1. Ответьте на вопросы:

1. Was it interesting for you to read this text?

2. Did you read about the history of aviation at school?

3. When did the first scientific principles of human flight appear?

4. Who was the first to study the problem of human flight?

5. Describe the flying machine designed by Leonardo de Vinchi.

6. What was the first actual flight man made?

7. Why was it impossible to fly in a balloon?

8. Who was the first Russian aeroplane designer?

9. What plane was designed by him?

10. What distance did the plane cover?

11. Who designed the first glider?

12. What is glider?

13. What event took place in Petersburg in 1913?

14. How long did “Russky Vityaz” stay in the air?

15. Who is called “the father of Russian aviation”?

2. Переведите слова, обращая внимание на словообразующие элементы:

observe – observer – observation

safe – safely – safety – unsafe

science – scientist – scientific

design – designer

fly – flight

invent – inventor – invention

construct – constructor – construction

improve – improvement

weigh – weight - weightless

develop – development

3. Найдите в тексте эквивалент следующим словосочетаниям:

полет человека, поток воздуха, конструктор самолета, конструкция крыла, модель вертолета, мировой рекорд, максимальная скорость, беспосадочный полет, паровой двигатель, лыжи самолета.

4. Переведите на английский язык:

1. Научные принципы полета человека изучались великим ученым Леонардо де Винчи.

2. Леонардо де Винчи изучал потоки воздуха и создал первую летающую машину.

3. Первый фактический полет был сделан на воздушном шаре в 1783 г.

4. Этот полет длился только 10 минут и высота полета была 25 метров.

5. Первым русским конструктором самолета был Александр Можайский.

6. Он сконструировал моноплан с двумя паровыми двигателями в 1882 году.

7. Большим шагом вперед было создание первого самолета с двигателем внутреннего сгорания, сконструированного двумя американцами, братьями Райт.

8. Ученые и конструкторы многих стран работали над созданием и совершенствованием летательных аппаратов.

9. Первый в мире многомоторный самолет был сконструирован русским конструктором Игорем Сикорским.

10. В начале 20го столетия был изобретен дирижабль.

11. В 1913 г. в Петербурге был сконструирован тяжелый многомоторный самолет «Русский витязь».

12. Полет «Русского Витязя» продолжался 1 час 34 минуты, его скорость была 90 км/час.

13. В 1937 году русский летчик Чкалов со своим экипажем совершил беспосадочный полет в США через Северный полюс.

14. Ломоносов построил модель первого вертолета.

15. Менделеев разработал конструкцию стратостата с герметизированной кабиной.

Unit II. Famous Russian design bureaus and outstanding constructors Text 1. Energia

Energia is also called RKK Energia formerly OKB-1 Russian aerospace company that is a major producer of spacecraft, launch vehicles, rocket stages, and missiles. It built the world's first intercontinental ballistic missile and the first artificial satellite, Sputnik, and pioneered the development and operation of Soviet space stations including the Salyut series and Mir. Its headquarters are in the Moscow suburb of Korolev (formerly Kaliningrad).

Energia serves as a main contractor for the International Space Station (ISS). It provided the service module Zvezda, the station's control centre and living quarters during the initial stage of human occupancy. Other primary products include the Block DM upper stage and the Yamal communications satellite system. The company, which employs more than 20,000 people, comprises a main design bureau and subordinate enterprises including an experimental plant in Korolev, the Volga design bureau in Samara, and the Primorsk Scientific-Technological Center. It also maintains a branch at the Baikonur Cosmodrome launch centre in Kazakhstan.

Energia's history is closely tied to the career of rocket designer Sergey P. Korolyov, widely recognized as the founder of the Soviet space program and its guiding genius until his death in 1966. The company traces its origin to a May 1946 decree that established the Soviet Union's missile and space programs. Under the watchful eye of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, the Soviet armaments industry founded NII-88 (Scientific-Research Institute 88) in Kaliningrad to direct all work on long-range missiles. Assigned to lead Department 3, one of several departments within the institute, was Korolyov, who had studied aeronautical engineering under the aircraft designer Andrey N. Tupolev and helped develop the Soviet Union's first liquid-propellant rockets in the early 1930s.

Korolyov's department was initially assigned to build improved versions of the German V-2 missile, but by the early 1950s it began to develop its own ballistic missiles including the R-2 (U.S. Department of Defense code name SS-2) and R-5M (SS-3). In 1950 the department was upgraded to an experimental design bureau (OKB), and in 1956 it formally separated from NII-88 and became the independent OKB-1.

The most important work of the design bureau in the 1950s was the creation of the R-7 (SS-6), the world's first intercontinental ballistic missile, which was successfully launched in August 1957. Two months later, on October 4, a modified R-7 placed the first artificial satellite, Sputnik, into Earth orbit, inaugurating the space era. Korolyov was the primary force behind the launch, having convinced a reluctant Soviet leadership to fund the effort. Over the next decade his design bureau was responsible for establishing the U.S.S.R.'s commanding early lead in the space race with the United States. Its successes included the launches of the first probes—Luna 2 and 3—to reach the Moon, in 1959; the Vostok spacecraft that carried the first human—Yury A. Gagarin—into space in 1961 and the first woman—Valentina Tereshkova—into space in 1963; the Voskhod spacecraft in which Vladimir M. Komarov, Konstantin P. Feoktistov, and Boris B. Yegorov conducted the first multiperson spaceflight in 1964 and from which Aleksey A. Leonov took the first space walk in 1965; and the first spacecraft—Venera 3—to impact on another planet (Venus), in 1965.

The organization's most expensive space project in the 1960s was the secret N1-L3 program, designed to compete with the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Apollo program to land humans on the Moon. The same year, the government created the NPO Energia (Scientific and Production Association Energia) conglomerate, with the former OKB-1 at its centre, to play a leading role in the Soviet piloted space program. In the 1970s and '80s, Energia was the prime contractor for the development of the Energia-Buran reusable space system, a combination of launch vehicle (Energia) and winged orbiter (Buran). Despite two successful launches—one of the launch vehicle in 1987 and another of the entire system, including an unmanned, fully automated orbiting and landing of the Buran orbiter, in 1988—funding for the program was canceled in the early 1990s due to severe financial problems accompanying the dissolution of the Soviet Union.

Energia's other main work during the 1970s and early '80s focused on the Soviet Union's early generation of space stations, a series of seven spacecraft called Salyut. In 1971 it built and launched its first Salyut, the world's first space station. After recovering from a spate of failures, Energia mounted an unprecedented run of successful missions to the advanced Salyut 6 and 7 stations beginning in the late 1970s. These stations were supplied by improved versions of Soyuz ferry spacecraft and Progress unmanned cargo tankers. A total of 26 crews, including several international ones, visited the two stations, setting consecutive records for endurance in space.

In 1986 Energia launched the core module for the Mir space station, which it subsequently expanded with a series of science and service modules. For 10 years, from 1989 to 1999, the firm kept the station continuously manned, an unequalled achievement. Building on its experience with Mir, Energia signed on in the early 1990s as the main contractor for the Russian portion of the ISS. Its role, however, was gradually reduced, owing partly to stiff competition from another Russian company, Khrunichev, which assumed responsibility for the design and manufacture of a number of ISS modules. In April 1994 Russian President Boris Yeltsin signed an order renaming the firm RKK Energia (Rocket-Space Corporation Energia) and partially privatizing the company.

After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Energia vigorously pursued international cooperative efforts. Successful ventures included partnerships with Sea Launch and International Launch Services, two multinational satellite launching services to which Energia provided its Block DM upper stage for boosting payloads to geostationary orbit. The company achieved some notoriety in the late 1990s when it sought commercial customers for Mir in order to keep its single most important asset in operation. Continued financial support did not materialize, however, and Energia disposed of Mir in a guided reentry in 2001.