The Story of How Humanity Left Earth

Sputnik 2

Laika, a stray dog from Moscow, becomes the first living being to orbit Earth. She dies of overheating within hours of launch.

Explorer 1

America's first successful satellite carries a Geiger counter that reveals Earth's radiation belts.

Luna 2

First spacecraft to reach the surface of another celestial body, crashing into the Moon near Mare Imbrium.

Luna 3

Soviet probe returns 17 photographs of the lunar far side, revealing a heavily cratered, mare-poor landscape never before seen by humanity.

Sputnik 5

Two dogs, 40 mice, two rats, and a rabbit become the first higher organisms to survive a full orbital flight and return alive to Earth, paving the way for Yuri Gagarin's flight eight months later.

Freedom 7

Shepard's 15-minute suborbital flight aboard Mercury-Redstone 3 places the US firmly into the crewed spaceflight era.

Vostok 2

Just 25 years old at launch, Titov becomes the first human to spend more than a day in space, completing 17 orbits and proving that humans can eat, sleep and work in microgravity.

Friendship 7

Glenn becomes the first American to orbit the planet, completing three orbits in just under five hours.

Vostok 6

At age 26, Tereshkova orbits Earth 48 times over nearly three days, more time than all American astronauts combined to that point.

Voskhod 2

Leonov spends 12 minutes outside the spacecraft. His suit nearly traps him outside when it inflates beyond design limits.

Ed White becomes the first American to spacewalk

On Gemini 4, Ed White spends 23 minutes outside the spacecraft using a hand-held thruster — three months after Leonov's pioneering Soviet EVA.

Mariner 4

First spacecraft to successfully fly past Mars, returning 22 grainy images that ended a century of speculation about canals and revealed a cratered, desolate world.

Astérix

Launched on a Diamant rocket from Hammaguir, Algeria, Astérix makes France the third country to put a satellite in orbit using its own launch vehicle, after the USSR and USA.

Luna 9

First spacecraft to land softly on another world and transmit images back to Earth.

Soyuz 1

Soyuz 1's parachutes fail during re-entry after a mission plagued by technical problems. Komarov becomes the first human to die during a spaceflight, prompting a 15-month grounding of Soyuz.

Apollo 8

Borman, Lovell and Anders read from Genesis live on Christmas Eve. Their Earthrise photograph becomes one of the most influential images ever taken.

Ohsumi

A four-stage Lambda-4S rocket places Ohsumi in orbit, making Japan the fourth country to independently launch a satellite — and the first Asian nation to do so.

Apollo 13 returns safely after in-flight explosion

Lovell, Swigert and Haise splash down in the Pacific four days after an oxygen tank explosion crippled their command module en route to the Moon — turning a near-disaster into the most celebrated rescue in spaceflight history.

Dong Fang Hong 1

China becomes the fifth nation to independently launch a satellite using its own rocket (Long March 1), broadcasting the patriotic song 'The East Is Red' from orbit for 28 days.

Luna 16

Returns 101 grams of lunar regolith from Mare Fecunditatis to Earth, proving the basic feasibility of robotic sample-return missions.

Lunokhod 1

Eight-wheeled solar-powered rover deployed by Luna 17 explores 10.5 km of the lunar surface across 11 lunar days, returning more than 20,000 images.

Venera 7

Survives crushing pressure and 475 °C heat to transmit 23 minutes of data from Venus' surface — the first signal ever received from the surface of another world.

Salyut 1

Soviets launch humanity's first orbital station, paving the way for 50+ years of continuous human presence in space.

Soyuz 11

After spending 23 days on Salyut 1, cosmonauts Dobrovolski, Volkov and Patsayev die from cabin depressurisation during re-entry — the only humans ever to perish above the Kármán line.

Apollo 15

Scott and Irwin deploy the first LRV on the Moon, expanding traverse range from hundreds of metres to tens of kilometres and transforming what astronauts could accomplish during a single mission.

Prospero

A Black Arrow rocket lifts off from Woomera, Australia, placing Prospero into orbit and making the UK the sixth country to launch its own satellite — and the only one to subsequently abandon its independent launch capability.

Mariner 9

Enters Mars orbit and waits out a planet-wide dust storm before mapping nearly the entire surface, revealing Olympus Mons, Valles Marineris, and the polar caps in unprecedented detail.

Mars 3

Lander transmits for 14.5 seconds before failing, but proves Mars surface operations are possible.

Pioneer 10 launches

First spacecraft to traverse the asteroid belt and to fly past Jupiter (December 1973), carrying the famous Pioneer plaque toward interstellar space.

Apollo 17

Cernan and Schmitt complete the final Apollo lunar EVA, conducting the longest surface stay and longest cumulative moonwalks of the program. No human returns to the Moon's vicinity for 53 years.

Skylab

America's first crewed station hosts three long-duration missions, advancing solar physics and microgravity science.

Aryabhata

Built by ISRO and launched on a Soviet Kosmos-3M rocket, Aryabhata makes India the 11th country to put a satellite in orbit and marks the beginning of an indigenous Indian space programme.

Apollo-Soyuz

American and Soviet spacecraft dock in orbit, symbolising a thaw in the space race.

Venera 9

Soviet lander survives 53 minutes on Venus' surface and transmits the first ever black-and-white panorama from the surface of another world.

Viking 1

First successful US Mars lander, beaming back the planet's first colour panoramas.

Voyager 2 launches

Launches two weeks before Voyager 1 on a 'grand tour' trajectory; flies past Jupiter (1979), Saturn (1981), Uranus (1986) and Neptune (1989), and crosses into interstellar space in 2018.

Voyager 1 launched on grand tour

Voyager 1 launches and eventually becomes the most distant human-made object, crossing into interstellar space in 2012.

Ariane 1

Maiden flight from Kourou establishes Europe as an autonomous launch power, breaking US dominance of the commercial satellite launch market through what would become the Ariane family.

Rohini-1

ISRO's SLV-3 rocket lifts off from Sriharikota and places Rohini-1 in orbit, making India the seventh nation to develop an indigenous orbital launch capability.

Giotto launches

ESA's first deep-space mission flies within 600 km of comet 1P/Halley's nucleus in March 1986, returning the first ever close-up images of a cometary surface.

Mir core module launched

First modular space station. Hosts continuous crewed presence for nearly 15 years.

Buran

Soviet shuttle Buran flies twice around Earth uncrewed and lands itself on the runway at Baikonur — the only flight of the program before the Soviet Union's collapse ends Buran development.

Galileo launches to Jupiter

First dedicated Jupiter orbiter. Releases an atmospheric probe in 1995, then spends nearly eight years studying Jupiter and its moons, discovering subsurface oceans on Europa and Ganymede.

Valeri Polyakov returns after 437-day Mir stay

Polyakov returns to Earth after 437 days 18 hours in space — still the longest single human spaceflight on record, proving humans can survive in microgravity for the duration of a Mars mission.

Mars Pathfinder & Sojourner

Airbag-protected lander touches down in Ares Vallis on US Independence Day and deploys the 11.5-kg Sojourner rover, the first vehicle to drive on another planet.

Cassini-Huygens launches to Saturn

Most ambitious outer-solar-system mission ever flown. Cassini orbits Saturn for 13 years, completes 22 ring-grazing finale orbits, and discovers methane lakes on Titan and water plumes on Enceladus.

Shenzhou 1

Uncrewed maiden flight of Shenzhou validates the spacecraft design that would carry Yang Liwei to orbit four years later, beginning China's human-spaceflight programme.

First permanent ISS crew arrives

Expedition 1 begins continuous human habitation of space, unbroken to this day.

Mars Express

Europe's first interplanetary mission launches to Mars carrying the Beagle 2 lander. The orbiter is still returning data over 20 years later, mapping the planet's atmosphere, geology and subsurface ice.

Shenzhou 5

China becomes the third country to launch humans to orbit independently.

Rosetta launches on a 10-year journey to a comet

ESA's flagship cometary mission begins a decade-long pursuit of comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko, culminating in the first orbit and landing on a cometary nucleus in 2014.

Huygens

ESA's Huygens probe parachutes through Titan's thick nitrogen atmosphere and soft-lands on the moon's surface — the most distant landing in history and the only one on a moon other than Earth's.

Chang'e 1

China's first deep-space mission completes 16 months of lunar mapping before being deliberately impacted into the Moon's surface, establishing China as a lunar exploration power.

Shenzhou 7

Taikonaut Zhai Zhigang performs China's first EVA, spending 22 minutes outside Shenzhou 7 and unfurling a Chinese flag in space.

Falcon 1

SpaceX reaches orbit on its fourth attempt, opening the commercial spaceflight era.

Chandrayaan-1 launches

Maiden Indian lunar mission orbits the Moon for 10 months and provides the first definitive evidence of water on the lunar surface, transforming our understanding of the Moon.

Omid era

Although Israel's first Ofeq satellite launched in 1988, its independent launch capability matures through the 2000s; by 2009 Israel is one of only nine nations capable of indigenous orbital launches with the Shavit rocket.

Hayabusa returns first asteroid sample to Earth

JAXA's Hayabusa probe parachutes a capsule containing micrograms of dust from near-Earth asteroid Itokawa into the Australian outback — the first material ever returned from an asteroid.

STS-135 Atlantis

Ends 30 years of Shuttle operations. US loses independent human launch capability for nine years.

Curiosity rover lands on Mars

Sky Crane manoeuvre lowers a 1-tonne nuclear-powered rover into Gale Crater. Still operating today.

Voyager 1 enters interstellar space

Plasma density measurements confirm Voyager 1 has crossed the heliopause at 121 AU, becoming the first human-made object to leave the Sun's magnetic bubble and enter the interstellar medium.

Mangalyaan launches

PSLV launches India's first interplanetary mission toward Mars on a budget of just $74 million — less than the production cost of the film 'Gravity' released the same year.

Chang'e 3 / Yutu

Chang'e 3 lands in Mare Imbrium and deploys the Yutu rover, making China only the third nation to soft-land a spacecraft on the Moon — and the first to do so in 37 years.

Mangalyaan enters Mars orbit on first attempt

India becomes the first nation — and the first space agency outside NASA, Roscosmos and ESA — to successfully enter Mars orbit on its first try, on a budget of just US $74 million.

Philae lands on comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko

First soft landing on a comet, after a decade-long journey aboard Rosetta.

Hayabusa 2 launches to asteroid Ryugu

Successor to Hayabusa launches on a six-year mission to rendezvous with carbonaceous asteroid 162173 Ryugu, deploy landers, fire an impactor, and return samples.

New Horizons flies past Pluto

After a 9.5-year journey, New Horizons screams past Pluto at 14 km/s, returning the first close-up images of the dwarf planet and revealing nitrogen glaciers, water-ice mountains, and a 'heart' of frozen plains.

Falcon 9 first stage lands vertically after orbital launch

First orbital-class rocket first stage to return and land. Reusability becomes economically real.

Juno enters Jupiter orbit

Solar-powered Juno enters a polar orbit around Jupiter on Independence Day, mapping the gas giant's gravity and magnetic fields and returning some of the most striking planetary images of all time.

SES-10

Falcon 9 first stage that flew on CRS-8 returns to flight on the SES-10 mission and lands again, proving orbital-rocket reusability is not just possible but operational.

BepiColombo launches toward Mercury

Joint ESA–JAXA mission begins a 7-year cruise to Mercury orbit, carrying two orbiters that will study the planet's magnetic field, surface and exosphere in unprecedented detail.

Chang'e 4

Communicates via Queqiao relay satellite stationed at Earth-Moon L2.

Crew Dragon Demo-1

Uncrewed test flight validates Crew Dragon's autonomous rendezvous and docking with the ISS, the dress rehearsal that paves the way for Demo-2 a year later.

Beresheet

Privately funded Israeli lander crashes into Mare Serenitatis after a gyroscope failure during descent, but proves that under-$100M lunar missions are achievable by non-state actors.

Hayabusa 2 returns asteroid Ryugu sample

5.4 grams of pristine asteroid Ryugu lands in the Australian outback, far exceeding mission goals and providing the largest, freshest carbonaceous asteroid sample ever returned to Earth.

Chang'e 5 returns first lunar samples since 1976

1.731 kg of lunar regolith from Mons Rümker returns to Inner Mongolia — the first new Moon samples on Earth in 44 years and China's first sample-return mission.

Hope

Emirates Mars Mission orbiter Hope (Al-Amal) enters Mars orbit on its first attempt, making the United Arab Emirates only the fifth space agency to operate a spacecraft at Mars and the first Arab nation in interplanetary space.

Perseverance lands on Mars

Most sophisticated Mars rover to date, carrying samples for future return to Earth.

Ingenuity

1.8-kg helicopter completes 39-second hover in the thin Martian atmosphere.

Tianhe

Long March 5B places the 22.5-tonne Tianhe core module into orbit, beginning construction of China's permanent Tiangong space station and giving humanity a second continuously-crewed orbital outpost.

Tianwen-1 / Zhurong

China becomes only the second nation to successfully operate a rover on the Martian surface, deploying the solar-powered Zhurong rover in Utopia Planitia.

Nuri / KSLV-II

Three-stage Nuri rocket reaches orbit and deploys a 1.3-tonne dummy payload on its second flight, making South Korea the seventh country to develop a homegrown launcher capable of orbiting a 1+ tonne satellite.

DART impacts Dimorphos

Successfully alters the orbit of a 160-m asteroid moonlet, proving planetary defence is feasible.

Artemis I

First flight of SLS and Orion. Sets the stage for crewed lunar return later this decade.

JUICE launches to Jupiter's icy moons

Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer begins an 8-year cruise to the gas giant system, where it will study Ganymede, Europa and Callisto and become the first spacecraft to orbit a moon other than Earth's.

Chandrayaan-3

India becomes the fourth nation to soft-land on the Moon, and the first at the southern polar region.

Aditya-L1

ISRO's first dedicated solar mission heads to the Sun-Earth Lagrange point L1, where it studies the solar corona, photosphere and chromosphere from a 1.5-million-km vantage.

OSIRIS-REx returns asteroid sample to Earth

First US asteroid sample-return mission delivers 122 g of material from Bennu, hand-delivered to Utah desert.

SLIM

JAXA's Smart Lander for Investigating Moon achieves the most accurate Moon landing ever attempted (within 55 m of its target), though it tips on its side and operates with reduced solar power.

Chang'e 6 returns first samples from the Moon's far side

Lands in Apollo crater, collects 1.935 kg of regolith from the South Pole–Aitken basin, and returns to Inner Mongolia — humanity's first material from the lunar far side.

Ariane 6 maiden flight restores European launch capability

After a year-long gap following Ariane 5's retirement, Ariane 6 successfully reaches orbit on its first flight, ending Europe's dependence on SpaceX and Vega for medium-lift launches.

Polaris Dawn

Privately funded crew conducts EVA at 700 km altitude, the highest crewed orbit since Apollo.

Europa Clipper launches to Jupiter's icy moon

NASA's largest interplanetary spacecraft launches on Falcon Heavy to investigate whether Europa's subsurface ocean could host life. Arrival at Jupiter is scheduled for 2030.

Starship Flight 6

Sixth integrated Starship flight test. Booster splashes down in the Gulf instead of attempting a catch; the ship completes a controlled Indian Ocean splashdown.

Parker Solar Probe makes closest-ever approach to the Sun

Passes within 6.1 million km of the Sun's surface — closer than any spacecraft in history — at roughly 692,000 km/h, surviving the corona thanks to a heat shield rated to 1,400 °C.

Blue Ghost Mission 1 and IM-2 launch together

Falcon 9 deploys two commercial lunar landers in one launch: Firefly's Blue Ghost bound for Mare Crisium, and Intuitive Machines' IM-2 Athena bound for the lunar south pole.

New Glenn

Blue Origin's 98-metre heavy-lift rocket reaches orbit on its maiden flight, deploying a Blue Ring spacecraft demonstrator. The first-stage booster recovery attempt fails on the droneship.

Starship Flight 7

Super Heavy is caught at the launch tower for the second time. The new Block 2 upper stage is lost approximately eight minutes into flight after a propellant leak.

Blue Ghost

Firefly's Blue Ghost lander touches down at Mare Crisium upright and operational, becoming the first commercial mission to complete every planned lunar surface objective.

IM-2 Athena reaches the lunar south pole

Intuitive Machines' second lander arrives at Mons Mouton, the closest controlled landing to the lunar south pole to date, but tips on its side and ends operations within a day.

Wilmore and Williams return after unplanned nine-month ISS stay

Crew-9 Dragon Freedom splashes down off Florida, ending the saga of the Boeing Starliner Crew Flight Test astronauts, who launched on an eight-day mission in June 2024 and stayed in orbit 286 days.

Shenzhou 20 launches crew to Tiangong

Three taikonauts launch to China's Tiangong space station for a six-month expedition, continuing China's now-routine cadence of two crewed Tiangong rotations per year.

Tianwen-2 launches

Long March 3B lofts the Tianwen-2 spacecraft toward near-Earth asteroid 469219 Kamoʻoalewa, Earth's quasi-satellite. Sample return is planned for 2027, followed by an extended cruise to main-belt comet 311P/PANSTARRS.

SpaceX Crew-11 launches to the ISS

Falcon 9 launches Dragon Endeavour from Kennedy LC-39A carrying NASA's Zena Cardman and Michael Fincke, JAXA's Kimiya Yui, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Oleg Platonov for Expedition 73/74.

Starship Flight 10

Tenth integrated Starship flight. Every major objective is achieved, including the first payload deployment from Starship — eight Starlink mass simulators released in orbit — and a controlled Indian Ocean splashdown of the ship.

Shenzhou 21 launches crew to Tiangong

Long March 2F sends three taikonauts to Tiangong on a six-month expedition. The mission later becomes the unplanned ride home for the Shenzhou 20 crew after their return capsule is damaged by orbital debris.

New Glenn NG-2 sends ESCAPADE to Mars and lands the booster

Blue Origin's New Glenn launches NASA's twin ESCAPADE probes toward Mars and lands its first stage on the recovery ship Jacklyn — the first non-SpaceX orbital-class booster to be recovered, achieved on the rocket's second-ever flight.

Shenzhou 22 launches uncrewed as an emergency rescue capsule

Long March 2F lofts an uncrewed Shenzhou 22 to Tiangong, restoring return capability after orbital-debris impact cracked a Shenzhou 20 window. The Shenzhou 20 crew had already come home aboard Shenzhou 21 on November 14 — the first time a Chinese crew rode home on a different vehicle than they launched on.

Zhuque-3

LandSpace's stainless-steel Zhuque-3 reaches orbit on its maiden flight, but its first-stage landing burn ends in a crash. The flight nevertheless makes China the second country to attempt orbital-class first-stage recovery.

SpaceX Crew-12 launches to the ISS

Falcon 9 launches Dragon Endurance from Kennedy carrying NASA's Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway, ESA's Sophie Adenot, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev. The Dragon docks the next day to reinforce a skeleton ISS crew.

Artemis II sets new farthest-from-Earth crewed-flight record

Five days into the mission, Orion surpasses the 400,171 km record set by Apollo 13 in 1970, becoming the farthest any humans have ever travelled from Earth. The crew splash down safely on April 10.

Tianzhou 10 cargo resupply launches to Tiangong

Long March 7 lofts the first Tiangong resupply mission of 2026, delivering propellant and crew consumables to support back-to-back Shenzhou 21 and Shenzhou 23 expeditions.