The space conquest consists of the physical exploration of space and the objects external with the Ground, and in a general way to all that touches with the Science, the Technologie, and with the space policy.

It took its rise at the end of the Second world war thanks to the German projections in the fields of the rocket S, and it was one of the great moments of second half of the 20th century. It was marked, at its beginnings, by a strong competition between the USA and the the USSR, for reasons for national prestige related to the Cold war.

The idea to send an object or a man in space was conceived by authors of Science-fiction of the hundreds of years before that is not physically and materially possible. During second half of the XXe century, with the development of the adequate means of propulsion, of the improvement of materials, the sending of a mission in space was not any more one dream but a reality.

The first space flight was carried out by the not inhabited Soviet mission Sputnik 1 the October 4th 1957.

The first manned flight by an human being took place the April 12th 1961 with the orbital flight of Soviet Youri Gagarine.

Great dates

Space programs by country

Famous great men and some cosmonauts

Victims

Officially, the space conquest has fact 23 died to date. However, out of many people were killed in the ex-USSR, China and with the Brésil by the explosion of rockets on the launching pad or by rockets falling down on the ground. The explosion of a rocket ARIANE 5 had caused the potentially dangerous remains repercussion on zones fortunately not inhabited in French Guiana.

To date, it there of died forever in space. The deaths occurred either at the time of the drive on the ground, or at the time of the Décollage, or at the time of the re-entry in the atmosphere.

NASA pays homage to these victims through a memorial. The names of several of these spationauts were used to baptize geological Astéroïde S or formations on other celestial bodies. Several commemorative plaques were deposited on the the Moon by the Apollo missions, of which in particular by David Scott, at the time of the landing of Apollo 15.

Great programs

Live missions

  • List of the live missions between 1961 and 1986

  • List of the live missions between 1987 and 1999
  • List of the live missions between 2000 and 2010

Figures

The Cité of formless space that a figure completely symbolic system was reached the December 10th 2006 because an astronaut sprang in space as a 1  000e team member of a space mission.

It is about Mark Polansky, 50 years, pilot of the Space shuttle Atlantis for the mission STS-98 in 2001, a space flight bound for the International space station (ISS) which lasted 13 days. For its second mission, STS-116, it orders the shuttle Discovery which also joined the ISS.

For these 1  000 members of a space mission, here some figures remarkable or surprising:

  • on these 1  000 team members, 446 different people including 99 Russians, 280 Americans, 3 Chinese, 64 of other nationalities including 31 Europeans including 9 French;
  • on these 446 people, 168 made only one mission;
  • 158 left in the space vacuum during their mission (Sortie extravéhiculaire);
  • oldest at the time of its flight was 78 years old (John Glenn);
  • on these 446 people, 44 women including 1 Frenchwoman (Claudie Haigneré, godmother of the City of space);
  • young person at the time of its flight was 25 years old (Guerman Titov);
  • 18 lost the life on mission;
  • the longest flight in only one mission (14 month - Valeri Poliakov);
  • 12 astronauts walked on the the Moon among the 24 astronauts having left towards our natural satellite;
  • 2 astronauts made 7 missions (Jerry Ross and Franklin Chang-Diaz);
  • 4 citizens “offered” a place of “space tourist”;
  • Sergei Avdeyev lived longest in space, that is to say more than 2 years in several missions and 3 flights;
  • 2 women were “Commander” of their mission (Valentina Terechkova and Eileen Collins);
  • the orbital flight shortest was of only one orbit (Youri Gagarine, the April 12th 1961).

On the whole, the Man passed - at December 10th, 2006 - in space mission 718  266 hours and 17 minutes, that is to say 29  927 days, i.e. nearly 82 years.

See too

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