the British Crown Dependencies. The author of the tune is unknown and it may originate in Plainsong, plainchant, but an attribution to the composer John Bull (composer), John Bull is sometimes made. "God Save the King" is the ''de facto'' national anthem of the United Kingdom and one of national anthems of New Zealand, two national anthems used by New Zealand since 1977, as well as for several of the UK's territories that have their own additional local anthem. It is also the royal anthem—played specifically in the presence of the monarch—of the aforementioned countries, in addition to Australia (since 1984), Canada (since 1980), Belize (since 1981), Antigua and Barbuda (since 1981), The Bahamas (since 1973), and most other Commonwealth realms. In countries not part of the British Empire, the tune of "God Save the King" ha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Artificial Satellite
A satellite or artificial satellite is an object intentionally placed into orbit in outer space. Except for passive satellites, most satellites have an electricity generation system for equipment on board, such as solar panels or radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs). Most satellites also have a method of communication to ground stations, called transponders. Many satellites use a standardized bus to save cost and work, the most popular of which is small CubeSats. Similar satellites can work together as a group, forming constellations. Because of the high launch cost to space, satellites are designed to be as lightweight and robust as possible. Most communication satellites are radio relay stations in orbit and carry dozens of transponders, each with a bandwidth of tens of megahertz. Satellites are placed from the surface to orbit by launch vehicles, high enough to avoid orbital decay by the atmosphere. Satellites can then change or maintain the orbit by propuls ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sound Barrier
The sound barrier or sonic barrier is the large increase in aerodynamic drag and other undesirable effects experienced by an aircraft or other object when it approaches the speed of sound. When aircraft first approached the speed of sound, these effects were seen as constituting a barrier, making faster speeds very difficult or impossible. The term ''sound barrier'' is still sometimes used today to refer to aircraft approaching Supersonic speed, supersonic flight in this high drag regime. Flying faster than sound produces a sonic boom. In dry air at 20 °C (68 °F), the speed of sound is 343 metres per second (about 767 mph, 1234 km/h or 1,125 ft/s). The term came into use during World War II when pilots of high-speed fighter aircraft experienced the effects of compressibility, a number of adverse aerodynamic effects that deterred further acceleration, seemingly impeding flight at speeds close to the speed of sound. These difficulties represented a bar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Black Budget
A black budget or covert appropriation is a government budget that is allocated for classified or other secret operations of a nation. The black budget is an account expenses and spending related to military research and covert operations. The black budget is mostly classified because of security reasons. The black budget can be complicated to calculate, but in the United States it has been estimated to be over US$50 billion a year, taking up approximately 7 percent of the US$700 billion American defense budget. By country France In France, the black budget is known as "special funds" ( French: ''fonds spéciaux''). In 2020, 70 million euros were spent on the funds, which were also illegally used by ministers to pay themselves. There is no law that regulates use of the funds, though the black budget is voted on every year by deputees. Russia According to an estimate by the Moscow-based , about 21% (3.2 trillion rubles) of the Russian federal budget was "black" (not itemized ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 Winston Churchill in the Second World War, during the Second World War, and again from 1951 to 1955. Apart from two years between 1922 and 1924, he was a Member of Parliament (United Kingdom), Member of Parliament (MP) from 1900 to 1964 and represented a total of five UK Parliament constituency, constituencies. Ideologically an Economic liberalism, economic liberal and British Empire, imperialist, he was for most of his career a member of the Conservative Party (UK), Conservative Party, which he led from 1940 to 1955. He was a member of the Liberal Party (UK), Liberal Party from 1904 to 1924. Of mixed English and American parentage, Churchill was born in Oxfordshire to Spencer family, a wealthy, aristocratic family. He joined the British Army in 1895 and saw action in British Raj, Br ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Battle Of Britain
The Battle of Britain, also known as the Air Battle for England (german: die Luftschlacht um England), was a military campaign of the Second World War, in which the Royal Air Force (RAF) and the Fleet Air Arm (FAA) of the Royal Navy defended the United Kingdom (UK) against large-scale attacks by Nazi Germany's air force, the Luftwaffe. It was the first major military campaign fought entirely by air forces."92 Squadron – Geoffrey Wellum." ''Battle of Britain Memorial Flight'' via ''raf.mod.uk.''. Retrieved: 17 November 2010, archived 2 March 2009. The British officially recognise the battle's duration as being from 10 July until 31 October 1940, which overlaps the period of large-scale night attacks known as |
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS). Following the Allied victory over the Central Powers in 1918, the RAF emerged as the largest air force in the world at the time. Since its formation, the RAF has taken a significant role in British military history. In particular, it played a large part in the Second World War where it fought its most famous campaign, the Battle of Britain. The RAF's mission is to support the objectives of the British Ministry of Defence (MOD), which are to "provide the capabilities needed to ensure the security and defence of the United Kingdom and overseas territories, including against terrorism; to support the Government's foreign policy objectives particularly in promoting international peace and security". The R ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
