Julius Hatry (designer), Fritz von Opel (pilot and program head), Max Valier (program head)Īrtificial object in outer space, i.e. Opel-RAK, world's first large-scale rocket program Successful public flight of a manned rocket-powered aircraft ( Opel RAK.1) See also: Timeline of space exploration Date Another small-satellite launcher, Rocket Lab, has developed the Electron rocket and the Photon satellite bus for sending spacecraft further into the Solar System.Ĭhronology History of technology A spinoff company, Virgin Orbit, air-launches small satellites with their LauncherOne rocket. Richard Branson's company Virgin Galactic is concentrating on launch vehicles for space tourism. Blue Origin, a private company founded by founder Jeff Bezos, is developing rockets for use in space tourism, commercial satellite launches, and eventual missions to the Moon and beyond. Since the Demo-2 mission for NASA in 2020 in which SpaceX launched astronauts for the first time to the International Space Station, the company has maintained an orbital human spaceflight capability. Elon Musk, the founder and CEO of SpaceX, has put forward the goal of establishing a colony of one million people on Mars and the company is developing its Starship launch vehicle to facilitate this. A significant private spaceflight company is SpaceX which became the proprietor of one of world's most capable operational launch vehicle when they launched their current largest rocket, the Falcon Heavy in 2018. NASA is hoping that this mission will “usher in a new era of space exploration.” Īnother major factor affecting the current Space Age is the privatization of space flight. The Orion spacecraft is due to be completed in the early 2020s. NASA's goal with this new space capsule is to carry humans to Mars. Īs for the United States space program, NASA is currently constructing a deep-space crew capsule named the Orion. There are several other countries with less extensive space programs, including Brazil, Germany, Ukraine, and Spain. Some of the countries joining this new race are France, India, China, Israel and the United Kingdom, all of which have employed surveillance satellites. There are many scientific and commercial satellites in use today, with thousands of satellites in orbit, and several countries have plans to send humans into space.

Several countries now have space programs from related technology ventures to full-fledged space programs with launch facilities. The winner, Space Ship One in 2004, became the first spaceship not funded by a government agency. In the early 21st century, the Ansari X Prize competition was set up to help jump-start private spaceflight. SpaceX's Falcon Heavy reusable side boosters land in unison at Cape Canaveral Landing Zones 1 and 2 following test flight on 6 February 2018. NASA has since relied on Russia and SpaceX to take American astronauts to and from the International Space Station. Since the 1990s, the public perception of space exploration and space-related technologies has been that such endeavors are increasingly commonplace. Since then, participation in space launches has increasingly widened to include more governments and commercial interests. During the 1990s funding for space-related programs fell sharply as the remaining structures of the now-dissolved Soviet Union disintegrated and NASA no longer had any direct competition. Following the disaster, NASA grounded all Shuttles for safety concerns until 1988. In the United States, the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster in 1986 marked a significant decline in crewed Shuttle launches. Since then, public attention has largely moved to other areas. The landing of Apollo 11 was watched by over 500 million people around the world and is widely recognized as one of the defining moments of the 20th century. The Space Race reached its peak with the Apollo program that captured the imagination of much of the world's population. Prior to the first attempted human spaceflight, various animals were flown into outer space to identify potential detrimental effects of high g-forces in takeoff and landing, microgravity, and radiation exposure at high altitudes. Much of the technology developed for space applications has been spun off and found additional uses, such as memory foam. Sputnik's launch began a Space Race between the United States and the Soviet Union, resulting in rapid advances in rocketry, materials science, and other areas. Weighing 83.6 kg (184.3 lb) and orbiting the Earth once every 98 minutes. The Space Age was an era of new military, political, technological, and scientific developments which began with the Soviet Union's Octolaunch of Earth's first artificial satellite Sputnik 1.

1960s space age