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Space Race History

Decent Essays

On october 4, 1957, in the midst of the cold war, the soviet union launched Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite to be sent into orbit sparking the space race, as well as marking the beginning of the space age(Gaber).The space race was a competition between the two biggest rivals in the world, the United States and the Soviet Union. During the space race, the United States and the Soviet Union competed to conquer space exploration. The soviet union ran two main mission Sputnik and Luna and the United State had three, Mercury, Gemini and Apollo.The space race brought on many scientific discoveries. From 1947 to 1991, the United States and the Soviet Union fought in a war of ideas know as the Cold War. The cold war started after World …show more content…

Once it was stated that a satellite should be launch during the International Geophysical Year both the United States and the Soviet Union worked to build a starlight with out telling each other. In July 1955, the white house announced plans to launch Earth orbiting satellite. When the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, it was such a technological advancement that it caught the United states of guard. The launch of sputnik made the United States fear that due to the Soviet Union’s ability to launch the satellite transferred directly to their ability to launch missiles that could go all the way from Europe to America. After the launch of Sputnik I the United States defence department approved funding to build a different satellite as well as start a space program known as NASA. The United States defence department appointed Wernher Von Braun to work on the new satellite and he named the project the Explorer project(Gaber). On January 31, 1985, Explorer I was secretary launched. Once the launch was a success president Eisenhower made a radio announcement about it. On …show more content…

Early in 1959, Luna I made a trip past the moon, and on September 14,1959, Luna II crashed on the moon. Luna II was truly the first actual visit by spacecraft to another object in space (McArthur, 29-30). The United States started the Apollo mission with the goals of reaching the moon and sending people to land on the moon safely. The Apollo missions go off to a rough start when on January 27, 1967, Apollo I caught on fire during the preflight test. Apollo II-VI where unmanned moon orbiter space crafts. Apollo VII was launched on October 11, 1968, and had three peope on board.It was in spaced for a little bit less than 11 days and in that time it orbted the moon colecting data. Apollo VIII was launched on December 21, 1968 and was in space over christmas and on christma eve they made a telecast were the astronauts red verses from the bible. On Apollo VII they also made five other telecasts. Apollo IX was launched on March 3, 1969, and collected more data on the moon and experimented with photography. Apollo X was launched May 18, 1969 and while in orbit tracked the moon's main landmarks. On July 16,1969, Apollo 11 blasted into space with Neil Armstrong, Edwin Aldrin, and Michael Collins (Loff). When it came time to attempt to and on the moon mission control tried to guide Apollo 11 somewhere Armstrong fet was too risky so he took over and went to land somewhere

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