Space Exploration Timeline

Space Exploration Timeline Info. THIS POWERPOINT GOES STEP-BYSTEP THROUGH THE NOTES SHEET YOU GOT TITLED “Notes— The History of Space Travel” Event: First Artificial Satellite October 4, 1957 The Soviet Union ushers in a new era—the space age—with the launch of Sputnik 1. A technological feat, the beach ball-size satellite weighs 184 pounds (84 kilograms) and takes 98 minutes to orbit Earth. The launch grabs the world's attention—and catches the U.S. off-guard. The first successful American satellite doesn't get off the ground until January 31, 1958. Event: First Animal in Orbit November 3, 1957 Having stunned the world with the first orbital space launch, Sputnik 1, less than a month before, the Soviet Union tries for a second coup by launching a dog named Laika on a one-way journey on a hastily completed follow-up mission, Sputnik 2. The dog survives the launch, but Soviet secrecy masks her ultimate fate for many years. It now appears that even though she had a week's supply of food, Laika died within hours, possibly due to a life-support failure that caused her canister to overheat. Event: First Successful American Satellite January 31, 1958 Launched less than two months after Vanguard 1A, the first American attempt to compete with Sputnik, blows up on the launchpad, Explorer 1 (officially called Satellite 1958 Alpha) achieves an orbit extending an astonishing 1,560 miles (2,500 kilometers) above the Earth. This leads to the first great scientific discovery of the space age, when instruments designed by Iowa physicist James Van Allen find the radiation belts now named in his honor. The 31-pound (14-kilogram) satellite transmits until May 23, when its batteries die, but it remains aloft for more than 12 years. Event: NASA Signed into Law July 29, 1958 Fearful that Soviet successes in space mean the U.S. is losing the Cold War, congressional leaders, including future President Lyndon B. Johnson, quickly write the National Aeronautics and Space Act. The act creates a civilian agency, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to assume many of the duties (and 8,000 employees) of the pre-existing National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics. The new agency, which will come to symbolize the U.S. side of the space race, begins operation on October 1. President Eisenhower gets a lesson on space. Event #6 Wow, Russia has really been winning the “space race” so far. This is a big blow to the American scientists—Russia sends the first man into outer space…a guy named Yuri Gregarin. On April 12, 1961, Vostok 1 blasts off and Yuri returns nearly 2 hours later after completing one orbit and parachuting from a few miles off the ground. Dang! Event #7 Required for your project! America strikes back, sending its first astronaut, Alan Shepard, into space. The mission is called Mercury Freedom 7. It lasted only 16 minutes and didn’t actually go in complete orbit around Earth.  Shepard was still hailed as a hero, and he later became the 5th person to walk on the moon. It stung American scientists, though, that they lost the race to send a person into space by less than one month. Boo. Shepard on the navy ship that rescued him after his ocean splashdown. Event #8 Vostok 6 blasted off in Russia on June 16, 1963. On board was the first woman in space, so the Russians beat us again. Her name was Valentia Tereshkova, and she recorded data about the atmosphere for 3 days before returning safely to Earth. Event #9 Here go the Russians again. Not happy with just going into space, on the mission Voskhod 2, they actually let one of their cosmonauts leave the space ship! Alexei Leonov left the spaceship (attached to it by a tether cord) and stayed out in space for around 12 minutes. Cool. Except that his space suit inflated (due to outer space being a vacuum) and he almost wasn’t able to make it back inside the ship. Brave Alexei. Event #10 Required for your project! President Kennedy issued the challenge in 1962 that America NEEDED to go to the moon because it would be so hard to do so. And less than a decade later, we did. Nobody else has managed this feat. America just jumped way ahead of Russia in the space race. On July 20, 1969, the Apollo 11 mission lands on the moon, and Neil Armstrong utters the famous words, “one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.” USA! USA! USA! This is awesome. Event #11 If you’ve seen the movie Apollo 13 starring Tom Hanks and Kevin Bacon, you know that it’s a story of American brainpower and creativity overcoming horrible odds. After an oxygen tank explodes on the way to the Moon, the crew of Apollo 13 and NASA scientists in Houston are forced to abandon the plan to land on the Moon and instead just get the men home without killing them. Through days of hard work, they succeed. NASA scientists working frantically. The crew safe, at last. Event #12 The next Apollo mission, Apollo 14, lands on January 31, 1971 in the exact spot that Apollo 13 was supposed to explore. Alan Shepard leads this expedition, where millions of viewers watched on television as the astronauts played golf and threw javelins on the moon. Faith in NASA is restored. Event #13 NASA scientists had envisioned a permanent space station, and in 1973, Skylab began a 12-year experiment to see how practical the idea was. Skylab used large solar panels to provide electricity for itself, and allowed other spacecraft to float near it and “dock.” This allowed crew members to enter Skylab and leave when they needed to. Three such dockings occurred. The Skylab experiment ended, but provided valuable information about the realism of life in space. A docking pod, where crew from another space flight could enter Skylab. Event #14 July 1975 – The final Apollo mission was a good one. After nearly 20 years of outdoing each other, America and Russia agree to do a mission together. The Space Race is pretty much done at this point—we can be friends now. Apollo 18 and the Soviet ship Soyuz 19 fly into space and dock with each other—allowing the American and Russian crew members to meet in space. Cool. Event #15 Finally, a space craft you recognize easily. On August 12, 1978, the Enterprise is the first space shuttle to be tested. Carried on the back of a much larger plane, the Enterprise “let go” and glided to a safe landing. Now NASA was confident that the shuttles could do missions on their own and perform a rolling landing. Event #16 It was just a matter of time (a few years later) when NASA would actually send one of the new space shuttles into space for a real mission. In 1981, the Columbia blasted off with the help of booster rockets, then landed on an Air Force base in California after 2 days in space. Event #17 Yet another space shuttle, the Challenger, blasts off on April 4, 1983. Part of the 5-day mission involved a four hour spacewalk where 2 of the crew members performed repairs of the shuttle. Nice work, gentlemen. 80s haircuts. Cool. Event #18 About a billion years after the Soviet Union sent Valentia Tereshkova as the first woman in space, America finally sends its own female astronaut. Her name is Sally Ride, and she performs numerous missions afterward and becomes a hero to many! Event #19 August 30, 1984…the space shuttle Discovery successfully carries 3 communications satellites into space, a first for a shuttle mission. NASA keeps trying new techniques to address old problems with great success. Americans are cocky at this point, as it seems like NASA can achieve any goal it wants. Whoa. 80s hair is out of control in zero gravity. Event #20 There were 4 space shuttles in service—Discovery, Challenger, Columbia, Enterprise, and Atlantis. On October 3, 1985, Atlantis joins the squad as the fifth (and final) shuttle to be launched into space. Atlantis carries some secret defense satellites into space (maybe to spy on our old friends, the Soviet Union?) Event #21 Whoa. Hold the phone. Tap the brakes. What just happened? Was that supposed to happen? On January 28, 1986, the shuttle Challenger lifted off, as planned. Kids all over America were gathered around televisions to watch the event live as it happened, and teachers were ready to do a space lesson right afterward. It all changed as 73 seconds later, the shuttle blew up in mid-air, killing the crew and shocking the world.  Stunned silence just a minute later Clapping and cheering here… Event #22 In 1992, a new space shuttle, Endeavour, was launched into space. It was built as a better replacement to Challenger, which exploded 6 years prior. After its July 5 launch, three crewmen space walked to grab a satellite that wasn’t responding to commands properly. After the longest space walk ever, the satellite was repaired and sent back into orbit. Endeavour is scheduled to be retired in 2010 after performing one last space mission. Event #23 Oh no, not again. On February 1, 2003, people in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area felt a thud slam through their neighborhoods. The shuttle Columbia, returning from a long, successful space flight, was cruising through the atmosphere preparing to land in Florida. Days before, during the launch of the shuttle, a piece of foam damaged the heat shield on one wing of the shuttle. It didn’t become a problem until the shuttle entered our atmosphere going around twenty times the speed of sound. The heat from friction with the air burst through the weak wing, and debris from the shuttle flying apart was found in several states! All 7 crew members died. Event #24 NASA had two MAJOR incidents that shook America’s confidence in the space program. The explosions of Challenger and Columbia slowed down how often we went into space. Fortunately, one of the big achievements that happened after the Columbia disaster was the successful launching of the Hubble Space Telescope by the shuttle Discovery in 1990.This telescope has given us incredible images of events and objects far distant in 1991.the universe. Good job, Discovery. One of the thousands of awesome images taken by the H.S.T. Event #25 Required for your project! Another crowning achievement for modern scientists is a project worked on mainly by five nations—a space station appropriately named the International Space Station. Construction began in 1998 and is scheduled to be finished sometime in 2011. Shuttles fly crew and equipment to the space station frequently, where scientists stay for weeks at a time doing experiments in outer space. The I.S.S. is big enough to see without a telescope if you catch it at the right time of year at night. Pretty neat that it’s up there. Cool.