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This is a timeline of most major achievements in rocketry and space exploration. Click on events to learn more, or to take you to other parts of the website.

1232

Rockets used by Chinese against Mongols at Kai-Fung-Fu

1790's

Rockets used in India against the British

1806

First major rocket bombardment on Boulogne
Claude Ruggiere launches small animals on rockets

1814

British rockets fired on Fort McHenry prompts "rockets red glare" in Francis Scott Keys famous poem

1903

Tsiolkovsky published the first calculations of rocket motion, the fundamental rocket equation, see here, is named after him.

1925

"The Attainability of Celestial Bodies", by Walter Hohmann, see here, described the principles involved in interplanetary flight

1926

The first liquid fuel rocket is launched by Robert Goddard, reaching 41 feet

1942

The first V2 was successfully launched, first object to reach spaced

1957

First satellite to orbit earth Sputnik 1 First animal in orbit aboard Sputnik 2

1959

First crash landing on the moon Luna 2

1961

First human to orbit earth Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin

1962

First mission to reach and photograph Venus

1964

First probe to land softly on moon

1965

First spacewalk and docking

1966

First soft-landing on the moon

1967

First soft-landing on Venus

1968

First manned Apollo mission, first test of Saturn V rocket

1969

First men on moon

1971

First landing on Mars

1973

First probe to Jupiter & Mercury

1980

First probe to Saturn

1981

First launch of Space Shuttle

1985

First probe to a comet

1986

First probe to Uranus

1987

First orbital spacestation MIR

1989

First probe to Neptune

2000

New era of rockets being deployed, including Atlas V

2004

First vehicle with no government funding to leave the earths atmosphere, the X-Prize is won, see here

2015

First probe launched to Pluto

2018

Man's planned return to the moon