Scroll down to view all space missions that took place between 1960 and 1964 or select another time period from the table below.
| 1955 - 1959 | 1960 - 1964 | 1965 - 1969 | 1970 - 1974 | 1975 - 1979 | 1980 - 1984 |
| 1985 - 1989 | 1990 - 1994 | 1995 - 1999 | 2000 - 2004 | 2005 - PRESENT | FUTURE |
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During the early sixties, America and the Soviet Union sent rockets in all directions to achieve several space firsts, not just to get to the Moon but to get to Mars and Venus too. Manned space exploration began as both countries sent astronauts and cosmonauts into orbit. |
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| LAUNCH DATE | NAME | DESTINATION | COUNTRY | MISSION DETAILS | MAIN ACHIEVEMENT | CURRENT STATUS | |
| 1st April 1960 | Tiros-1 | Earth (satellite) | USA |
Weather satellite containing television cameras sending back views of clouds above Earth. It only worked for 78 days, but demonstrated that satellites could be used to observe and monitor the weather from space. | First weather satellite | Operated for 78 days | |
10th October 1960 |
Marsnik 1 (also called Mars 1960A) | Mars (possible flyby) | USSR |
The first attempt to visit another planet in the Solar System was made by the Soviets. The mission was apparently designed to explore the space in between Mars and Earth, complete a flyby of Mars and send back images. However, at an altitude of 120km, the thrusters failed and the spacecraft re-entered Earth's atmosphere. There is some debate about whether this actually was a mission to go to Mars, with some Soviet scientists claiming that Marsnik 2 (below) was their first attempt! | First attempt to reach another planet. Or was it? | Launch failure | |
| 14th October 1960 | Marsnik 2 (also called Mars 1960B) | Mars (flyby) | USSR |
This mission was either the first or second attempt to send a spacecraft to Mars (depending on whether Marsnik 1 above was actually designed to go there). It failed to achieve Earth orbit because of a thrust failure and re-entered Earth's atmosphere after reaching an altitude of 120km. | 2nd attempt to reach another planet. Or was it the first??. | Launch failure | |
| 1961 | Sputnik 7 | Venus (flyby) | USSR |
First attempt to launch a probe to Venus. Sputnik 7 successfully entered Earth orbit, but the Venera probe which was to be released from Sputnik 7 failed to ignite. | First attempt to send a manmade object to Venus.. | Now In Earth orbit | |
| 12th February 1961 | Venera 1 (Venus 1) | Venus (flyby) | USSR |
First space craft to be sent to another planet. Information was sent back from the probe on 19th February 1961 but nothing was heard from it afterwards. The probe travelled to Venus and came within 100,000 km of the planet at about 19th/20th May 1961. However, because its onboard systems weren't working, it couldn't tell Earth it was there! | First manmade object to get to another planet. | Last communication from Venera 1 was on 19th February 1961. The Jodrell bank telescope in Britain may have picked up weak signals from it in June 1961. Mariner 1 is now in orbit around the Sun. | |
| 12th April 1961 | Vostok 1 | Earth (manned orbiter) | USSR |
The first man in space, Yuri Gagarin, was taken into orbit by Vostok 1. He made one complete orbit around Earth before returning, spending 108 minutes in space. | First man in space | Yuri Gagarin will always be remembered as the first man in space. He died on 27th March 1968 in a flying accident. | |
| 5th May 1961 | Mercury-Redstone 3 | Earth (manned orbiter) | USA
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Alan Shepard became the first American to be taken into space onboard Mercury. Unlike his Soviet predecessor Yuri Gagarin who had entered orbit less than a month earlier and spent almost two hours in orbit, Shepard's mission lasted 15 minutes, during which Shepard experienced only 5 minutes of weightlessness. Twenty days after this mission, President Kennedy famously addressed congress requesting funding to send an American to the Moon. | First American in space | The Mercury missions were intended to test human space flight and ended in 1963 when they were succeeded by Gemini and then Apollo. Alan Shepard returned to space on Apollo 14 and became the fifth man to walk on the Moon. He died on 21st July 1998. | |
| 26th January 1962 | Ranger 3 | Moon (lander) | USA |
Space craft designed to fly to the Moon and send back television images of the Moon for 10 minutes before crashing into its surface. As it was going too fast and had its course changed incorrectly, the craft missed the Moon by 36,800 km on 28th January, sending back no useful TV images (but provided information about interplanetary gamma-ray flux, whatever that is!). | First American attempt to impact the Moon. | Failed to impact the Moon or send back useful television images. Now inactive but in orbit around the Sun. | |
| 20th February 1962 | Mercury-Atlas 6 | Earth (manned orbiter) | USA |
John Glenn became the first American to enter orbit around Earth. Whereas Shepard had remained in a sub-orbital position during his mission, Glenn actually entered orbit and completed 3 orbits of Earth before returning. | First American in Earth orbit. | John Glenn is the oldest living person to have flown in space when he flew aboard Space Shuttle Discovery in 1998 aged 77. | |
| 23rd April 1962 | Ranger 4 | Moon (lander) | USA |
Similar to Ranger 3, Ranger 4 was designed to go to the Moon and send back television images for 10 minutes before crashing into its surface. Power would have been supplied by the Sun through solar panels but these failed to be extended. The craft's instruments ceased operating 10 hours into its mission. However, Ranger 4 did impact the Moon on its far side (the side that is never visible from Earth) but no scientific information was provided. | First American Lunar impact | Although its instruments weren't operating, Ranger 4 crashed onto the surface of the Moon on 26th April 1962 at 15.30° S, 130.42° W. | |
| 10th July 1962 | Telstar 1 | Earth (communications satellite) | USA, UK, France
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Telstar was the first transatlantic communications satellite. It was launched from Cape Canaveral in Florida, USA. It was used to carry telephone calls and radio and television signals across the Atlantic and successfully transmitted the first television signals from the USA to Great Britain and France. The satellite was developed by Bell Telephone Laboratories for AT&T with the cooperation of the British General Post Office and the French National Post, Telegraph and Telecom Office. Television signals sent from America were received at Goonhilly Downs Earth station in Cornwall, England, where they were transmitted by the BBC. Telstar paved the way for international communication, meaning that events like the Olympic Games, the World Cup, the Superbowl, international news events and global concerts could be broadcast across the planet. Since Telstar 1, there have been many more Telstar launches, many of which still carry television and radio broadcasts today. Goonhilly Downs in Cornwall which received the first transmission is now the world's largest satellite station and the satellite that received that first transmission is still active today! | First transatlantic television transmission. | Telstar 1 went out of service in December 1962 after being overwhelmed by radiation. It was successfully restarted in January 1963 but went out of service again on 21st February. It is believed to remain in orbit around Earth. | |
| 22nd July 1962 | Mariner 1 | Venus (flyby) | USA |
First American attempt to launch a probe to Venus, intending it to fly by the planet. A problem at launch meant the rocket veered off course and the instruction to destruct the rocket had to be given by the Range Safety Officer. | First US attempt to go to Venus | Spacecraft was remotely destructed shortly after launch. | |
| 27th August 1962 | Mariner 2 | Venus (flyby) | USA
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Second American attempt to reach Venus. The spacecraft reached the planet and successfully completed a flyby, sending back data about Venus' atmosphere. | First successful mission to Venus | Last communication from Mariner 2 was 3rd January 1963. Mariner 2 is now in orbit around the Sun. | |
| 18th October 1962 | Ranger 5 | Moon (lander) | USA
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Like Ranger 3 and 4, Ranger 5 should have gone to the Moon to send back television images of it for 10 minutes before crashing into its surface. Ranger 3 missed the Moon. Ranger 4 hit the Moon but had ceased operating over 50 hours earlier. Ranger 5 both missed the Moon and ceased operating too early! The craft's instruments should have operated by solar power at a certain point in its mission, but a fault caused the power to come from the craft's battery instead. This caused the battery to deplete and all instruments to switch off. The craft went as close as 724 km from the Moon on 21st October but sent back no information. | . | Ranger 5 missed the Moon and entered an orbit around the Sun. | |
| 24th October 1962 | Sputnik 22 (also called Mars 1962A) | Mars (flyby) | USSR |
This should have been a mission to fly past Mars, but actually nearly started a nuclear war! The spacecraft broke up when trying to get into Earth orbit or during its burn to enter its trajectory to Mars. The debris from the spacecraft remained in orbit around Earth. Because this was during the Cuban Missile Crisis, an Early Warning system in Alaska detected the debris and it was feared that it was the start of a Soviet nuclear attack. | Could have started a war! | Broke up after launch. | |
| 1st November 1962 | Mars 1 | Mars (flyby) | USSR |
Originally intended to fly by Mars and send back data and information, a leak in one of the valves controlling the probe's orientation system meant that it didn't quite make it. It sent back information at first every 2 days, and then every 5 days. On 21st March 1963, at a distance of 106,760,000 km from Earth, communications stopped. Information about small meteorite impacts, radiation around Earth and the solar wind was provided. The Spacecraft actually came as close as 193,000 km to Mars in June 1963. | Sent back a large amount of information about the interplanetary space between Earth and Mars. | Contact lost in 1963. Now In an orbit around the Sun, between Mars and Jupiter. | |
| 2nd April 1963 | Luna 4 (Lunik 4) | Moon (flyby, intended lander) | USSR |
Luna 4 was sent to the Moon and completed a flyby of it on 5th April 1963. However, it is thought that Luna 4 should have landed on the surface of the Moon but missed its target. A programme scheduled to have been broadcast on Radio Moscow on 5th April called "Hitting the Moon" was cancelled since Luna 4 didn't actually hit the Moon! | . | Inactive but in orbit around Earth. | |
| 16th June 1963 | Vostok 5 | Earth (manned orbiter) | USSR |
Soviet cosmonaut Valentina Vladimirovna Tereshkova became the first woman to enter space when she took off from Earth on 16th June 1963. This achievement was another in a series of space firsts by the Soviet Union, although it took the Americans over twenty years to achieve the same goal when Sally K. Ride became the first American in space in 1984. Valentina Vladimirovna Tereshkova spent almost three days in space and completed 48 orbits around Earth. | First woman in space. | Vostok 5 returned to Earth on 19th June 1963. Valentina Vladimirovna Tereshkova never flew in space again after this mission. Her husband was another cosmonaut (Andrian Nikolayev) and their child (Elena Andrionovna) became the first to have parents that had both been into space. | |
| 30th January 1964 | Ranger 6 | Moon (lander) | USA
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Ranger 6 was the first of a new build of Ranger space crafts (Rangers 3, 4 and 5 all failed their missions). It was equipped with 6 television cameras to transmit high quality images of the Moon before impacting its surface. It did impact the surface at precisely the right time on 2nd February 1964, but the power supply for the cameras had short-circuited not long after launch so no images were sent back. | First American mission to successfully land as intended on the Moon. | Ranger 6 now lies inactive on the Moon on the eastern edge of Mare Tranquillitatis (Sea of Tranquillity) at 9.24° N, 21.30° east. | |
| 4th April 1964 | Zond 1 | Venus (lander) | USSR |
Soviet attempt to land on Venus and analyse the planets atmosphere as it descending through the clouds and surface rocks when it landed. It was even designed to survive if it landed in water on Venus! Communications failed by 14th May, the probe came within 100,000km of Venus on 14th July, never landing on the planet. | First attempt to land on Venus | Communications failed after 14th May, Zond 1 is now in orbit around the Sun. | |
| 28th July 1964 | Ranger 7 | Moon (lander) | USA |
Similar to Ranger 6, Ranger 7 was sent to the Moon to transmit images back to Earth using 6 television cameras before crashing into its surface. For 17 minutes before hitting the Moon, Ranger 7 sent back 4,308 images of the Moon's surface. It impacted the Moon on 31st July as planned. | Ranger 7 sent back the first American close-up images of the Moon. | Ranger 7 now lies inactive on the Moon at Mare Cognitum at 10.35° S, 339.42° E. | |
| 12th October 1964 | Voskhod 1 | Earth (manned orbiter) | USSR |
The first mission to fly more than one cosmonaut/astronaut into space. In fact, there were three cosmonauts involved in this mission. Added to that, they weren't wearing spacesuits. An aim of the mission was to test how people could work together in space, and was also another space first for the Soviet Union. | First non-solo manned space flight. First mission without space suits. | Returned to Earth after 1 day and 17 minutes. | |
| 5th November 1964 | Mariner 3 | Mars (flyby) |
USA
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This probe was sent to Mars to take measurements (it must have had a tape-measure on it!) and send back surface images. On its way, a protective shield failed to eject, so the solar panels which were used to collect energy for the spacecrafts batteries couldn't operate. The batteries ran out. If only they'd packed Durecell...... | First American attempt to go to Mars | In Solar orbit. | |
| 28th November 1964 | Mariner 4 | Mars (orbiter) |
USA |
Mariner 3's sister mission was much more successful than its predecessor. It reached Mars and sent back the first close up images of the planet, revealing a cratered and presumably geologically and biologically dead planet. In other words, no earthquakes, volcanoes or life. This slightly disappointed scientists who were hoping to find evidence of ancient alien civilisations. | First successful images of Mars. | Communications terminated on | |
| 30th November 1964 | Zond 2 | Mars (flyby) |
USSR |
Attempted flyby mission of Mars. Contained a camera to produce images of Mars. Communications were lost in March 1965. Zond 2 continued operating without one of its solar panels as it passed by Mars on 6th August 1965 | . | Communications terminated in March 1965, now floating around space. | |
| 1955 - 1959 | 1960 - 1964 | 1965 - 1969 | 1970 - 1974 | 1975 - 1979 | 1980 - 1984 |
| 1985 - 1989 | 1990 - 1994 | 1995 - 1999 | 2000 - 2004 | 2005 - PRESENT | FUTURE |
