On August 10th 1519 Ferdinand Magellan's five ships set sail from Seville on their mission to circumnavigate the globe but Magellan was killed in the Philippines midway through the expedition so it was his second in command, Juan Sebatián Elcano, who completed the expedition. Nearly 500 years later, on the 10th of August 1990, a NASA space probe named in Magellan's honour reached the planet Venus. I know that linking these two stories is as excessive as the opening scenes of the movie 2000 AD - A Space Odyssey where we see a satellite orbiting the earth immediately after a scene showing prehistoric man throwing his club in the air, but so what! Every once in a while it's probably worthwhile to pause and think about the breathtaking scope of human determination and endeavour and of how, in all likelihood, the latter achievement in this yarn would not have been possible were it not for the former. But I have no idea how Boney M have managed to get in on the act!
More in a couple of days ...
More in a couple of days ...
Boney 'M' for Magellan perhaps!
No comments:
Post a Comment