Wombat News
23-02-2004, 11:48
Woooshmera, Australian Marsupials; Wombat News
On Sunday evening, the world was shocked awake to the news of Australian Marsupials' launch of a Numbat IV rocket for an historic 3 orbit manned space flight. Images of the smiling kanganauts floating happily in their Soviet-style capsule burned bitterly into the minds of jealous foreigners. Australian Marsupials, it seems, has won the space race.
Bruce Ocker, a top figure in the Australian Marsupials Space Agency, explained how his group was able to beat the rest of the world to the space-age punch. "Well, look around. In terms of what most foreigners would consider 'modernity', it's still 1957 here. So the way we see it, we've been able to get a man into orbit a full four years before Yuri Gagarin. Suck on that, Kruschev!"
While some mistakenly believed that Australian Marsupials had given up on the quest for orbital superiority years ago, Australian Marsupials officials now say that was all a ruse. "Strewth, we all know the Yankee stuff was staged," quipped Ocker. "It took another three decades or more before the technology actually existed in order to put a human being into space. I mean, anybody whose seen Capricorn One knows that."
Immediately after the news broke, governments around the world held emergency meetings, demanding to know how this could have been allowed to happen.
The names of the Australian Marsupials crew were not released to the domestic press, or even decided upon, until the last possible minute. Government leaders said they didn't make the names public in advance for fear that their well-meaning countrymen might undermine their confidence with the traditional Australian Marsupials farewell which loosely translates to "Let us hope that you do not die soon in a thousand-degree fireball several miles above the earth".
In the end, though, AMSA officials chose 29-year-old Bludger Blackfella for the mission. When he addressed the proud nation prior to launch, he expressed his elation at the opportunity to make history.
"Please, release my wife and children," said Blackfella into the capsule-mounted camera. "Do not make me go."
Australian Marsupials reportedly held back for years because government officials felt the failure of the space programme, exploding capsules on live television and all that, would be worse than no space programme at all. Then a few years ago, officials noticed the refreshingly casual attitude with which NASA approaches safety issues and reportedly figured "what the hell".
For Ocker, his future at AMSA, even his own life, rests on the fortunes of this flight. "If it goes well, my country will be proud," said Ocker. "If it does not go well, they say that I will be the next to go up."
THIS BROADCAST IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY WOMBAT NEWS – BRINGING YOU FACE TO FACE WITH REALITY
On Sunday evening, the world was shocked awake to the news of Australian Marsupials' launch of a Numbat IV rocket for an historic 3 orbit manned space flight. Images of the smiling kanganauts floating happily in their Soviet-style capsule burned bitterly into the minds of jealous foreigners. Australian Marsupials, it seems, has won the space race.
Bruce Ocker, a top figure in the Australian Marsupials Space Agency, explained how his group was able to beat the rest of the world to the space-age punch. "Well, look around. In terms of what most foreigners would consider 'modernity', it's still 1957 here. So the way we see it, we've been able to get a man into orbit a full four years before Yuri Gagarin. Suck on that, Kruschev!"
While some mistakenly believed that Australian Marsupials had given up on the quest for orbital superiority years ago, Australian Marsupials officials now say that was all a ruse. "Strewth, we all know the Yankee stuff was staged," quipped Ocker. "It took another three decades or more before the technology actually existed in order to put a human being into space. I mean, anybody whose seen Capricorn One knows that."
Immediately after the news broke, governments around the world held emergency meetings, demanding to know how this could have been allowed to happen.
The names of the Australian Marsupials crew were not released to the domestic press, or even decided upon, until the last possible minute. Government leaders said they didn't make the names public in advance for fear that their well-meaning countrymen might undermine their confidence with the traditional Australian Marsupials farewell which loosely translates to "Let us hope that you do not die soon in a thousand-degree fireball several miles above the earth".
In the end, though, AMSA officials chose 29-year-old Bludger Blackfella for the mission. When he addressed the proud nation prior to launch, he expressed his elation at the opportunity to make history.
"Please, release my wife and children," said Blackfella into the capsule-mounted camera. "Do not make me go."
Australian Marsupials reportedly held back for years because government officials felt the failure of the space programme, exploding capsules on live television and all that, would be worse than no space programme at all. Then a few years ago, officials noticed the refreshingly casual attitude with which NASA approaches safety issues and reportedly figured "what the hell".
For Ocker, his future at AMSA, even his own life, rests on the fortunes of this flight. "If it goes well, my country will be proud," said Ocker. "If it does not go well, they say that I will be the next to go up."
THIS BROADCAST IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY WOMBAT NEWS – BRINGING YOU FACE TO FACE WITH REALITY