Using a rocket model, Lynn Poole reviews how, as fuel is consumed, it lifts in stages and ultimately goes into free flight. He then shows a film of the rocket crew's view from space. Colonel Flickinger, Director of Human Factors of the Air Force Research and Development Command, explains selection and training of the crew for outer space. He then shows an artist's conception of a space flight simulator that will monitor the crew's vital signs under physiological stress. He discusses the importance of the crew's emotional durability and shows an artist's rendering of a sealed cabin simulator and a five-crew centrifuge. Commander Phoebus, of the Medical Corps of the U. S. Navy, explains explosive decompression and describes the differences between partial and full pressure suits, as worn by such fliers as Charles Yeager and modelled by servicemen in the studio. He also shows a navigation simulator particular to space flight and discusses how crew train to move outside the space vehicle.

In this first in a series of programs on space exploration, Dr. John Strong describes the layers of the earth's atmosphere. Heinz Haber discusses the problems that humans must overcome to travel in space. They will need to surmount oxygen deprivation, depressurization, ultraviolet and cosmic radiation, and zero gravity and weightlessness. Protecting man from these elements must be solved before manned space travel can occur.

In this third in a series of programs on space exploration, Dr. Wernher von Braun, rocket expert, explains and demonstrates a three-stage rocket and its role in the construction of a three-story space station, which will be a launch pad for trips to the moon. He shows viewers both a prototype space station model and moon rocket model and an animated version of the workings of the two.

In this second in a series of programs on space exploration, Francis Clauser discusses how Newton's third law explains the propulsion of rocket ships. Speeds of over 25,000 miles per hour are needed to escape the earth's atmosphere and 16,000 miles per hour to put a rocket in orbit around the earth. Fuels that can be used to propel rockets include hydrazine and nitric acid. A model of a three stage rocket is shown to demonstrate how man will begin space travel.