美国国家公共电台 NPR 世界首富贝佐斯的太空之旅圆满成功

The world's richest man has left the planet¹.

世界首富已经离开地球。

Five, four — command and then start — two, one. Ignition.

五，四，控制，启动，二，一。点火。

Earlier this morning, Blue Origin, the space flight company founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos, made its first trip into space with passengers on board, including Bezos himself.

今天上午早些时候，亿万富翁杰夫·贝佐斯创建的太空飞行公司“蓝色起源”进行首次载人太空飞行，乘客包括贝佐斯本人。

The jaunt² into space went just as planned. Here to tell us more about the flight and its crew is Brendan Byrne.

这一太空之旅按计划进行。下面将给我们介绍这次飞行及机组人员详细信息的是布伦丹·伯恩。

He covers space at NPR member station WMFE in Orlando, Fla. So, Brendan, how did the flight go?

他在佛罗里达州奥兰多市的NPR成员站WMFE报道太空新闻。布伦丹，这次飞行情况如何？

Oh, it was a picture-perfect launch³. The spacecraft, which is called New Shepard, took off from Blue Origin's facility in West Texas.

哦，这是一次完美的发射。这艘名为“新谢泼德”号的宇宙飞船从“蓝色起源”公司位于得克萨斯州西部的发射场起飞。

The rocket headed to the boundary of space, and just as it reached that point, a capsule carrying the crew separated from the rest of the rocket.

火箭飞向太空边界，在即将抵达边界时，搭载乘客的太空舱与火箭其余部分分离。

The passengers on board had about four minutes of weightlessness and views of the Earth against the blackness of space.

飞船上的乘客经历了大约四分钟的失重状态，在黑暗的太空中欣赏了地球的景色。

And as you can hear, there was plenty of excitement in the capsule.

正如你所听到的，兴奋之情充斥着太空舱。

Oh, wow, wow, wow.

哦，哇，哇，哇哦。

Don't forget to look out the window.

别忘了看窗外。

So as they were looking out the window, the reusable rocket booster landed back near the launch site,

他们看向窗外时，可重复使用的火箭助推器降落在发射场附近，

and not long after, the capsule carrying the crew gently landed in the Texas desert, thanks to a set of parachutes.

不久之后，搭载机组人员的太空舱借助降落伞在得克萨斯沙漠缓慢降落。

The whole mission⁴ from start to finish lasted less than 11 minutes.

整个任务从头到尾持续了不到11分钟。

That is some serious same-day delivery⁵, even for Amazon.

即使是对亚马逊来说，这也是需要重视的“当日送达”。

All right, so we know Bezos was on this flight. Who else went with him?

好，我们知道贝佐斯进行了这次飞行。和他一起的还有谁？

So there were three other passengers, which included the oldest and youngest person to ever go to space.

还有三位乘客，其中包括有史以来进入太空最年轻和最年长的人。

So there was 82-year-old Wally Funk. She's a pilot and was a member of the Mercury⁶ 13 back in the 1960s.

最长者是82岁的沃利·芬克。她是一名飞行员，上世纪60年代时是“水星13号”项目的成员。

That was a program that put female⁷ astronaut candidates⁸ through the same training and testing as NASA's male astronauts.

该项目让女性宇航员候选人接受与美国国家航空航天局（简称NASA）男性宇航员相同的训练和测试。

But Funk and, actually, none of the women from that program ever got the chance to go to space.

但芬克，应该说，那个项目中的所有女性都没有获得进入太空的机会。

Here she is speaking with StoryCorps back in 2017.

以下是她2017年接受故事团组织的采访时所说。

I applied⁹ to NASA four times. And finally, they said, Wally, you know, we're sorry, but you don't have an engineering¹⁰ degree.

我向美国国家航空航天局申请了四次。最后，他们说，沃利，我们很抱歉，但你没有工程学学位。

I said, well, I'll get one. So I never let anything stop me.

我说，好吧，我去考一个。我从不让任何事情阻止我。

So now about a half-century later, she finally gets that chance.

在约半个世纪后的现在，她终于得到了进入太空的机会。

Then there's also Oliver Daemen. He's only 18 years old, which makes him the youngest person to travel into space.

乘客中还有奥利弗·戴曼。他只有18岁，这使他成为进入太空最年轻的人。

Daemen wasn't originally supposed to be on this flight. Actually, the spot was reserved for the winner of a $28 million auction¹¹.

戴曼原本不应进行这次飞行。实际上，这个座位本来是为在拍卖中以2800万美元胜出的中标者所保留。

But the person who paid for that seat ended up having a scheduling conflict.

但最终，拍得座位者的行程与飞行日程安排发生了冲突。

Still can't get over that. So Daemen got the seat. I know, right?

还是无法克服。所以戴曼得到了这个座位。我知道，对吧？

So because of that conflict, Daemen got the seat instead. And the fourth and final spot went to the brother of Jeff Bezos, Mark.

因为行程冲突，戴曼得到了座位。第四位也是最后一位乘客是杰夫·贝佐斯的兄弟马克。

All right. So we got Bezos. We got Branson. Anyone that's not a billionaire, will they be having a chance to go to space any time soon?

好。贝佐斯和布兰森都进行了太空之旅。不是亿万富翁的人近期能有机会进入太空吗？

Well, probably not. These are the very first flights, and they're very expensive.

可能没有。这是首批飞行，价格昂贵。

Eventually, prices will go down so it only costs a mere¹² few hundred thousand dollars to go to space...

最终，价格会下降，去太空只需几十万美元%……

...Which means clearly most people will still not get that chance to fly to outer space.

……这意味着（笑声）很明显，大多数人仍没有机会飞往外太空。

What do you think, Brendan? What's the future of this industry? I mean, is there going to be a market for these kind of flights?

布伦丹，你有什么看法？这个行业的未来是什么？这种飞行会有市场吗？

You know, it sure appears that there is. So Blue Origin says it's planning two more space tourism flights this year, half a dozen next year.

看起来确实有。蓝色起源公司表示，他们计划今年再进行两次太空飞行，明年再进行六次。

And the company's long-term goal is to fly as often as once every two weeks.

公司的长期目标是每两周飞一次。

And Virgin¹³ Galactic — that's Richard Branson's space tourism company — says it already has around 600 reservations¹⁴ filled for flights on its spacecraft.

维珍银河航空公司是理查德·布兰森的太空旅游公司，该公司称目前已有约600人预定了其太空飞船的船票。

That's Brendan Byrne, a reporter covering space at member station WMFE in Florida and also host of the podcast "Are We There Yet?" Brendan, thanks a lot.

以上是布伦丹·伯恩带来的报道，他是佛罗里达州WMFE成员站的太空记者，也是播客节目《我们到了吗？》的主持人。布伦丹，非常感谢。

Any time.

不客气。

1 planet   

n.行星

参考例句：

• Neptune is the furthest planet from the sun. 海王星是离太阳最远的行星。
• Rubbish, however, is only part of the problem of polluting our planet. 然而, 垃圾只是我们这个星球的污染问题的一个方面。

2 jaunt   

v.短程旅游；n.游览

参考例句：

• They are off for a day's jaunt to the beach.他们出去到海边玩一天。
• They jaunt about quite a lot,especially during the summer.他们常常到处闲逛，夏天更是如此。

3 launch   

vt.发动，推出；发射；n.发射，下水，投产

参考例句：

• The makers are about to launch out a new product.制造商们马上要生产一种新产品。
• Would it be wise to launch into this rough sea?在这样汹涌的大海中游泳明智吗？

4 mission   

n.使命，任务，天职；代表团，使团

参考例句：

• He was charged with an important mission.他受委托承担一项重要使命。
• I'll leave you to undertake an important mission.我要让你承担一项重要使命。

5 delivery   

n.交付；投递；分娩；解救者；演讲的风格

参考例句：

• The strike caused a great delay in the delivery of the mail.这次罢工严重地延误了邮件的投递。
• He was employed at the local grocery store as a delivery boy.他受雇于当地杂货店当送货员。

6 mercury   

n.汞，水银，水银柱

参考例句：

• The liquid we can see in thermometers is mercury.我们看到的温度计里的液体是水银。
• Mercury has a much greater density than water.水银的密度比水大得多。

7 female   

adj.雌的，女(性)的；n.雌性的动物，女子

参考例句：

• We only employ female workers.我们只雇用女工。
• The animal in the picture was a female elephant.照片上的动物是头母象。

8 candidates   

n.报考者( candidate的名词复数 )；申请求职者；攻读学位者；最后命运或结局如何已显然可见者

参考例句：

• Employers must consider all candidates impartially and without bias. 雇主必须公平而毫无成见地考虑所有求职者。
• one of the leading candidates for the presidency 总统职位的主要候选人之一

9 applied   

adj.应用的；v.应用，适用

参考例句：

• She plans to take a course in applied linguistics.她打算学习应用语言学课程。
• This cream is best applied to the face at night.这种乳霜最好晚上擦脸用。

10 engineering   

n.工程，工程学，管理，操纵

参考例句：

• The science of engineering began as soon as man learned to use tools. 人类一学会使用工具,工程科学就开始了。
• It was the first great engineering works in the world. 这是世界上第一家大型的工程工厂。

11 auction   

n.拍卖；拍卖会；vt.拍卖

参考例句：

• They've put the contents of their house up for auction.他们把房子里的东西全都拿去拍卖了。
• They bought a new minibus with the proceeds from the auction.他们用拍卖得来的钱买了一辆新面包车。

12 mere   

adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过

参考例句：

• That is a mere repetition of what you said before.那不过是重复了你以前讲的话。
• It's a mere waste of time waiting any longer.再等下去纯粹是浪费时间。

13 virgin   

n.处女，未婚女子；adj.未经使用的；未经开发的

参考例句：

• Have you ever been to a virgin forest?你去过原始森林吗？
• There are vast expanses of virgin land in the remote regions.在边远地区有大片大片未开垦的土地。

14 reservations   

n.[法律]（权益等的）保留( reservation的名词复数 )；预订；保留地；保留意见

参考例句：

• Most of these workers are American Indians living on reservations. 这些工人中的大多数是住在居留地的美洲印第安人。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Have you made the reservations for our holiday yet? 你为我们度假做好预订安排了吗？ 来自《简明英汉词典》