Vocabulary...

Gully: Deep ditch cut by running water (especially after a prolonged downpour)
Brisk: Quick and energetic.
Slippery: Being such as to cause things to slip or slide.
Launch: To throw or propel with force; hurl.
Bounce: To rebound after having struck an object or a surface.
Refurbishment: To make new or as if new again
Stretch: To lengthen, widen, or distend.
Nemesis: A source of harm or ruin.
Headpiece: A typically thin metallic crown or headband worn around the forehead.
Swashbuckling: Is a term that developed in the 16th century to describe rough, noisy and boastful swordsmen.
Steer: Mechanisms used to turn while controlling the operation of a vehicle.
Raft: Is any flat floating structure for travel over water. It is the most basic of boat
Plunge: (or "dive") is a type of play in American Football in which the ball carrier (usually a running back or a fullback) attempts to rush through one of the gaps immediately to the left or right of center.
Carrier: A group of molecules that facilitates the transport of dyes into a fiber.
Stunts: Is an unusual and difficult physical feat, or any act requiring a special skill, performed for artistic purposes in TV, theatre or cinema.

NASA

In October 1, 1958, the official start of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), was the beginning of a rich history of unique scientific and technological achievements in human space flight, aeronautics, space science, and space applications.

Formed as a result of the Sputnik crisis of confidence, NASA inherited the earlier National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), and other government organizations, and almost immediately began working on options for human space flight. NASA's first high profile program was Project Mercury, an effort to learn if humans could survive in space, followed by Project Gemini, which built upon Mercury's successes and used spacecraft built for two astronauts. NASA's human space flight efforts then extended to the Moon with Project Apollo, culminating in 1969 when the Apollo 11 mission first put humans on the lunar surface. After the Skylab and Apollo-Soyuz Test Projects of the early and mid-1970s, NASA's human space flight efforts again resumed in 1981, with the Space Shuttle program that continues today to help build the International Space Station.

NASA also has done pioneering work in space applications satellites.

NASA has helped bring about new generations of communications satellites such as the Echo, Telstar, and Syncom satellites. NASA's Earth science efforts have also literally changed the way we view our home planet; the Landsat and Earth Observing System spacecraft have contributed many important scientific findings.

NASA technology has also resulted in numerous "spin-offs" in wide-ranging scientific, technical, and commercial fields.

Overall, while the tremendous technical and scientific accomplishments of NASA demonstrate vividly that humans can achieve previously inconceivable feats, we also are humbled by the realization that Earth is just a tiny "blue marble" in the cosmos.