The Space Race

From 1957 to 1975, the Cold War between the Soviet Union (USSR) and the United States (US) focused on space exploration, which was necessary for national security and a symbol of technological and ideological superiority.

Time Magazine

National Geographic

The Space Race involved pioneering eorts to launch articial satellites, suborbital and orbital human spaceight around the Earth, and piloted voyages to the Moon. It eectively began with the Soviet launch of the Sputnik 1 articial satellite on October 4, 1957, and concluded with the co-operative Apollo-Soyuz Test Project human spaceight mission in July 1975. The ApolloSoyuz Test Project came to symbolize a partial easing of strained relations between the USSR and the US. The Space Race had its origins in the missile-based arms race that occurred just after the end of the World War II, when both the Soviet Union and the United States captured advanced German rocket technology and perSputnik 1 sonnel. 1

The Space Race increased investments on education and pure research, which led to benecial spin-o technologies. An unforeseen eect was that the Space Race contributed to the birth of the environmental movement; the rst color pictures of Earth taken from deep space were used as icons by the movement to imply that the planet was a fragile blue marble surrounded by the blackness of space. Some famous probes and missions include Sputnik 1, Explorer 1, Vostok 1, Mariner 2, Ranger 7, Luna 9, Alouette 1, Apollo 8, and Apollo 11. The rst human to journey into outer space was Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin, when his Vostok spacecraft completed an orbit of the Earth on 12 April 1961. Gagarin became an international celebrity, and was awarded many medals and titles, including Hero of the Soviet Union, the nations highest honour.

Vostok Yuri Gagarin Apollo 11 was the spaceight that landed the rst humans on the Moon, Americans Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, on July 20, 1969. Armstrong became the rst to step onto the lunar surface six hours later on July 21. Armstrong spent about two and a half hours outside the spacecraft, Aldrin slightly less, and together they collected 47.5 pounds (21.5 kg) of lunar material for return to Earth.

Neil Armostrong Lunar Module Launched by a Saturn V rocket from Kennedy Space Center in Merritt Island, Florida, on July 16, Apollo 11 was the fth manned mission of NASAs Apollo program. The Apollo spacecraft had three parts: a Command Module (CM) with a cabin for the three astronauts, and the only part that landed back on Earth; a Service Module (SM), which supported the Command Module with propulsion, electrical power, oxygen, and water; and a Lunar Module (LM) for landing on the Moon. After being sent toward the Moon by the Saturn Vs upper stage, the astronauts separated the spacecraft from it and traveled for three days until they entered into lunar orbit. Broadcast on live TV to a world-wide audience, Armstrong stepped onto the lunar surface and described the event as one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind. Apollo 11 eectively ended the Space Race and fullled a national goal proposed in 1961 by the late US President John F. Kennedy in a speech before the United States Congress, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth.