The 1970s
16 missions
Apollo 13
An oxygen tank exploded 200,000 miles from Earth. The famous words Houston, we have had a problem. T...
Voyager 1
Launched September 5, 1977, still transmitting after 48 years. The most distant human-made object, o...
Voyager 2
Launched 16 days before Voyager 1 but on a slower path. The only spacecraft to visit Uranus and Nept...
Skylab
Americas first space station, made from a Saturn V third stage. Lost its meteoroid shield and solar ...
Mariner 9
The first spacecraft to orbit another planet. Arrived during a global dust storm that hid the entire...
Viking 1
First successful Mars lander, touching down July 20, 1976. Operated for over 6 years, far exceeding ...
Pioneer 10
First spacecraft to traverse the asteroid belt. First to fly by Jupiter in 1973, returning the first...
Pioneer 11
First to fly by Saturn in 1979. Used Jupiters gravity to slingshot to Saturn. Discovered an addition...
Venera 7
First spacecraft to transmit data from the surface of another planet. Survived 23 minutes in 475 deg...
Apollo 15
The first advanced J mission with a lunar rover. Dave Scott and Jim Irwin spent 3 days on the Moon a...
Apollo 17
The final Apollo mission and the last time humans walked on the Moon. Gene Cernan and Harrison Schmi...
Apollo-Soyuz Test Project
The first international crewed space mission, a symbol of detente. An Apollo capsule docked with a S...
Luna 16
The first robotic sample return from the Moon. Drilled 35 cm into the surface and brought back 101 g...
Luna 24
The last Soviet lunar mission, returning 170 grams from 2 meters deep in August 1976. Its core drill...
Salyut 1
The first space station in history, launched in April 1971. The first crew could not board after a d...
Mars 3
Achieved the first soft landing on Mars on December 2, 1971. The lander transmitted what may be the ...