1908:
Wilbur and Orville Wright make the first successful powered flight of a heavier-than-air vehicle, according to the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum Web site. The brothers made four flights that day – the best of which reached nearly 260 meters for 59 seconds – with their self-built Wright Flyer in Kitty Hawk, N.C.
Dec. 19
2003:
The U.K.-built Beagle 2 Mars rover separates from its European Space Agency Mars Express mothership. Communication was lost as it descended toward the red planet.
Dec. 21
1968:
Apollo 8 launches aboard a Saturn 5 rocket from Kennedy Space Center, Fla., into lunar orbit. Astronauts Frank Borman, James Lovell
and William Anders took high-resolution photographs of possible landing sites for Apollo 11 as they flew about 112 kilometers above the lunar surface.
Dec. 24
1979:
The French Space Agency, CNES, and the European Space Agency launches the French-built Ariane 1 rocket from Kourou, French Guiana. It was the first of four test launches for the Ariane 1, a heavy-lift, three-stage launch vehicle capable of lofting almost
1 metric ton into geostationary transfer orbit, the CNES Web site said.
Dec. 29
2002:
The People’s Republic of China launches its Shenzhou 4 from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center on a Long March 2 rocket into Earth orbit. The unmanned capsule was China’s last test of the Shenzhou capsule before
launching its first manned capsule into orbit October 2003.
Jan. 3
1999:
NASA launches the Mars Polar Lander on a Delta 2 rocket from Cape Canaveral, Fla., to search for near-surface ice water. Contact was lost, however, when a software problem shut down the spacecraft’s thrusters prematurely and
the lander crashed into the Mars surface.
Jan. 4
2004:
The Mars Exploration Rover Spirit lands on the red planet after being launched aboard a Delta 2 rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla., June 5, 2003. Spirit and its later-arriving twin rover, Opportunity, continue to comb Mars, long past their expected 90-day duration.
Jan. 5
1972:
U.S. President Richard Nixon announces that NASA is developing a reusable launch vehicle:
the space shuttle.