A Brief History of Space Travel
- 21st Aug 2024
- Author: David Southworth
Astronauts travelling to space is now a regular occurrence, but that wasn’t always the case. In this blog, we take a whistlestop tour through the history of human space flight, and ponder briefly what might come next.
The concept of space travel has long captivated the imaginations of human beings. For centuries, literature has included fantasies of flight and, as early as the mid-19th Century, authors such as Jules Verne were writing about travelling through space. The advent of film gave science fiction a wider audience, and the idea of humans travelling to other worlds became more firmly cemented in the public’s consciousness. The development of rocket technology in the 1940s brought the possibility of such fictional accounts becoming a reality, and the race to send humans to space was on.
The Space Race
The early years of the Space Race were characterised by the United States and the Soviet Union desperately trying to beat the other to various milestones in space exploration. This competitive approach sometimes led to developments that seem heartless viewed through a modern lens – such as Laika the dog becoming the first living creature to orbit the Earth, despite the fact that the Soviets had not yet developed the de-orbiting technology that they knew would be required to bring her back safely. However, it’s undeniable that such competition also led to impressive technological progress.
On 12 April 1961, space travel for human beings made the shift from dream to reality, when Yuri Gagarin became the first person in space. His flight aboard Vostok 1 lasted just under two hours, and saw him orbit the Earth once and return safely. This achievement caught the imagination of people the world over and made him into an international celebrity, transcending the typical reticence of the Cold War period. Over the next few years he toured a large number of countries including many in the West, the United Kingdom among them.
Of course, this success didn’t put an end to the Space Race, instead firing the determination of the United States to produce a suitably impressive response. Very soon, the Americans did just that, by stating publicly their aim to land humans on the Moon. Although the Soviets weren’t so open about their ambitions, it became clear that their target was the same. Once again, the race was on.
Moon landings
Throughout the 1960s, both countries put huge efforts into achieving that objective. The first probes to fly close to the Moon had flown in the previous decade, and the first soft landing was achieved by the Soviet Luna 9 mission in 1966. The two countries traded important space flight firsts through the 1960s, including the first spacewalk, longer duration human flights, going beyond Low Earth Orbit, and in-flight docking of two crewed spacecraft.
All of these were vital steps towards the aim of landing humans on the Moon and, in July 1969, all that work came to fruition with Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin becoming the first humans to walk on the surface of another celestial body. Apollo 11, the first Moon landing, finally gave the United States the statement achievement they had been searching for in the Space Race.
Over the next three years, five further American missions landed people successfully on the Moon until, beset by public and political scepticism about the costs involved, Apollo 17 became the last. At that point, in December 1972, still only 60 people had been to space.
Back down to Earth
With the Soviet lunar programme hit by technological setbacks, both countries turned their focus closer to home. The 1970s saw a series of short-term space stations launched into Low Earth Orbit – a number of Salyut space stations on the Soviet side, and Skylab for the Americans. In 1975, the Soviets and Americans collaborated on a joint mission, with a Soyuz capsule and an Apollo spacecraft docking while in orbit – a truly symbolic demonstration of the thawing of relations.
In the 1980s, the number of people travelling to space increased significantly, and small steps were made in increasing their diversity – steps which have become larger and larger over the decades since. The American Space Shuttle programme providing a large, reusable spacecraft, and the Soviets constructed space station Mir – the first long-term space station concentrating on scientific research. Cooperation between the two superpowers also continued. In the 1990s, several American Space Shuttle missions visited Mir. Subsequent to this, the US and Russia collaborated, along with a number of other nations, on the construction and operation of the International Space Station.
Find out more about different outposts in space, in our blog: Space Stations
Expanding our horizons once more
Although space travel was limited to Low Earth Orbit during this era, the human imagination was not. The idea of travelling to other planets continues to intrigue, and the first steps are being taken. The current Artemis programme, led by NASA in collaboration with several other space agencies, will see humans revisit the Moon for the first time in over fifty years. And this time, a brief visit to the Moon is not the ultimate objective. There are plans to build on that by constructing a space station orbiting the Moon – the Lunar Gateway – and potentially establish a long-term base on the Moon and eventually take humans to Mars.
The democratisation of space travel?
Space travel is no longer the domain of just two government agencies. In 2003, China became the third country to launch humans to space, and India should soon become the fourth. Over the last twenty years, several private companies have also launched human spaceflights.
Although space tourism is still prohibitively expensive, it’s sure to become more accessible in the future. Who knows, perhaps in just a few decades taking a space flight might start to be as common as hopping on a plane is today. And in the future, maybe even travel posters like this one could just become a normal part of our holiday plans.
Full references / credits
(Banner) The SLS launch for the Artemis I mission. Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls
(1) Buzz Aldrin on the Moon during the Apollo 11 mission. Credit: NASA
(2) Yuri Gagarin en route to the launch pad for his flight on Vostok 1. Credit: NASA
(3) Deke Slayton and Alexei Leonov on board the joint Apollo-Soyuz mission. Credit: NASA
(4) Travel poster to Venus, as imagined by NASA. Credit: NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory
