On board of the craft Sputnik 2, a dog Laika travelled for the first time in history. It was the first animal in space.

The mission didn’t imply Laika’s return from the orbit, yet 5 hours later data on her state ceased coming in. The craft didn’t have TV cameras, but afterwards the research showed that the dog most likely had died from overheating.

The ship successfully repeated the Luna 1 craft mission — reaching the surface of the Moon. Luna 2 slammed into the surface of the Moon around Mare Imbrium.

The craft carried solar wind measurement equipment and a banner with the USSR coat of arms.

It’s the first craft that have reached the surface of another celestial body.

Luna 3 an automatic station was fundamentally different from its predecessors of the Luna programme. Two cameras were mounted on board; the craft was equipped with a stabilization system.

The ship performed the first ever gravity maneuver — it flew around the Moon and came back to Earth to transmit the first photo of the far side of the Moon. On-board developed film was used for the shooting.

The first attempt to launch a meteosat was Vanguard 2, yet its data quality was unsatisfactory due to the craft’s strong gyration.

TIROS transmitted the first high-quality photos of the Earth cloud veil. It has been successfully operating for 75 days, but was shut down afterwards. Its design became a base for meteorological research craft series development.

Gherman Titov was the second man to travel in space on the board of Vostok 2 spaceship. The flight lasted 25 hours 18 minutes; 17.5 orbits were performed. Earth was filmed during the flight.

For the first time a cosmonaut slept in the orbit. Titov also experienced unpleasant consequences of a prolonged exposure to weightlessness.

The first telecom satellite was Echo, which served as a passive signal transponder. It only reflected radio waves with its surface.

Telstar provided two-way telephone communication. Besides, it transmitted the first TV signal, including live broadcasting. It also relayed John Kennedy’s transatlantic press-conference.

The craft performed a successful flight around Venus within 34.7 km distance. It proved a suggestion concerning the hot atmosphere of the planet.

Mariner 2 wasn’t equipped with cameras, yet scientific equipment was mounted on board. It measured solar wind parameters and the amount of space dust. It couldn’t detect a magnetic field due to the its weakness.

The first female astronaut was sent to the orbit on the board of Vostok 6. Despite not feeling well, she performed 48 orbits around Earth. The spaceflight lasted for almost three days.

Due to the manual controls malfunction the landing was performed automatically. Simultaneously, another ship stayed in the orbit — it was Vostok 5 piloted by Valery Bykovsky.

For the first time, a spacecraft performed a successful soft landing on another celestial body’s surface. It was preceded by more than 10 failed attempts of Moon landing.

The first ever panoramic shot was made on the surface, and the photos were transmitted to Earth. Luna 9 moon station functioned for 75 hours.

Venera 3 automatic station was launched 4 days after Venera 2, a similar Venus research craft.

The craft enabled obtaining important data on interplanetary space and solar wind. Unfortunately, the connection between both stations was terminated before approaching Venus, so the information about the planet was not received.

The craft crashed into the planet on the 1st of March, becoming the first man-made object on the other planet.

On the board of Gemini 8 ship, Neil Armstrong and David Scott performed the first manual docking with another spacecraft.

As a docking experiment target, Agena upper rocket stage was used. Due to malfunctions the crafts had to be undocked soon, and a planned spacewalk got cancelled. The crew successfully made it to Earth.

Frank Borman, James Lovell and William Anders were the first people to reach another celestial body. The flight was conducted as a part of manned Moon landing preparation programme.

Apollo 8 successfully entered the Moon orbit with a lunar module mock-up. For the first time did people see the far side themselves and made the first shots. The whole flight took 6 days.

Soyuz 5 craft was launched a day after Soyuz 4, with crews of 3 and 1 astronaut respectively.

During the flight, Soyuz 4 docked to Soyuz 5. Astronauts Aleksei Yeliseyev and Yevgeny Khrunov entered outer space and boarded Soyuz 4. Docking modules had no hatches for crew transfer between crafts.

For the first time, cosmonauts took off on one ship and landed on the other.

Automatic station consisted of landing platform, reusable rocket and reusable craft. Before, there had been 5 failed attempts to deliver lunar soil.

After platform’s successful landing on the Moon surface, Luna 16 station acquired soil samples. A capsule with them was sent to Earth via the reusable craft. The whole process was automatic. Soil mass was 101 grams.

The first station expedition on the board of Soyuz 10 couldn’t enter the station owing to docking process malfunctions. The first astronauts entered the station during Soyuz 11 expedition.

The first long-run station stayed inhabited for 22 days. During Soyuz 11 landing depressurizing occurred, and all three crew members died.

Mars 3 automated station consisted of an orbital station and a lander. The latter contained the first Mars rover — PrOP-M, connected to the station via the cable.

The rover was quite compact, 25 cm long, and was meant to move using two stepping skis.

Data transmission was terminated 14.5 seconds after the landing; only a part of black and white panoramic shot was transmitted. Apparently, the craft failed due to a sandstorm.

The flight was aimed at studying Venus and Mercury. Mariner 10 flew around Mercury 3 times, achieving a closest distance of 327 km.

The craft obtained high-definition shots that enabled mapping of 45% of planetary surface. A weak magnetic field and an extremely rarified, practically non-existent atmosphere were discovered.

In 2008, Messenger became the next probe to reach Mercury.

Venera 9 automated station consisted of an orbiter and a lander. The orbiter performed data transmission from the surface.

For the first time, a shot from the surface was obtained. A connection with the lander lasted for 53 minutes; important data on the surface of the planet was transmitted throughout this period. Surface pressure was measured at over 90 atmospheres, with a temperature of over 450°С.

Mars 3 automatic probe could only transmit a part of the Mars surface shot. Viking 1 craft made quite a few high definition shots, including color ones. For the first time ever, Martian soil was sampled and analyzed.

The probe was active for 2306 days and provided a lot of important data on Mars.

The second female astronaut Svetlana Savitskaya arrived on Salyut 7 orbital station on the board of Soyuz T-12 spaceship. It was the fourth expedition to the station; during the mission Svetlana performed a spacewalk.

Together with Vladimir Dzhanibekov she stayed in the outer space for 3 hours 35 minutes researching metalwork tools.

ISEE-3 probe was originally intended to study solar wind. Upon the end of the mission it was renamed into ICE (International Cometary Explorer) and sent to Giacobini-Zinner comet.

The craft crossed the tail within 7 800 km from cometary core. It examined an interaction between solar wind and comet matter, and headed to another target — Halley comet. It wasn’t equipped with onboard cameras.

Two identical crafts Vega 1 and Vega 2 were designed to study Venus and Halley comet.

The ships launched the first balloon probes in Venus atmosphere, and then departed to Halley comet. The mission procured the first ever shots of a comet nucleus. Substance analysis was conducted as well; complex organic molecules were discovered.

Like the Shuttle, Buran was a reusable piloted rocket airplane. Buran programme was in a large extent similar to the Space Shuttle programm.

Its first and only flight Buran performed in the automatic mode, unmanned. Shuttle differed by the manual landing procedure. The programme was closed.

The craft was named after Galileo Galilei, the astronomer who discovered Jupiter’s first 4 moons.

Crossing the asteroid belt, Galileo was the first to enter Ida asteroid orbit and discovered its satellite Dactyl.

The craft became Jupiter’s first artificial satellite, and launched a probe in its atmosphere.

Mars Pathfinder automated station performed a soft landing and delivered Sojourner, the first active Mars rover, to the surface.

The vehicle passed a total of 100 meters until Mars Pathfinder, which served as a connection relay, went out of order.

Rovers became the new stage of Mars exploration.

On the November 2, Soyuz TM-31 delivered the first crew to the station.

International Space Station became the first long-term orbiter with 14 nations’ participation (as of now). Moreover, ISS is the largest long-term artificial satellite of Earth.

Station is run by four control centers in different counties, which are constantly exchanging data.

The craft was named after planetary scientist Eugene Shoemaker, a founder of planetary science.

Before landing on Eros asteroid, the probe passed by and filmed Matilda asteroid.

High definition shots were obtained; soil examination was conducted. The probe stayed active and transmitted data from the surface for 2 weeks.

The craft’s mission was to deliver an impact probe to the Tempel comet.

Deep Impact was the first to conduct an experiment of running an impactor into the comet nucleus, creating a cometary matter emission. Comet’s brightness increased six times upon the impact; analysis of the emitted dust was held by the probe.

The impactor was equipped with a camera, which filmed the surface before the strike.

Hayabusa craft was the first one to manage obtaining soil samples from Itokawa and delivering it to Earth.

During landing the craft was supposed to release a Minerva minilander with cameras and asteroid matter analysis equipment mounted on board. Yet connection with the robot was lost.

On the 13th of June, 2010 a capsule with soil was successfully brought to Earth.