NASA’s Gemini IX mission was another step in developing technology for future spaceflights from Apollo to the agency’s upcoming Artemis Program designed to return astronauts to the Moon followed by exploration of Mars. But, this 1966 mission included developing alternate plans when faced with the unexpected.
The International Space Station has been in operation with research ongoing since Nov. 2, 2000. America’s first space station was Skylab. Launched 48 years ago, it was a complex orbiting scientific laboratory that helped pave the way for permanent operations in low-Earth orbit. It was a program of unparalleled scientific scope that continues to yield highly valuable information about the universe and life within it.
According to an ancient Chinese proverb, “A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.” NASA is preparing to return astronauts to the Moon followed by exploration of Mars, a planet that is 121 million miles from Earth. Those journeys began 60 years ago with a single, 116-mile “step” into space by Alan Shepard on May 5, 1961.
After 168 days in space, NASA astronauts Mike Hopkins, Victor Glover and Shannon Walker, along with Soichi Noguchi of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA, returned to Earth landing in pre-dawn darkness at 2:56 a.m. EDT on May 2, 2021 completing the Crew-1 mission. Liftoff atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket took place Nov. 15, 2021, from the agency’s Kennedy Space Center.
A SpaceX Falcon 9 streaked into the early morning sky from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center launching four astronauts to the International Space Station. The Crew-2 mission is the first to fly two astronauts from other nations as part of the agency’s Commercial Crew Program. Liftoff of the Falcon 9 rocket took place at 5:49 a.m. EDT April 23, 2021.
The dream of breaking the “chains of gravity” and traveling through space was realized six decades ago on April 12, 1961. At age 27, Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin launched into a one-orbit mission around the Earth becoming the first person to venture into the cosmos. While it was another volley in the Cold War with the United States, it marked a historic achievement hailed around the world.
From the Space Shuttle’s first flight in 1981 to its final mission in 2011, thousands of professionals made the program a technical marvel. On the front line were highly skilled mechanics, technicians and engineers whose innovative work launched landmark missions such as deployment of the Space Telescope and assembly of the Space Station. For one elite group of spacecraft operators, their workstation was the space program’s “inner sanctum” — the shuttle’s crew modules.
In early 1966, Gemini VIII chalked up another crucial spaceflight technology milestone for the United States. But the triumph quickly became an in-flight emergency, testing NASA’s quick-thinking skills to bring the astronauts safely home — 55 years ago this month.
A droid exploring a distant planet is not only the stuff of science fiction, it is today’s reality. NASA’s Perseverance rover successfully landed on Mars at 3:55 p.m. EST on Feb. 18, 2021 and promptly phoned home beaming back the first of what should be thousands of detained images and science data from the Red Planet.
When John F. Kennedy was sworn in as president in 1961, he promised to reach for a “New Frontier.” Attention abroad concentrated on the Cold War with the Soviet Union. Closer to home, there was increasing unrest among those who were being left behind simply because of their race. America’s space agency soon would be thrust into the forefront of both issues.