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Astronauts

Astronauts (called cosmonauts in Russia) must travel in tightly sealed compartments and bring their own supply of oxygen with them. Heavy space suits are necessary for activity outside the spacecraft. Travelling outside the Earth's protective atmosphere, astronauts must also be shielded against harmful radiation. The lack of gravity in space can be a big problem on long voyages. Without gravity to work against, human hearts and bones weaken. Space travel can affect people's minds as well. Astronauts may feel cooped up. They may also get on each other's nerves if they are together for too long.
The first astronauts came from the ranks of military pilots. In the 1960s scientists started to be recruited for duty as mission specialists. Still later, citizen-astronauts such as the schoolteacher Christa McAuliffe were chosen to serve on US space shuttles. Eventually astronauts of many nations served together in cooperative missions.
Astronauts prepare for space travel by going through a thorough training programme. They study maths and science in classrooms. They learn to operate their spacecraft by using computer-controlled simulators. These devices present astronauts in training with conditions that they will later experience during actual flight. Astronauts get used to a lack of gravity by bouncing around in fast-diving aeroplanes. They also improve their physical fitness in the gymnasium.

Before the Space Age

People have imagined spaceflight since ancient times. As early as AD 160 a Greek writer named Lucian of Samosata described a voyage to the moon. Many centuries later, during the Renaissance, advances in science made people more interested in space. In the 17th century the invention of the telescope and the work of Johannes Kepler in Germany and Isaac Newton in England provided new knowledge of the solar system. Kepler was an author of science fiction as well as an astronomer. His Sleep, a tale of a trip to the moon, was published in 1634, after his death. The French writer Jules Verne imagined that a spacecraft could be shot from a huge gun in his famous novel From the Earth to the Moon (1865).
The first forms of flight developed by humans were balloons. Balloons are useless for space travel, however, because there is little or no air in space. The lack of air makes ordinary aeroplanes useless in space as well because their engines use oxygen in the air to burn fuel.
A rocket, however, carries its own oxygen supply as well as fuel. In March 1926 Robert H. Goddard of the United States launched the first liquid-fuelled rocket. Goddard is known today as the father of modern rocketry. But many years passed before rockets could travel fast enough to overcome the Earth's gravity, which requires a speed of more than 40,000 kilometres (25,000 miles) per hour. By the end of World War II (1939–45) German scientists had developed advanced rockets for use as weapons.

The Race into Space

On 4 October 1957 the Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite to be put into orbit around the Earth. The space age was underway – and so was the ‘space race' between the Russian and US space programmes. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) took charge of the US effort.
On 3 November 1957 the Soviet Union sent a dog named Laika into orbit aboard the satellite Sputnik 2. According to Russian reports, Laika lived for a week aboard her spacecraft before she died. These reports encouraged scientists and government leaders who wanted to put humans in space. On 12 April 1961 Yuri Gagarin became the first human to circle the Earth in space. He completed one orbit and returned safely. Gagarin was the first of the Russian cosmonauts. In 1963 cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman in space, aboard the spacecraft Vostok 6.
The United States was close behind the Soviet Union in space technology. The first US satellite, Explorer 1, was launched on 31 January 1958. It studied radiation belts that circle the Earth. The US programme to put a human in space was called Project Mercury. On 5 May 1961 Mercury astronaut Alan B. Shepard, Jr., became the first American to enter space. Shepard flew for only 15 minutes and did not complete an orbit around the Earth. The first American in orbit was John H. Glenn, Jr. On 20 February 1962 he completed three orbits around the Earth.
Only one astronaut at a time could fly in a Mercury space capsule. But the next stage in the US space programme was Project Gemini, which featured two-person flights. (Gemini means ‘twins' in the Latin language.) Gemini astronauts, who flew between 1964 and 1967, had greater control over their spacecraft and practised docking manoeuvers.
Project Apollo followed Project Gemini. An Apollo spacecraft had space for three astronauts. Tragedy struck the programme in January 1967, when a fire broke out as the equipment was being tested on the ground. Three astronauts died, but the programme continued.
An ancient dream came true on 20 July 1969, when two of the Apollo 11 astronauts reached the surface of the moon. They touched down in a landing craft called the lunar module. The craft that brought them from Earth did not land, instead staying in orbit around the moon. As Neil Armstrong took the historic first step, he announced, ‘That's one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind'. Five other missions landed on the moon between 1969 and 1972.

Space Stations

Space exploration entered a new era with the creation of space stations. These are spacecraft that move in a fixed orbit, with compartments where people can live for months at a time. On a space station, a scientist has more time to do experiments and to do things that can only be done in near-zero gravity. Early space station programmes included Salyut, launched by the Soviet Union starting in 1971, and Skylab, launched by the United States in 1973. These stations were short-lived. The Soviet station Mir was launched in 1986 and stayed in orbit much longer.
In the 1990s the United States and 15 other countries agreed to build and operate a large space station together. The new project was called the International Space Station (ISS). Assembly of the ISS began in 1998. The first crew took up residence in the station in November 2000. (See also space station.)

Space Shuttles

In 1981 the United States launched the first reusable spacecraft – the space shuttle. It was designed to launch space probes and to carry people and equipment to space stations. The main section has wings and is called the orbiter. Attached to the orbiter are rockets, fuel tanks and oxygen tanks that boost the craft through the thickest part of the atmosphere. When their fuel is used up the boosters fall into the ocean, where they can be recovered. At the end of a mission, the orbiter returns to Earth and lands like an aeroplane.
Shuttle trips begin at the John F. Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral on the Atlantic coast of Florida. Missions are controlled from the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center near Houston, Texas. The space shuttle lands either at the Kennedy Space Center or at Edwards Air Force Base in California.
The first 24 shuttle missions operated successfully. Astronauts carried out experiments, gathered data and returned safely to Earth. On the mission launched 18 June 1983, astronaut Sally Ride became the first American woman in space.
Disaster struck the shuttle programme on the 25th mission, however. On 28 January 1986 the shuttle Challenger exploded 73 seconds after lift-off. All seven crew members were killed, including schoolteacher-astronaut Christa McAuliffe. NASA stopped the shuttle programme to study the cause of the explosion. The United States returned to space in September 1988 with the launching of the shuttle Discovery. In 1990 Discovery put the Hubble Space Telescope into orbit around the Earth. By the beginning of the 21st century the United States had launched more than 100 successful shuttle missions.
The shuttle programme experienced another disaster on 1 February 2003, when the shuttle Columbia broke apart as it was returning to Earth. The seven crew members onboard, including the first Israeli astronaut, were all killed.

Space Probes

Space vehicles that carry humans must carry life-support equipment. They must also return to Earth after every trip. By contrast, unmanned probes can devote more space to scientific equipment. They can also make one-way voyages into deep space. Probes are controlled from Earth by radio and send back their findings the same way. One disadvantage of probes is that without astronauts, they have less flexibility to respond to problems or opportunities that develop during a flight.
The Pioneer series of deep-space probes were launched from the late 1950s through the 1970s. Most were directed at the planets, but Pioneer 6 sent back data about the sun. In 1976 two unmanned spacecraft called Vikings 1 and 2 made soft landings on Mars. They sent back famous pictures of the planet's rock-strewn surface.
Two Voyager probes were launched in 1977 to collect data about the distant planets of the solar system. In the years that followed the Voyagers flew past Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, beaming back valuable data on the planets' atmospheres, moons and ring systems.


The United States launched the Mars Pathfinder in December 1996. It landed on Mars on 4 July 1997. Pathfinder then released a six-wheeled robot called Sojourner. Sojourner collected data that may help to answer the question of whether life has ever existed on Mars. The United States sent two more robots to Mars in 2003. They landed in late 2003 and early 2004 on opposite sides of the planet. The robots – called Spirit and Opportunity – took photographs and performed experiments on the planet's soil and rocks.

Benefits from Space Exploration

Space exploration has offered benefits beyond the knowledge gained about the planets and other bodies. Research for space travel has produced many new products and techniques, especially in medicine. For example, spacecraft needed electronic components that were smaller and more durable than any that had existed. After engineers developed these components for the space programme, they used them in other ways. They designed hearing aids small enough to fit entirely within an ear and cameras small enough to take pictures inside a person's stomach. The space programme has also led to lighter, more fire-resistant uniforms for firefighters, more accurate watches, better cushions for athletic shoes and stronger fibreglass for storage tanks.