NASA History Office
@NASAhistory
This is the NASA History Office's official X account. We're happy that you share our passion for aerospace history.
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May 18, 1969: Tom Stafford, John Young, and Gene Cernan begin the second crewed mission to the Moon.
Apollo 10 was the final critical test flight before Apollo 11's lunar landing, just 2 months later.
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Today would have been Dr. Roman’s 101st birthday! 🎉
We are honored to have @NASA’s next space telescope, launching later this year, named after such an inspiration who understood the importance of leaving Earth's atmosphere to better understand our universe.
Learn more:
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"Liftoff for the final launch of Endeavour!"
15 years ago today, Endeavour launched into space for its 25th and final time. STS-134, the penultimate mission of NASA's Space Shuttle program, delivered the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer-2 and critical supplies to the space station.
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America's first space station—and the last Saturn V—take flight! 🚀
Launched OTD in 1973, the main structure of Skylab—its Orbital Workshop—was built from a converted Saturn S-IVB rocket stage roughly 22.8 feet (6.7 m) in diameter.
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"Tower, this is Ghost Rider requesting a flyby."
During his service with the Navy, astronaut Scott "Scooter" Altman doubled for Tom Cruise and other actors in F-14 flight scenes for the original Top Gun movie, released 40 years ago this week!
Altman didn't just buzz the traffic control tower once, he did it nine times to get the right take for the movie!
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Wind tunnel testing? We’ve been at it for decades. 💁
Seen here in the ‘60s is an Apollo Command Module model being tested in our Unitary Plan Wind Tunnel.
Generations of air and spacecraft have had their critical safety checks here to ensure they’re ready to take to the skies to fly. Explore more:
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55 years ago, the Apollo 15 spacecraft was on the move.
The 363-foot-tall vehicle left the Vehicle Assembly Building on May 11, 1971, for its slow 8-hour trip to Pad 39A at @NASAKennedy. Apollo 15, the fourth Apollo lunar landing mission, was scheduled to lift off on July 26.
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Today we wish Vance Brand a very happy 95th birthday!
Selected as an astronaut 60 years ago, Brand's first spaceflight, the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, was followed by three shuttle missions and various administrative positions. He retired from NASA in 2008.
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A little love for our OG mom, Earth. 💙🌍 Happy Mother’s Day weekend.
At NASA’s Johnson Space Center, teams work every day to better understand and protect our home planet — a fitting reminder to celebrate the world that cares for us, and the mothers, caregivers, and communities who do the same.
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The new kid on the block takes flight
OTD in 1992, Space Shuttle Endeavour, the fifth and final operational orbiter to be built, was launched into space for its first mission: STS-49. Endeavour made 25 flights over 19 years, completing its final flight 15 years ago this month!
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Astronaut Neil Armstrong was forced to eject moments before the Lunar Landing Research Vehicle 1 (LLRV-1) crashed in a fiery blaze.
On May 6, 1968, Armstrong was five minutes into his 22nd flight of the LLRV when it suddenly went out of control. An investigation later revealed what had gone wrong, and a few months later training flights resumed with the LLRV's successor, the Lunar Landing Training Vehicle (LLTV).
Astronaut training in both the LLRV and the LLTV were essential to the success of the Apollo lunar landings.
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May 5, 1961: Freedom 7 soars into space with NASA astronaut Alan Shepard aboard—the United States’ first human spaceflight.
65 years later, this same pioneering spirit fuels the Artemis missions working to establish a long-term lunar presence.
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Do you see that tiny glowing streak?
That's the SpaceX Crew Dragon heading back to Earth in the early hours of May 2, 2021—5 years ago this week.
Astronauts on the International @Space_Station saw the Crew Dragon blazing through Earth's atmosphere, as NASA astronauts Mike Hopkins, Victor Glover and Shannon Walker, and JAXA astronaut Soichi Noguchi returned home.
Crew-1 safely splashed down off the coast of Florida, completing their 167-day mission on the space station, and the first operational mission of NASA's Commercial Crew Program.
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