Unequal partners

On the day that Spacelab was born, it was pleasantly warm in Washington, D.C., but the political climate had taken a chillier turn. The skies over the United States’ capital on 24 September 1973 were partly cloud-dappled, as a hot summer surrendered to a mild autumn. Eight months earlier, five burglars were sensationally convicted of wire-tapping the Democratic National Committee headquarters in the Watergate Office Building, working at the behest of corrupt officials in President Richard Nixon’s re-election campaign.