NASA

Moonwalker

This astronaut crossed the Kármán Line (100 km), the internationally accepted boundary of space.

Crossed Kármán Line

Moon Flyer

Charles Moss Duke Jr., born in Charlotte, North Carolina, in 1935, is a retired U.S. Air Force Brigadier General, test pilot, astronaut, and Apollo 16 lunar module pilot. A Naval Academy graduate with a master’s in Aeronautics from MIT, Duke joined NASA in 1966 and served as CAPCOM for Apollo 11 before flying to the Moon on Apollo 16 in 1972, spending over 71 hours on the lunar surface and 21 hours in spacewalks. His mission achieved major scientific milestones, including deploying the first lunar observatory and collecting 213 pounds of samples. Duke logged over 4,100 flight hours, received numerous awards such as the NASA Distinguished Service Medal, and retired from NASA in 1975 to pursue business and Christian ministry, becoming President of Charlie Duke Enterprises and Duke Ministry for Christ. Courtesy of NASA.

Apollo 16

Apollo 16 was the second of three science-focused human lunar landings. Young and Duke spent just shy of 3 days on the Moon's surface and drove a second Moon car 26.7 km. While walking on the Moon's surface, Mission Control told Young Congress had approved funding for the Space Shuttle program; Young responded, "America sure needs that Shuttle."  He would go on to Command the first Shuttle mission almost exactly 9 years later. After leaving lunar orbit, Mattingly performed a spacewalk to retrieve film cassettes. At a distance of 320,000 km, it stands to this day as the farthest spacewalk ever performed from Earth.

The main Apollo spacecraft was a Command and Service Module designed to take three astronauts to and from the Moon’s orbit and provide access to the lunar lander during missions. After the Moon program ended, Apollo spacecraft flew three crews to the Skylab space station and performed the historic joint U.S.-Soviet mission in 1975.

Apollo

Charles M. Duke Jr.

United States of America

Apollo 16 First moonwalk

Apollo 16 Transearth EVA

Apollo 16 Second moonwalk

Apollo 16 Third moonwalk

This astronaut is in the top 5% for number of missions.

Frequent Flyer

This astronaut has spent over a month in space.

Space Resident

Apollo 10

The flight that did everything except land on the Moon. Apollo 10 was a full-on dress rehearsal of Apollo 11. This mission would do everything except touch down on the lunar surface. The flight marked the first undocking and redocking of a spacecraft in orbit of a space body other than Earth and achieved the fastest speed to date for a human mission of 39,897 km/h. During the non-landing descent toward the Moon, Stafford and Cernan came within 15 km of the lunar surface. Apollo 10 was a total success. The stage was now set. Apollo 11 would attempt to land humans on the Moon.

STS-1 (Columbia)

The first flight of the Space Shuttle Program, and the first flight of Shuttle Columbia. The mission marked the first time in history a rocket was launched on its very first test flight with people onboard. At liftoff, an overpressure wave from Solid Rocket Booster ignition damaged and bent a critical flight control surface on Columbia, nearly preventing a safe return at the end of the mission. NASA enhanced the sound suppression system at the pad and the issue never recurred.

The first reusable launch and landing spacecraft, the Space Shuttle began a new chapter of human space exploration. It launched like a rocket but landed on a runway like a plane. Shuttle crews deployed dozens of commercial satellites and two interplanetary probes to Venus and Jupiter. The Shuttle served as a mini space station and hosted hundreds of biomedical, psychological, physiological, materials science, and physics experiments that have directly benefited life on Earth. The five flight-worthy Shuttles -- Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, Atlantis, and Endeavour -- flew 135 missions over 30 years. The Shuttles helped construct the Russian Mir space station and brought nearly 80% of the International Space Station to orbit. Shuttles also deployed and serviced the Hubble Space Telescope.

Space Shuttle

Gemini 3

The first human flight of NASA's Gemini Program saw two astronauts perform a three-orbit test flight of the new capsule. This mission marked the first time a human spacecraft changed its orbit using its onboard thrusters.

Gemini was a two-person spacecraft designed to prove technologies and procedures for the Apollo lunar landings. Crews proved rendezvous and docking as well as transfer from one ship to another via spacewalk were possible. Gemini demonstrated that humans could live and work in space for the length of time needed for a lunar flight.

Gemini

Gemini 10

This flight marked the first double-rendezvous in human spaceflight history, the first time a person met another spacecraft in space, the first U.S. mission to significantly raise its orbit higher than any human had ever been, and the first time a human spacecraft used a target vehicle's engine to change its orbit and control its orientation. The flight launched 100 minutes after its Agena target vehicle and docked to it 6 hours later. The crew then used the Agena's engine to raise their orbit from 272 km to 763 km -- the highest a human flight had gone to that point. The next day, they made two burns with the Agena to get into the correct orbit to rendezvous with another Agena that had been part of Gemini 8. Collins performed a spacewalk to photograph stars, sunrise, and the Gemini capsule. The crew rendezvoused with the second Agena and Collins performed a second spacewalk to retrieve a micrometeorite collector from the Agena.

European Space Agency (ESA)

STS-9 (Columbia)

Germany

A dedicated science flight co-sponsored by NASA and ESA, STS-9 marked the first time an ESA/West German astronaut reached space and the first time a non-American launched on a U.S. mission.

John W. Young

STS-4 (Columbia)

The final test flight of the Space Shuttle program. It was the final time NASA assigned a complete backup crew for their missions until the International Space Station program. Columbia finished proving the Shuttle's capabilities on this flight, allowing NASA to declare the Shuttle "operational." Columbia landed on July 4th, after which President Reagan greeted the crew and Columbia's sister Shuttle, the newly completed Challenger, performed a ceremonial flyover while mounted to the back of a 747 aircraft.

STS-51-C (Discovery)

The first classified Department of Defense Space Shuttle mission. Discovery was launched at or near the minimum air temperature the Solid Rocket Boosters were certified for at the time. After launch, it was discovered that a significant anomaly with all the O-ring seals on both Solid Rocket Boosters had occurred. All O-rings were found to be burned. In one place, the hot gasses from the rocket boosters had burned completely through the primary O-ring and nearly burned through the secondary seal -- which would have caused a Challenger-like failure. Morton Thiokol (who built the solid rockets) and NASA upper management both dismissed concerns raised by this finding. The Space Shuttle kept flying.

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