Around the sun leaving a bright trail behind. For more than
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1 HALLEY'S COMET A comet is an object that travels around the sun leaving a bright trail behind. For more than two thousand years, the return of Halley’s Comet has been observed and recorded on Earth every 76 years. Its 1986 visit, however, was the first time that humans kaldımtpok a close look at its nucleus. One spacecraft went within a few hundred kilometres of the nucleus. Two Soviet craft, Vega I and Vega 2, came within 10,000 km of the nucleus on March 6th and March 9th; and the European Space Agency's Giotto space probe passed within 600 km of Halley’s Comet on March 14th. Pioneer Venus Orbiter found that the cloud of gases and dust which make up the tail spread over a region about 20,000,000 km across, 15 times larger than the Sun. Scientists also discovered that the comet was losing about ten metres of material from its surface every orbit, suggesting a lifetime of about only 1,000 orbits in about 100,000 years it will disappear.
2 HIGH RISE In October 1981, newspapers in the USA and the UK reported plans for a 169-storey building in Chicago. If this is built, it will be almost twice as tall as the 384-metre Empire State Building in New York. Since the early days of civilised man, buildings have been getting higher all the time. Today, all large cities have tall buildings, either for use as offices or as flats. These are called high-rise buildings. The tallest of all in fact, are not used for offices or for living, but are special structures for radio and television. For instance, Warsaw Radio Mast in Poland, which is 646 metres tall, is the tallest of such structures. The world’s tallest office building is the Sears Tower in Chicago. This has 110 storeys, and reaches a height of 443 metres. 16,700 people work inside the building, and there are more than one hundred lifts for their use. But why do we have high buildings? Is there any real advantage? The most common reason given is that in many cities there is a lack of space. The island of Manhattan, New York City, is a good example of this. Here, office space is very expensive. There is no more land. Buildings have to go up. The same reason is given for high office buildings in Tokyo, London and other large cities of the world. But what about people? Is it really necessary to build high buildings for people to live in? Today, there are many who believe high buildings actually damage 25 people's minds and feelings. These people believe high-rise buildings: -have no advantages, except for their owners and for banks -are not cheap to build -do not help create open space -destroy the landscape -cause crime -are not good for children High-rise buildings lower the quality of life. The following reports show this. Report from England, 1967: The higher people live off the ground, the more likely they are to suffer from mental illnesses. Women, because they spend most time at home, suffer most.
Report from the USA: In comparing two buildings, one high-rise and the other low, crime is much more likely in the high-rise than in the low building. The reason for all this may be simple. High-rise living takes people away from life on the street. They become lonely. They meet other people less often. The building becomes a world of its own. At a height of four storeys there is still some connection with the street. Above that the connection is lost. But we continue to build high-rise buildings for people to live in. In Chicago, there is an apartment building 197 metres tall. It rises seventy storeys above the street, and that is sixty-six storeys above the four-storey limit.
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