Jan. 14
1960:
U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower reassigns the Army Ballistic Missile Agency’s Development Operations Division, headed by Wernher von Braun, to NASA.
1966:
The Soviet Union’s chief designer, SergeiKorolev, dies from complications stemming from routine surgery, leaving the Soviet space program without its most influential leader of the preceding 20 years.
1996:
Koreasat 2 launches on a Delta 2 rocket from Cape Canaveral, Fla. Identical to Koreasat
1,
the satellite was designed to provide direct broadcasting and fixed-station telecommunications across the Korean peninsula.
2004:
U.S. President George W. Bush announces
the Vision for Space Exploration, which
moves missions to the Moon and Mars to the top of
NASA’s priorities list.
Jan. 16
1958:
The Joint Congressional Committee on Atomic Energy creates
the Special Subcommittee on Outer Space Propulsion, chaired by Sen.
Clinton Anderson (D-N.M.).
2003:
The Space Shuttle Columbia, STS-107, launches from Kennedy Space Center, Fla., carrying aboard
the first Israeli astronaut, Ilan Ramon, to fly into space. Columbia disintegrated Feb. 1 upon re-entry, killing its entire seven-astronaut crew.
Jan. 19
1961:
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory awards a
contract
to Hughes Aircraft Co. to build seven Surveyor spacecraft. The Surveyor spacecraft were designed to
soft land
on the Moon and
take observations of the lunar surface.
1965:
Gemini 2 launches from Kennedy Space Center, Fla., on a Titan 2 launch vehicle. It was the second unmanned test launch for NASA’s first multi-crew orbiter.
2006:
NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft launches on an Atlas 5 from Cape Canaveral, Fla. The spacecraft is slated to fly past Pluto and its moon Charon in July 2015.
Jan. 20
1961:
NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center awards contracts to develop a paraglider recovery system for the Saturn rocket to North American Aviation and Ryan Aeronautical.
