— Ch. 1 · The Space Race Origins —
Moon landing.
~5 min read · Ch. 1 of 6
On the 4th of October 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1 as the first artificial satellite to orbit Earth. This unexpected event was a source of pride for Soviets and shock for the United States. The steady beeping of the radio beacon aboard Sputnik 1 passed overhead every 96 minutes. It demonstrated that nuclear-tipped Soviet rockets could potentially strike American cities in under 30 minutes. World War II had introduced deadly innovations like the V-2 rocket which killed thousands in attacks on London. Tensions mounted between the two ideologically opposed superpowers after both developed hydrogen bombs. In 1959, the R-7 rocket launched Luna 1, Luna 2, and Luna 3 spacecraft. These missions achieved the first escape from Earth's gravity, the first crash impact onto the Moon, and the first photography of the never-before-seen far side of the Moon. The U.S. response was to accelerate military space projects and create NASA. Military efforts initiated intercontinental ballistic missiles to bridge the so-called missile gap. These newly developed missiles were made available to civilians of NASA for various projects.
Robotic Pioneers And Failures
The first human-made object to touch the Moon was Luna 2 in 1959. Six government space agencies have reached the Moon with uncrewed missions including Interkosmos, NASA, CNSA, DOS, JAXA and ESA. The Soviet Union performed the first hard Moon landing with the Luna 2 spacecraft in 1959. The U.S. duplicated this feat in 1962 with Ranger 4. Following initial hard landings, sixteen Soviet, U.S., Chinese and Indian spacecraft used braking rockets to make soft landings. In 1966 the Soviet Union accomplished the first soft landings during the Luna 9 and Luna 13 missions. Airbags protected Luna 9's ejectable capsule which survived an impact speed of over 40 meters per second. Both returned panoramic photographs that were the first views from the lunar surface. The U.S. followed with five Surveyor soft landings between 1966 and 1968. Five of Surveyor's seven missions made successful uncrewed Moon landings. Surveyor 3 was visited two years after its Moon landing by the crew of Apollo 12. They removed parts for examination back on Earth to determine effects of long-term exposure.