Look Out Below

The long voyage of the space station Mir will end Friday, when the spacecraft's controllers in Russia bring it down to its final resting place on earth. Mir, which has already passed the "point of no return" for its final descent, served as an inspiration for many who saw it as the first step towards colonizing space. But there was no choice: after crashing into one too many Soyuz capsules, the craft was suffering from repeated electronic failures. Another loss of radio contact with Mir could have sent the craft into "uncontrolled descent." (Read "New York.")

But when the crash comes, nostalgic cosmonauts and Russian patriots will not be the only ones upset. The other worried parties are the residents of the southern Pacific, which will be the new home for perhaps as much as 25 tons of Mir debris. The one good thing to come out of their endangerment is that Taco Bell (long known for its interest in space exploration) has created a 40-foot by 40-foot floating target in the Pacific Ocean for Mir to hit -- and has promised a free taco to every man, woman and child in America if the target is struck.

We at The Crimson applaud Taco Bell's audacity in making this gamble. One estimate of the potential cost to Taco Bell was $10 million--a figure that seems high until one calculates the resulting cost of ingredients for each of 281 million tacos. But Taco Bell has bought insurance anyway, and at relatively low cost, since the target is 10 miles off the coast of Australia, and Mir is expected to crash more than 1,000 miles off the coast of New Zealand.

But, not to be outdone, The Crimson would like to meet Taco Bell's offer. We are prepared to offer a free copy of The Crimson to every man, woman and child in the United States in the event that Mir, by some unfortunate and deplorable accident, should happen to smash to ruins the building of the Harvard Lampoon.