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101-402: A launch pad is an above-ground platform from which rocket- missiles or space launch vehicles take off vertically. Launch pad may also refer to: Launch pad Most launch pads include fixed service structures to provide one or more access platforms to assemble, inspect, and maintain the vehicle and to allow access to the spacecraft, including the loading of crew. The pad may contain

202-615: A ballistic re-entry capsule launched on a derivative Atlas missile , and selecting a group of nine candidate pilots. After NASA's creation, the program was transferred over to the civilian agency's Space Task Group and renamed Project Mercury on November 26, 1958. The Mercury spacecraft was designed by the STG's chief engineer Maxime Faget . NASA selected a new group of astronaut (from the Greek for "star sailor") candidates from Navy , Air Force and Marine test pilots, and narrowed this down to

303-484: A flame deflection structure to prevent the intense heat of the rocket exhaust from damaging the vehicle or pad structures, and a sound suppression system spraying large quantities of water may be employed. The pad may also be protected by lightning arresters . A spaceport typically includes multiple launch complexes and other supporting infrastructure. A launch pad is distinct from a missile launch facility (or missile silo or missile complex ), which also launches

404-415: A flame deflector might be implemented to mitigate damage to the surrounding pad and direct exhaust. This is especially important with reusable launch vehicles to increase efficiency of launches while minimizing time spent refurbishing. The construction of a launch pad begins with site selection, considering various geographical and logistical factors. It is often advantageous to position the launch pad on

505-489: A few minutes later. This "fellow traveler", as the name is translated in English, was a small, beeping ball, less than two feet in diameter and weighing less than 200 pounds. But the celebrations were muted at the launch control center until the down-range far east tracking station at Kamchatka received the first distinctive beep ... beep ... beep sounds from Sputnik 1 ' s radio transmitters, indicating that it

606-531: A group of seven for the program. Capsule design and astronaut training began immediately, working toward preliminary suborbital flights on the Redstone missile , followed by orbital flights on the Atlas. Each flight series would first start unpiloted, then carry a non-human primate, then finally humans. The Mercury spacecraft's principal designer was Maxime Faget , who started research for human spaceflight during

707-620: A micrometeorite gauge and a Geiger-Müller tube . It passed in and out of the Earth-encompassing radiation belt with its 194-by-1,368-nautical-mile (360 by 2,534 km) orbit, therefore saturating the tube's capacity and proving what Dr. James Van Allen , a space scientist at the University of Iowa , had theorized. The belt, named the Van Allen radiation belt , is a doughnut-shaped zone of high-level radiation intensity around

808-432: A missile vertically but is located underground in order to help harden it against enemy attack. The launch complex for liquid fueled rockets often has extensive ground support equipment including propellant tanks and plumbing to fill the rocket before launch. Cryogenic propellants ( liquid oxygen oxidizer, and liquid hydrogen or liquid methane fuel) need to be continuously topped off (i.e., boil-off replaced) during

909-554: A moment that America would be successful". On January 31, 1958, nearly four months after the launch of Sputnik 1 , von Braun and the United States successfully launched its first satellite on a four-stage Juno I rocket derived from the US Army's Redstone missile, at Cape Canaveral. The satellite Explorer 1 was 30.66 pounds (13.91 kg) in mass. The payload of Explorer 1 weighed 18.35 pounds (8.32 kg). It carried

1010-581: A mysterious barrier between the space program and the Soviet populace. The program's nature embodied ambiguous messages concerning its goals, successes, and values. The program itself was so secret that a regular Soviet citizen could never achieve a concrete image of it, but rather a superficial picture of its history, present activities, or future endeavors. Launchings were not announced until they took place. Cosmonaut names were not released until they flew. Mission details were sparse. Outside observers did not know

1111-819: A national hero of the Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc, and a worldwide celebrity. Moscow and other cities in the USSR held mass demonstrations, the scale of which was second only to the World War II Victory Parade of 1945 . April 12 was declared Cosmonautics Day in the USSR, and is celebrated today in Russia as one of the official "Commemorative Dates of Russia." In 2011, it was declared the International Day of Human Space Flight by

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1212-513: A rocket launch, along with the sound it produces during liftoff, can damage the launchpad and service structure , as well as the launch vehicle. The primary goal of the diverter is to prevent the flame from causing damage to equipment, infrastructure, or the surrounding environment. Flame diverters can be found at rocket launch sites and test stands where large volumes of exhaust gases are expelled during engine testing or vehicle launch. Sites for launching large rockets are often equipped with

1313-621: A second satellite was sent into orbit with augmented cosmic ray instruments. On April 2, 1958, President Eisenhower reacted to the Soviet space lead in launching the first satellite by recommending to the US Congress that a civilian agency be established to direct nonmilitary space activities. Congress, led by Senate Majority Leader Lyndon B. Johnson , responded by passing the National Aeronautics and Space Act , which Eisenhower signed into law on July 29, 1958. This law turned

1414-497: A single, 108-minute orbit around the Earth in a craft called Vostok 1 . They dubbed Gagarin the first cosmonaut , roughly translated from Russian and Greek as "sailor of the universe". Gagarin's capsule was flown in automatic mode, since doctors did not know what would happen to a human in the weightlessness of space; but Gagarin was given an envelope containing the code that would unlock manual control in an emergency. Gagarin became

1515-419: A sound suppression system to absorb or deflect acoustic energy generated during a rocket launch. As engine exhaust gasses exceed the speed of sound , they collide with the ambient air and shockwaves are created, with noise levels approaching 200 db. This energy can be reflected by the launch platform and pad surfaces, and could potentially cause damage to the launch vehicle, payload, and crew. For instance,

1616-702: A successor to the R-1, the R-2 with an extended frame and a new engine designed by Glushko, which entered service in November, 1951, with a range of 600 kilometres (370 mi), twice that of the R-1. This was followed in 1951 with the development of the R-5 Pobeda , the Soviet Union's first real strategic missile, with a range of 1,200 km (750 mi) and capable of carrying a 1 megaton (mt) thermonuclear warhead. The R-5 entered service in 1955. Scientific versions of

1717-536: A tabloid article about the " Mercury 13 " group of women wanting to become astronauts, and got the mistaken idea that NASA was actually entertaining this. Five months after her flight, Tereshkova married Vostok 3 cosmonaut Andriyan Nikolayev , and they had a daughter. The US Air Force had been developing a program to launch the first man in space, named Man in Space Soonest . This program studied several different types of one-man space vehicles, settling on

1818-533: A three-and-a-half second first stage engine static firing as well. Space Race The Space Race (Russian: Космическая гонка [kɐsˈmʲitɕɪskəjə ˈɡonkə] ) was a 20th-century competition between two Cold War rivals, the United States and the Soviet Union , to achieve superior spaceflight capability. It had its origins in the ballistic missile -based nuclear arms race between

1919-535: Is contested by some historians, whilst space historian Asif A. Siddiqi proposed a more balanced view. The USSR continued to pursue crewed lunar programs to launch and land on the Moon before the US with its N1 rocket but did not succeed, and eventually canceled it to concentrate on Salyut , the first space station program, and the first landings on Venus and on Mars . Meanwhile, the US landed five more Apollo crews on

2020-405: Is unique, but a few broad types can be described by the means by which the space vehicle gets to the pad. A service structure is a steel framework or tower that is built on a launch pad to facilitate assembly and servicing. An umbilical tower also usually includes an elevator which allows maintenance and crew access. Immediately before ignition of the rocket's motors, all connections between

2121-607: The Goddard Rocket Launching Site after Robert H. Goddard 's series of launch tests starting in 1926, consisted of a mount situated on an open field in rural Massachusetts. The mount was compromised of a frame with a series of gasoline and liquid oxygen lines feeding into the rocket. It wasn't until the 1930s that rockets were increasing enough in size and strength that specialized launch facilities became necessary. The Verein für Raumschiffahrt in Germany

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2222-558: The Moon , Venus , and Mars , and human spaceflight in low Earth orbit and ultimately to the Moon. Public interest in space travel originated in the 1951 publication of a Soviet youth magazine and was promptly picked up by US magazines. The competition began on July 30, 1955, when the United States announced its intent to launch artificial satellites for the International Geophysical Year . Four days later,

2323-592: The National Academy of Sciences in Washington D.C., with a paper titled "Satellite Over the Planet", on October 6, 1957. Korolev anticipated that von Braun might launch a Jupiter-C with a satellite payload on or around October 4 or 5, in conjunction with the paper. He hastened the launch, moving it to October 4. The launch vehicle for PS-1 was a modified R-7 – vehicle 8K71PS number M1-PS – without much of

2424-596: The National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics into the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). It also created a Civilian-Military Liaison Committee, appointed by the President, responsible for coordinating the nation's civilian and military space programs. On October 21, 1959, Eisenhower approved the transfer of the Army's remaining space-related activities to NASA. On July 1, 1960,

2525-604: The RS-82 and RS-132 missiles , which became the basis for the Katyusha multiple rocket launcher , During the 1930s Soviet rocket technology was comparable to Germany's, but Joseph Stalin 's Great Purge from 1936 to 1938 severely damaged its progress. In 1945 the Soviets captured several key Nazi German A-4 ( V-2 ) rocket production facilities, and also gained the services of some German scientists and engineers related to

2626-520: The United Nations . The USSR demonstrated 24-hour launch pad turnaround and launched two piloted spacecraft, Vostok 3 and Vostok 4 , in essentially identical orbits, on August 11 and 12, 1962. The two spacecraft came within approximately 6.5 kilometers (3.5 nautical miles) of one another, close enough for radio communication, but then drifted as far apart as 2,850 kilometers (1,540 nautical miles). The Vostok had no maneuvering rockets to keep

2727-401: The 1957–58 International Geophysical Year launches to establish this principle in international law. Eisenhower also feared that he might cause an international incident and be called a "warmonger" if he were to use military missiles as launchers. Therefore, he selected the untried Naval Research Laboratory 's Vanguard rocket , which was a research-only rocket. This meant that von Braun's team

2828-405: The 1960s. They cloaked the program in a shroud of secrecy; public pronouncements were uniformly positive. As far as the public knew, the Soviet space program had never experienced failure. According to historian James Andrews, "With almost no exceptions, coverage of Soviet space exploits, especially in the case of human space missions, omitted reports of failure or trouble". Dominic Phelan says in

2929-598: The Air Force PGM-11 Redstone rocket family at Cape Canaveral. By 1957, a descendant of the Air Force MX-774 received top-priority funding. and evolved into the Atlas-A , the first successful American ICBM. The Atlas made use of a thin stainless steel fuel tank which relied on the internal pressure of the tank for structural integrity, this allowed an overall lighter weight design. WD-40

3030-550: The Army's first operational medium-range ballistic missile, the Redstone rocket , derivatives of which launched both America's first satellite, and the first piloted Mercury space missions. It became the basis for both the Jupiter and Saturn family of rockets . Each of the United States armed services had its own ICBM development program. The Air Force began ICBM research in 1945 with the MX-774 . In 1950, von Braun began testing

3131-542: The Council of Ministers to build a Prosteishy Sputnik (PS-1), or simple satellite. The council also decreed that Object D be postponed until April 1958. The new Sputnik was a metallic sphere that would be a much lighter craft, weighing 83.8 kilograms (185 lb) and having a 58-centimeter (23 in) diameter. The satellite would not contain the complex instrumentation that Object D had, but had two radio transmitters operating on different short wave radio frequencies,

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3232-403: The Earth above the magnetic equator. Van Allen was also the man who designed and built the satellite instrumentation of Explorer 1 . The satellite measured three phenomena: cosmic ray and radiation levels, the temperature in the spacecraft, and the frequency of collisions with micrometeorites. The satellite had no memory for data storage, therefore it had to transmit continuously. In March 1958

3333-611: The Earth" before the end of the decade. Both countries began developing super heavy-lift launch vehicles , with the US successfully deploying the Saturn V , which was large enough to send a three-person orbiter and two-person lander to the Moon. Kennedy's Moon landing goal was achieved in July 1969, with the flight of Apollo 11 . The conclusion of Apollo 11 is regarded by most as ending the Space Race with an American victory. This view

3434-463: The Moon and continued exploration of other extraterrestrial bodies robotically. A period of détente followed with the April 1972 agreement on a cooperative Apollo–Soyuz Test Project (ASTP), resulting in the July 1975 rendezvous in Earth orbit of a US astronaut crew with a Soviet cosmonaut crew and joint development of an international docking standard APAS-75 . Being considered as the final act of

3535-531: The Moon. The 730-pound (330 kg) Ranger 4 became the first US spacecraft to reach the Moon, but its solar panels and navigational system failed near the Moon and it impacted the far side without returning any scientific data. Ranger 5 ran out of power and missed the Moon by 725 kilometers (391 nmi) on October 21, 1962. The first successful Ranger mission was the 806-pound (366 kg) Block III Ranger 7 which impacted on July 31, 1964. Ranger had three successful impactors out of nine attempts. In 1963,

3636-492: The Moon. The fifth attempt on June 18 also failed at launch. The 390-kilogram (860 lb) Luna 2 successfully impacted the Moon on September 14, 1959. The 278.5-kilogram (614 lb) Luna 3 successfully flew by the Moon and sent back pictures of its far side on October 7, 1959. The US first embarked on the Pioneer program in 1958 by launching the first probe , albeit ending in failure. A subsequent probe named Pioneer 1

3737-465: The R-1, R-2 and R-5 undertook various experiments between 1949 and 1958, including flights with space dogs . Design work began in 1953 on the R-7 Semyorka with the requirement for a missile with a launch mass of 170 to 200 tons, range of 8,500 km and carrying a 3,000 kg (6,600 lb) nuclear warhead, powerful enough to launch a nuclear warhead against the United States. In late 1953

3838-691: The Redstone Arsenal became NASA's George C. Marshall Space Flight Center , with von Braun as its first director. Development of the Saturn rocket family , which when mature gave the US parity with the Soviets in terms of lifting capability, was thus transferred to NASA. In 1958, Korolev upgraded the R-7 to be able to launch a 400-kilogram (880 lb) payload to the Moon. The Luna program began with three failed secret 1958 attempts to launch Luna E-1 -class impactor probes. The fourth attempt, Luna 1 , launched successfully on January 2, 1959, but missed

3939-414: The Soviet Union responded by declaring they would also launch a satellite "in the near future". The launching of satellites was enabled by developments in ballistic missile capabilities since the end of World War II. The competition gained Western public attention with the " Sputnik crisis ", when the USSR achieved the first successful satellite launch, Sputnik 1 , on October 4, 1957. It gained momentum when

4040-475: The Soviet Union's "2nd Generation" Luna programme was less successful, Luna 4 , Luna 5 , Luna 6 , Luna 7 , and Luna 8 were all met with mission failures. However, in 1966 Luna 9 achieved the first soft-landing on the Moon, and successfully transmitted photography from the surface. Luna 10 marked the first man-made object to establish an orbit around the Moon, followed by Luna 11 , Luna 12 , and Luna 14 which also successfully established orbits. Luna 12

4141-561: The Soviet embassy of his country's intention to launch a satellite as well, in the "near future". On August 30, 1955, Korolev managed to get the Soviet Academy of Sciences to create a commission whose purpose was to beat the Americans into Earth orbit: this was the de facto start date for the Space Race. The Council of Ministers of the Soviet Union began a policy of treating development of its space program as top-secret. When

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4242-539: The Space Race, the competition was only gradually replaced with cooperation. The collapse of the Soviet Union eventually allowed the US and the newly founded Russian Federation to end their Cold War competition also in space, by agreeing in 1993 on the Shuttle– Mir and International Space Station programs . Although Germans, Americans and Soviets experimented with small liquid-fuel rockets before World War II, launching satellites and humans into space required

4343-520: The Sputnik project was first approved, one of the immediate courses of action the Politburo took was to consider what to announce to the world regarding their event. The Telegraph Agency of the Soviet Union (TASS) established precedents for all official announcements on the Soviet space program. The information eventually released did not offer details on who built and launched the satellite or why it

4444-419: The U.S. In August 1949, the Soviet Union became the second nuclear power after the United States with the successful RDS-1 nuclear weapon test. In October 1957, the Soviet Union conducted the world’s first successful test of an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), this was the R-7 Semyorka (also known as SS-6 by NATO) and was seen as capable of striking U.S. territory with a nuclear payload. Fears in

4545-674: The US due to this perceived threat became known as the Missile gap . The first American ICBM, the Atlas missile , was tested in late 1958. ICBMs presented the ability to strike targets on the other side of the globe in a very short amount of time and in a manner which was impervious to air interception such as bombers might have been. The value which ICBMs presented in a nuclear standoff were very substantial, and this fact greatly accelerated efforts to develop rocket and rocket interception technology. The first Soviet development of artillery rockets

4646-487: The USSR but did not take him seriously. The Soviet success raised a great deal of concern in the United States. For example, economist Bernard Baruch wrote in an open letter titled "The Lessons of Defeat" to the New York Herald Tribune : "While we devote our industrial and technological power to producing new model automobiles and more gadgets, the Soviet Union is conquering space. ... It is Russia, not

4747-422: The USSR had achieved a leading advantage in rocket technology. The dumbfounded CIA estimated the launch weight at 500 metric tons requiring an initial thrust of more than 1,000 tons and supposed the use of a three-stage rocket. In a secret report, it concluded that ″the launching of two earth satellites must have been a stupendous scientific achievement. ... Launching of these satellites does indicate, however, that

4848-505: The USSR has perfected an ICBM which they can put on any desired target with accuracy." In reality, the launch weight of the Soviet rocket was 267 metric tons with an initial thrust of 410 tons with one and a half stages. The CIA's misjudgement was caused by extrapolating the parameters of the US Atlas rocket developed at the same time (launch weight 82 tons, initial thrust 135 tones, maximum payload of 70 kg for low Earth orbit ). In part,

4949-489: The USSR sent animals into space to determine the safety of the environment before sending the first humans. The USSR used dogs for this purpose, and the US used monkeys and apes . The first mammal in space was Albert II , a rhesus monkey launched by the US on a sub-orbital flight on June 14, 1949, who died on landing due to a parachute malfunction. The USSR sent the dog Laika into orbit on Sputnik 2 on November 3, 1957, for an intended ten-day flight. They did not yet have

5050-409: The USSR sent the first human, Yuri Gagarin , into space with the orbital flight of Vostok 1 on April 12, 1961. These were followed by a string of other firsts achieved by the Soviets over the next few years. Gagarin's flight led US president John F. Kennedy to raise the stakes on May 25, 1961, by asking the US Congress to commit to the goal of "landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to

5151-470: The United States, who has had the imagination to hitch its wagon to the stars and the skill to reach for the moon and all but grasp it. America is worried. It should be." Eisenhower ordered project Vanguard to move up its timetable and launch its satellite much sooner than originally planned. The December 6, 1957 Project Vanguard launch failure occurred at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. It

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5252-467: The Vostok program was over. The craft consisted of a spherical descent module with a mass of 2.46 tonnes (5,400 lb) and a diameter of 2.3 meters (7.5 ft), with a cylindrical inner cabin housing the cosmonaut, instruments, and escape system; and a biconic instrument module with a mass of 2.27 tonnes (5,000 lb), 2.25 meters (7.4 ft) long and 2.43 meters (8.0 ft) in diameter, containing

5353-462: The ability to detect if a meteoroid were to penetrate its pressure hull, and the ability to detect the density of the Earth's thermosphere . Korolev was buoyed by the first successful launches of the R-7 rocket in August and September, which paved the way for the launch of Sputnik . Word came that the US was planning to announce a major breakthrough at an International Geophysical Year conference at

5454-406: The aft engine area of the vehicle prior to engine start. Too much excess hydrogen in the aft during engine start can result in an overpressure blast wave that could damage the launch vehicle and surrounding pad structures. The Spacex launch sequence includes a hold-down feature of the launch pad that allows full engine ignition and systems check before liftoff. After the first-stage engine starts,

5555-399: The area above the pad. Flame deflectors or flame trenches are designed to channel rocket exhaust away from the launch pad but also redirect acoustic energy away. In rockets using liquid hydrogen as their source of propellant , hydrogen burn-off systems (HBOI), also known as radially outward firing igniters (ROFI), can be utilized to prevent the build up of free gaseous hydrogen (GH2) in

5656-450: The basis for the R-7 family which includes Sputnik , Luna , Molniya , Vostok , and Voskhod space launchers , as well as later Soyuz variants. Several versions are still in use and it has become the world's most reliable space launcher. Although American rocket pioneer Robert H. Goddard developed, patented, and flew small liquid-propellant rockets as early as 1914, the United States

5757-602: The bold dream of Konstantin Tsiolkovsky will be realized within the next 10 to 15 years." From March 1952 to April 1954, the US Collier's magazine reacted with a series of seven articles Man Will Conquer Space Soon! detailing Wernher von Braun 's plans for crewed spaceflight. In March 1955, Disneyland's animated episode " Man in Space " in the US television with an audience of about 40 million people eventually fired

5858-527: The book Cold War Space Sleuths (Springer-Praxis 2013): "The USSR was famously described by Winston Churchill as 'a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma' and nothing signified this more than the search for the truth behind its space program during the Cold War. Although the Space Race was literally played out above our heads, it was often obscured by a figurative 'space curtain' that took much effort to see through". Initially, President Eisenhower

5959-515: The capsule was just large enough for a single astronaut. The first suborbital spacecraft weighed 3,000 pounds (1,400 kg); the heaviest, Mercury-Atlas 9, weighed 3,000 pounds (1,400 kg) fully loaded. On reentry, the astronaut would stay in the craft through splashdown by parachute in the Atlantic Ocean. On May 5, 1961, Alan Shepard became the first American in space, launching in a ballistic trajectory on Mercury-Redstone 3 , in

6060-545: The captured V-2s and began a program of launching them and instructing American engineers in their operation. These tests led to the first photos of Earth from space , and the first two-stage rocket, the WAC Corporal - V-2 combination, in 1949. The German rocket team was moved from Fort Bliss to the Army's new Redstone Arsenal , located in Huntsville, Alabama , in 1950. From here, von Braun and his team developed

6161-612: The coast, particularly with the ocean to the east, to leverage the Earth's rotation and increase the specific impulse of launches. Space programs such as Soviet space program or the French space program without this luxury may utilize facilities outside of their main territory such as the Baikonur Cosmodrome or Guiana Space Centre to launch for them. This orientation also allows for safe trajectory paths, minimizing risks to populated areas during ascent. Each launch site

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6262-518: The development of larger ballistic missiles such as Wernher von Braun 's Aggregat-4 (A-4) , which became known as the Vergeltungswaffe 2 (V-2) developed by Nazi Germany to bomb the Allies in the war. After the war, both the US and USSR acquired custody of German rocket development assets which they used to leverage the development of their own missiles. Public interest in space flight

6363-437: The engine system and propellant. After reentry, the cosmonaut would eject at about 7,000 meters (23,000 ft) over the USSR and descend via parachute, while the capsule would land separately, because the descent module made an extremely rough landing that could have left a cosmonaut seriously injured. The "Vostok spaceship" was first displayed at the July 1961 Tushino air show , mounted on its launch vehicle's third stage, with

6464-609: The far side of the moon. In late 1966, Luna 13 became the third spacecraft to make a soft-landing on the Moon, with the American Surveyor 1 having now taken second. Later on, to aid the Apollo missions, the Surveyor program was conducted by NASA, with five successful soft landings out of seven attempts from 1966 to 1968. The Lunar Orbiter program had five successes out of five attempts in 1966–1967. The US and

6565-553: The favourable data of the Soviet launcher was based on concepts proposed by the German rocket scientists headed by Helmut Gröttrup on Gorodomlya Island , such as, among other things, the rigorous weight saving, the control of the residual fuel quantities and a reduced thrust to weight relation of 1.4 instead of usual factor 2. The CIA had heard about such details already in January 1954 when it interrogated Göttrup after his return from

6666-403: The go-ahead to launch their Jupiter-C rocket as soon as they could. In Britain, the US's Western Cold War ally, the reaction was mixed: some celebrated the fact that the Soviets had reached space first, while others feared the destructive potential that military uses of spacecraft might bring. The Daily Express predicted that the US would catch up to and pass the USSR in space; "never doubt for

6767-421: The launch sequence ( countdown ), as the vehicle awaits liftoff. This becomes particularly important as complex sequences may be interrupted by planned or unplanned holds to fix problems. Most rockets need to be supported and held down for a few seconds after ignition while the engines build up to full thrust . The vehicle is commonly held on the pad by hold-down arms or explosive bolts , which are triggered when

6868-423: The launcher is held down and not released for flight until all propulsion and vehicle systems are confirmed to be operating normally. Similar hold-down systems have been used on launch vehicles such as Saturn V and Space Shuttle . An automatic safe shut-down and unloading of propellant occur if any abnormal conditions are detected. Prior to the launch date, SpaceX sometimes completes a test cycle, culminating in

6969-421: The maximum admissible overall sound power level (OASPL) for payload integrity is approximately 145 db. Sound is dissipated by huge volumes of water distributed across the launch pad and launch platform during liftoff. Water-based acoustic suppression systems are common on launch pads. They aid in reducing acoustic energy by injecting large quantities of water below the launch pad into the exhaust plume and in

7070-468: The mission to justify the death of the dog...". On August 19, 1960, the dogs Belka and Strelka were sent into orbit aboard Sputnik 5 and safely returned. The Americans sent the chimpanzee Ham on a suborbital flight of the Mercury capsule on Mercury-Redstone 2 and recovered him safely on January 31, 1961. The chimpanzee Enos was launched on Mercury-Atlas 5 on November 29, 1961, into what

7171-424: The nose cone in place concealing the spherical capsule. A tail section with eight fins was added in an apparent attempt to confuse western observers. This also appeared on official commemorative stamps and a documentary. The Soviets finally revealed the true appearance of their Vostok capsule at the April 1965 Moscow Economic Exhibition. On April 12, 1961, the USSR surprised the world by launching Yuri Gagarin into

7272-621: The project. A-4s were assembled and studied and the experience derived from assembling and launching A4 rockets was directly applied to the Soviet copy, called the R-1 , with NII-88 chief designer Sergei Korolev overseeing the R-1's development., The R-1 entered into service in the Soviet Army on 28 November 1950. By the latter half of 1946, Korolev and rocket engineer Valentin Glushko had, with extensive input from German engineers, outlined

7373-486: The proposed US satellites, having a weight of 1,400 kilograms (3,100 lb), of which 300 kilograms (660 lb) would be composed of scientific instruments that would photograph the Earth, take readings on radiation levels, and check on the planet's magnetic field. However, things were not going along well with the design and manufacturing of the satellite, so in February 1957, Korolev sought and received permission from

7474-534: The public enthusiasm for space travel and raised government interest, both in the US and USSR. Soon after the end of World War II, the two former allies became engaged in a state of political conflict and military tension known as the Cold War (1947–1991), which polarized Europe between the Soviet Union's satellite states (often referred to as the Eastern Bloc ) and the states of the Western world allied with

7575-481: The size or shape of their rockets or cabins or most of their spaceships, except for the first Sputniks, lunar probes, and Venus probe. The Soviet military maintained control over the space program; Korolev's OKB-1 design bureau was subordinated under the Ministry of General Machine Building , tasked with the development of intercontinental ballistic missiles, and continued to give its assets random identifiers into

7676-725: The stage was set for nationalistic competition. On July 29, 1955, James C. Hagerty , President Dwight D. Eisenhower 's press secretary, announced that the United States intended to launch "small Earth circling satellites" between July 1, 1957, and December 31, 1958, as part of the US contribution to the International Geophysical Year (IGY). On August 2, at the Sixth Congress of the International Astronautical Federation in Copenhagen, scientist Leonid I. Sedov told international reporters at

7777-511: The technology to return Laika safely to Earth, and the government reported Laika died when the oxygen ran out, but in October 2002 her true cause of death was reported as stress and overheating on the fourth orbit due to failure of the air conditioning system. At a Moscow press conference in 1998 Oleg Gazenko , a senior Soviet scientist involved in the project, stated "The more time passes, the more I'm sorry about it. We did not learn enough from

7878-483: The test equipment and radio gear that was present in the previous launches. It arrived at the Soviet missile base Tyura-Tam in September and was prepared for its mission at launch site number one . The first launch took place on Friday, October 4, 1957, at exactly 10:28:34 pm Moscow time, with the R-7 and the now named Sputnik 1 satellite lifting off the launch pad and placing the artificial "moon" into an orbit

7979-479: The time of the NACA. It consisted of a conical capsule with a cylindrical pack of three solid-fuel retro-rockets strapped over a beryllium or fiberglass heat shield on the blunt end. Base diameter at the blunt end was 6.0 feet (1.8 m) and length was 10.8 feet (3.3 m); with the launch escape system added, the overall length was 25.9 feet (7.9 m). With 100 cubic feet (2.8 m ) of habitable volume,

8080-399: The tower and the craft are severed, and the bridges over which these connections pass often quickly swing away to prevent damage to the structure or vehicle. A flame deflector, flame diverter or flame trench is a structure or device designed to redirect or disperse the flame, heat, and exhaust gases produced by rocket engines or other propulsion systems. The amount of thrust generated by

8181-435: The two craft a controlled distance apart. Vostok 4 also set a record of nearly four days in space. The first woman, Valentina Tereshkova , was launched into space on Vostok 6 on June 16, 1963, as (possibly) a medical experiment. She was the only one to fly of a small group of female parachutist factory workers (unlike the male cosmonauts who were military test pilots), chosen by the head of cosmonaut training because he read

8282-489: The two nations following World War II and had its peak with the more particular Moon Race to land on the Moon between the US moonshot and Soviet moonshot programs. The technological advantage demonstrated by spaceflight achievement was seen as necessary for national security and became part of the symbolism and ideology of the time. The Space Race brought pioneering launches of artificial satellites , robotic space probes to

8383-430: The vehicle is stable and ready to fly, at which point all umbilical connections with the pad are released. Precursors to modern rocketry, such as fireworks and rocket launchers, did not generally require dedicated launch pads. This was due in part to their relatively portable size, as well as the sufficiency of their casings in sustaining stresses. One of the first pads for a liquid-fueled rocket, what would later be named

8484-445: The warhead's mass was increased to 5.5 to 6 tons to accommodate the then planned theromonuclear bomb . The R-7 was designed in a two-stage configuration, with four boosters that would jettison when empty. On the 21 August 1957 the R-7 flew 6,000 km (3,700 mi), and became the worlds's first intercontinental ballistic missile. Two months later the R-7 launched Sputnik 1 , the first artificial satellite, into orbit, and became

8585-492: Was a monumental failure, exploding a few seconds after launch, and it became an international joke. The satellite appeared in newspapers under the names Flopnik, Stayputnik, Kaputnik, and Dudnik. In the United Nations, the Soviet delegate offered the US representative aid "under the Soviet program of technical assistance to backwards nations." Only in the wake of this very public failure did von Braun's Redstone team get

8686-442: Was a satellite mission that failed, expedited plans to get his own satellite in orbit. Since the R-7 was substantially more powerful than any of the US launch vehicles , he made sure to take full advantage of this capability by designing Object D as his primary satellite. It was given the designation 'D', to distinguish it from other R-7 payload designations 'A', 'B', 'V', and 'G' which were nuclear weapon payloads. Object D dwarfed

8787-460: Was able to transmit detailed photography of the surface from orbit. Luna 10, 12, and Luna 14 conducted Gamma ray spectrometry of the Moon, among other tests. The Zond programme was orchestrated alongside the Luna programme with Zond 1 and Zond 2 launching in 1964, intended as flyby missions, however both failed. Zond 3 however was successful, and transmitted high quality photography from

8888-662: Was an exact replica to Kummersdorf's large test stand. It was this site which saw the development of the V-2 rocket . Test Stand VII was the principle testing facility at the Peenemünde Airfield and was capable of static firing rocket motors with up to 200 tons of thrust. Launch pads would increase in complexity over the following decades throughout and following the Space Race . Where large volumes of exhaust gases are expelled during engine testing or vehicle launch,

8989-683: Was carried out in the 1930s by the Group for the Study of Reactive Motion (GIRD), where Soviet rocket pioneers Sergey Korolev , Friedrich Zander , Mikhail Tikhonravov and Leonid Dushkin launched GIRD-X , the first Soviet liquid-fueled rocket in 1933. In 1933 the two design bureaus were combined into the Reactive Scientific Research Institute and produced the RP-318, the USSR's first rocket-powered aircraft and

9090-593: Was developed to prevent rust on the Atlas rockets so that rust protecting paint could be avoided, in order to further reduce weight. A later variant of the Atlas, the Atlas-D , served as a nuclear ICBM and as the orbital launch vehicle for Project Mercury and the remote-controlled Agena Target Vehicle used in Project Gemini . In 1955, with both the United States and the Soviet Union building ballistic missiles that could be used to launch objects into space,

9191-425: Was first aroused in October 1951 when the Soviet rocketry engineer Mikhail Tikhonravov published "Flight to the Moon" in the newspaper Pionerskaya pravda for young readers. He described a two-person interplanetary spaceship of the future and the industrial and technological processes required to create it. He ended the short article with a clear forecast of the future: "We do not have long to wait. We can assume that

9292-482: Was in 1921 when the Soviet military sanctioned the Gas Dynamics Laboratory , a small research laboratory to explore solid-fuel rockets, led by Nikolai Tikhomirov , who had begun studying solid and liquid-fueled rockets in 1894, and obtained a patent in 1915 for "self-propelled aerial and water-surface mines. The first test-firing of a solid fuel rocket was carried out in 1928. Further development

9393-550: Was injured. A propellant fuel tank exploded, while experimenting with mixing 90% hydrogen peroxide and alcohol, before combustion. In May 1937, Dornberger, and most of his staff, moved to the Peenemünde Army Research Center on the island of Usedom on the Baltic coast which offered much greater space and secrecy. Dr. Thiel and his staff followed in the summer of 1940. Test Stand VI at Pennemünde

9494-642: Was launched with the intention of orbiting the Moon only to result in a partial mission success when it reached an apogee of 113,800 km before falling back to Earth. The missions of Pioneer 2 and Pioneer 3 failed whereas Pioneer 4 had one partially successful lunar flyby in March 1959. The Ranger program was started in 1959 by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory . The Block I Ranger 1 and Ranger 2 suffered Atlas-Agena launch failures in August and November 1961. The 727-pound (330 kg) Block II Ranger 3 launched successfully on January 26, 1962, but missed

9595-399: Was launched. However, the public release is illuminating in what it does reveal: "there is an abundance of arcane scientific and technical data... as if to overwhelm the reader with mathematics in the absence of even a picture of the object". The Soviet space program's use of secrecy served as both a tool to prevent the leaking of classified information between countries, and also to create

9696-426: Was not allowed to put a satellite into orbit with their Jupiter-C rocket, because of its intended use as a future military vehicle. On September 20, 1956, von Braun and his team did launch a Jupiter-C that was capable of putting a satellite into orbit, but the launch was used only as a suborbital test of reentry vehicle technology. Korolev received word about von Braun's 1956 Jupiter-C test and, mistakenly thinking it

9797-427: Was on its way to completing its first orbit. About 95 minutes after launch, the satellite flew over its launch site, and its radio signals were picked up by the engineers and military personnel at Tyura-Tam: that's when Korolev and his team celebrated the first successful artificial satellite placed into Earth-orbit. At the latest, the successful start of Sputnik 2 with its weight of more than 500 kg proved that

9898-673: Was permitted after a request for funding in 1930 to move from farms to the Berlin rocket launching site ( German : Raketenflugplatz Berlin ), a repurposed ammunition dump. A test stand was built for liquid-propellant rockets in Kummersdorf in 1932, where the early designs from the Aggregat series of ballistic missiles were afterwards developed. This site was also the location of the first casualties in rocket development, when Dr. Wahmke and 2 assistants were killed, and another assistant

9999-405: Was supposed to be a three-orbit flight. However, the mission was aborted after two orbits due to capsule overheating, and a malfunctioning "avoidance conditioning" test subjecting him to 76 electrical shocks. The Soviets designed their first human space capsule using the same spacecraft bus as their Zenit spy satellite , forcing them to keep the details and true appearance secret until after

10100-547: Was the only one of the three major allied World War II powers to not have its own rocket program, until Von Braun and his engineers were expatriated from Nazi Germany in 1945. The US acquired a large number of V-2 rockets and recruited von Braun and most of his engineering team in Operation Paperclip . The team was sent to the Army's White Sands Proving Ground in New Mexico, in 1945. They set about assembling

10201-475: Was worried that a satellite passing above a nation at over 100 kilometers (62 mi) might be seen as violating that nation's airspace. He was concerned that the Soviet Union would accuse the Americans of an illegal overflight, thereby scoring a propaganda victory at his expense. Eisenhower and his advisors were of the opinion that a nation's airspace sovereignty did not extend past the Kármán line , and they used

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