ISS austronauts contacted from ancient Incan city
By IANSFriday, August 27, 2010
Buenos Aires, Aug 27 (IANS/RIA Novosti) The ancient Incan civilisation city of Machu Picchu in Peru made history Thursday when a radio contact was established from there with the Intetrnational Space Station (ISS).
The Russian and Peruvian delegations talked with the ISS crew for 10 minutes Thursday.
The conversation was made in three languages — Russian, Spanish and the Peru Indian language of Quechua. ISS Commander Alexander Skvortsov said it was the first time Quechua had ever been heard on the ISS.
Quechua is spoken by some 10 million native South American Indians.
Russia is helping Peru to build its first ever satellite, media reports said. It has also agreed to grow Peruvian potatoes on the ISS.
The rector of the Peruvian National University of Engineering, Aurelio Padilla Rios said the potatoes “will be healthy for the cosmonauts’ food ration during a proposed three-year flight to Mars.”
The current ISS crew is made up of Russian cosmonauts Alexander Skvortsov, Mikhail Korniyenko and Fedor Yurchikhin, US astronauts Tracy Caldwell Dyson, Shannon Walker and Douglas Wheelock.
Machu Picchu, “The Lost City of the Incas”, is Peru’s top archeological site, and was built in the middle of the 15th century.
–IANS/RIA Novosti
