Jump to content

This Day in Spaceflight History


Recommended Posts

On August 3, 1933, German rocket scientists launched a Nebel rocket from a boat at Schwielow Lake. The owner of their previous launch location made them leave after their amount of failures. The rocket exploded soon after liftoff.

Luftbild_Schwielowsee_Caputh_Werder-Have

Schweilow Lake  ^

On August 3, 2004, the U.S. Mercury satellite MESSENGER was launched. Two launch delays caused it to be launched four months after its March 10 original launch date. The probe was first put into orbit around Earth and was then sent into an escape trajectory. On August 1, 2005, it made a flyby of Earth. It made two Venus flybys in 2006 and 2007. It then made 2 Mecury encounters in 2008, one in 2009, and one in 2011. On the last encounter, it was placed into an orbit around Mercury.

ht_messenger_mercury_kb_150416_16x9_992.

 

Edited by The Raging Sandwich
MESSENGER (thanks DDE)
Link to comment
Share on other sites

10 minutes ago, DDE said:

@The Raging Sandwich @vonBraun That's what you get for calling your rocket "fog".

Also on August 3 2004, the launch of MESSENGER.

Oops, I overlooked that! I knew something was suspicious about only one semi-notable thing happening on this day. I'll go back and put that on there! Thanks for telling me!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On August 4, 1181, Chinese astronomers looked into the sky and discovered a supernova dubbed SN 1181, one of the only eight supernova visible with the naked eye in known history. It was named Cassiopia after it was seen in the Cassiopeia constellation. It was visible for about 185 days.

  cassiopeia.jpg

On August 4, 1969, the Mariner 7 probe did a flyby of Mars. It was designed to fly over Mars' equator and southern hemispheres along with Mariner 6. It studied Mars' atmosphere and its chemical makeup. Together with Mariner 6, the two probes sent back a total of 198 pictures of Mars.

143128main_pia02981-browse.jpg

On August 4, 2007, the Phoenix Mars lander was launched. It was made with parts from the cancelled Mars Surveyor lander from 2001. It would land in Vastitas Borealis in northern Mars. It had a protective shell over it during reentry. The shell would detach after reentry and a parachute would deploy after. Small rockets would fire to land it gently onto Mars' surface.

C_Phoenix_Mission_0013.jpg

Edited by The Raging Sandwich
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On August 5, 1930, Neil Armstrong was born. He was a pilot in the Navy from 1949 to 1955. He went on to test fly many types of new aircraft, including the famed X-15. He signed up for NASA's Gemini astronaut program in 1962 and was accepted. He first flew into space on Gemini 8 which had the first successful docking in space with two vehicles. A near disaster caused Armstrong and Dave Scott to return nearly two days early. He then went on to become the first man on the Moon on Apollo 11. He retired from NASA in 1970 and went on to teach at a university. He died on August 25, 2012 at age 82.

1000509261001_2051017826001_Bio-Biograph

On August 5, 1973, the Soviet Mars 6 lander was launched. It reached Mars on March 12, 1974. Once in orbit, it separated from the bus and descended into the atmosphere. A parachute opened to slow the descent. All the way down to the surface, a computer chip malfunction caused the data to be largely unreadable. Retro rockets fired to slow the lander to a soft touchdown on the surface where all data ceased to transmit.

mars_6.jpg

On August 5, 1997, Soyuz TM-26 was launched. The crew was launched into orbit on a 197 day mission to the Mir space station. It docked to the Mir manually on August 7. The crew undertook 7 spacewalks to repair the station.

soyuz-tm-26_launch.jpg

On August 5, 2011, the Juno Jupiter probe was launched. It was boosted into an escape trajectory by the AV-029 Centaur. It did a flyby of Earth on October 9, 2013 to speed it towards Jupiter. It arrived at Jupiter on July 4, 2016. It will burn up into Jupiter's atmosphere in October of 2017.

273602_orig.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 7/18/2016 at 3:38 PM, Nibb31 said:

That picture is a recreation. There are pics of both spacecraft taken from each other, but no pictures of them docked together from the outside, for obvious reasons.

One could make the picture from earth. I'm not kidding - on one of the first space shuttle flights that reached orbit, the usability of the heat shield was checked by a telescope from the ground (or a telescope mounted on an airplane, I don't remember exactly).

(this thing im quoting is about Apollo-Soyuz Test Project)

And sandwich where do you get so many anniversaries from?

Edited by TheDestroyer111
Link to comment
Share on other sites

52 minutes ago, TheDestroyer111 said:

One could make the picture from earth. I'm not kidding - on one of the first space shuttle flights that reached orbit, the usability of the heat shield was checked by a telescope from the ground (or a telescope mounted on an airplane, I don't remember exactly).

True, but not with Earth in the background. :P Here's the ISS transiting the Moon:

Spoiler

transit_iss_moon_101220_70.jpg

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On August 6, 1961, Soviet cosmonaut Gherman Titov was launched into orbit on Vostok 2 on a one day journey into orbit. The mission was to further test the affects of weightlessness on a human and how a human worked in space. They got what they wanted because Titov suffered from space sickness in orbit. After retrofire, the service module on the spacecraft had trouble separating, just like Gagarin's mission. He landed on August 7.

vostok-2__1.jpg

On August 6, 1985, STS-51-f landed back at Earth.

10062698.jpg

On August 6, 2001, the Galileo Jupiter probe did a flyby of Jupiter's moon Io. It flew about 124 miles above the volcanic moon's surface.

1858-004-B7D081B9.jpg

Edited by The Raging Sandwich
STS-51-f landing clarification
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Green Baron said:

Always a pleasure to follow this thread ! Wasn't STS 51f the one that aborted to orbit ?

(Aemmm, but that doesn't look like Cape Canaveral ...)

I was thinking the same thing about the landing. It didn't look like Cape Canaveral to me, especially because I've been there before. I'll fix it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On August 7, 1959, the Explorer 6 satellite was launched. It was a 141 pound Earth-orbiting satellite that monitored the Earth's magnetosphere. It was placed in a highly elliptical orbit of 26,300 miles by 152 miles with a 765 minute orbital period. It monitored radiation data and took the first photo from space. The orbit decayed and it deorbited to Earth in June 1961.

Explorer_6_paddles_up.jpg

On August 7, 1961, Vostok 2 landed back at Earth. Gherman Titov returned to Earth after 17.5 orbits onboard Vostok 2. After the deorbit burn, the service module failed to jettison, just like in Vostok 1. The module did jettison, however, and the Vostok 2 survived reentry. Titov rode his ejector seat safely to the ground.

vostok1_landing_big.gif

On August 7, 1971, the Apollo 15 crew landed back at Earth. After reentry, one of the three main parachutes failed to deploy meaning a hard splashdown  for Irwin, Scott, and Worden. All main mission objectives had been accomplished.

ap15-71-h-1242.jpg

On August 7, 1997, STS-85 was launched with astonauts Curtis Brown, Kent Rominger, Jan Davis, Robert Curbeam, Stephen Robertson, Bjami Tryggvason. It was placed into a 162 by 154 mile orbit. It deployed the CRISTA-SPAS, IEH-1, TAS-1, and MFD satellites.

KSC-97EC-1207.jpg

 

Edited by The Raging Sandwich
Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, The Raging Sandwich said:

The module did deploy, however, and the Vostok 2 survived reentry. Titov rode is ejector seat safely to the ground.

*The module did jettison after some time, however, and the Vostok 2 survived reentry. Titov rode his ejection seat safely to the ground.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This thread is quite old. Please consider starting a new thread rather than reviving this one.

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...