Space Race: USA vs. USSR

Main events

- Space race began when the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the first artificial satellite to orbit around Earth, on October 4th, 1957.

- The US did not want to fall behind so US Navy launched Vanguard TV3, in attempt to launch their first satellite in orbit three months later. After rising a couple of feet, the space craft crashed violently onto the launchpad at Cape Canaveral, Florida. This was a huge international embarrassment

- In January 1958, the United States its own satellite, Explorer 1, under the direction of German rocket scientist Wernher von Braun

What was the Space Race ?

A competition between the two superpowers at the time, USSR and United States, to explore outer space with the use of satellites and man made spacecrafts. This was during the Cold War, a time of high political and military tension between these two countries to prove their superiority.

Bibliography

http://www.nationalcoldwarexhibition.org/schools-colleges/national-curriculum/space-race/

http://www.history.com/topics/space-race

http://hy4104coldwararmsrace.blogspot.com/2010/03/important-people-related-to-arms-and.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Race

Main Events

http://ed.ted.com/lessons/what-was-the-point-of-the-space-race-jeff-steers

- In the same year, President Dwight Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act (NASA) and insisted that the space program should be a non-military operation

- The Soviet Union were first again in hit-landing Luna 2, a space probe, on the moon. Later that year, Luna 3

- In April 1961, the Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first person to orbit Earth, traveling in the capsule-like spacecraft Vostok 1

- Under Project Mercury, astronaut Alan Shepard became the first American in space in May of 1961 and John Glenn was the first American in orbit in 1962

- President John F. Kennedy made the bold, public claim that the U.S. would land a man on the moon before the end of the decade in 1962

Important People

- Wernher Von Braun was one of the leading figures in the development of rocket technology. He was most notably known for his achievement in creating the Saturn V booster rocket that helped land Neil Armstrong and his team on the Moon.

- Sergei Korolev was was a rocket scientist, and like Van Braun, was significant in Russia’s foundation of space program. Korolev took part in the designing of the rocket of Sputnik I, and the rocket became the most wide used rocket in the world

- John F. Kennedy the president of the US from 1961-1963 was very enthusiastic and the one who set the goal of placing men on the moon within

- Richard Nixon the 37th President of the US made to approve the first joint US-USSR space program

Space Race: USA vs. USSR

1957-1975

Main Events

- Project Apollo ran from 1961 to 1972 and was originally designed to carry out a series of manned missions which would orbit the Earth but ultimately changed to to get a man to the moon

- They succeeded after many tragedies and obstacles, on on July 21st on 1961 Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first men to set foot on the Moon.

- The Space race ended with joint Apollo-Soyuz mission which sent three U.S. astronauts into space aboard an Apollo spacecraft that docked in orbit with a Soviet-made Soyuz vehicle. When the commanders of the two crafts officially greeted each other, their “handshake in space” served to symbolize the gradual improvement of U.S.-Soviet relations