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APOLLO MISSIONS"That's one small step for a man. One giant leap for mankind."
- Neil Armstrong It has now been 46 years since humans first went to the Moon. The first steps by humans on another planetary body were taken by Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on July 20, 1969, while Mike Collins remained in the Command Module. The astronauts also returned to Earth the first samples from another planetary body. Apollo 11 achieved its primary mission - to perform a manned lunar landing and return the mission safely to Earth - and paved the way for the Apollo lunar landing missions to follow. |
INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATIONThe International Space Station is a truly international collaboration between the space agencies - NASA (USA), Roscosmos (Russia), ESA (European Union), JAXA (Japan) and CSA (Canada). The space station has been continuously occupied since November 2000. In that time, more than 200 people from 15 countries have visited.
It is a microgravity laboratory in which an international crew of six people live and work while traveling at a speed of 7.66 km per second, orbiting Earth every 90 minutes. Click on the photograph to the right or follow these links for more information.
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ROSETTAThe tiny European spacecraft made history last November when it became the first spacecraft to orbit a comet and drop a lander on its surface. Rosetta and Philae (the lander) are still accompanying the comet as it transforms from a frozen rock into the characteristic comet with a fiery tail as it approaches the Sun. Visit the website and watch the video below to understand just how significant Rosetta is.
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MARS ROVER - CURIOSITYEveryone's favourite interplanetary robot Curiosity (or Mars Science Laboratory MSL) , has been exploring the surface (and bit below) of Mars since August 2012. In that time it has drilled rocks to sample the soil chemistry, found evidence of old lake beds, taken selfies (!) and far surpassed the hopes of its mission controllers on Earth. Visit the MSL website for information on Curiosity and explore Mars using this fantastic interactive site - Mars Trek. NASA has also just released Experience Curiosity - a 3-D animation that allows the viewer to travel along with the robot on the surface of Mars.
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HUBBLE TELESCOPEPerhaps no single instrument has done more to change our understanding and vision of the universe than the Hubble telescope. Since its launch into orbit by the Space Shuttle Colombia in 1990, Hubble has uncovered a universe where almost anything seems possible within the laws of physics and provided us with astonishingly beautiful images of cosmic wonders.
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CASSINIThe Cassini space craft is the largest and heaviest spacecraft ever launched by NASA. Since its arrival at Saturn in 2004, it has revolutionised our understanding not just of the ringed "Jewel of the Solar System" but also its mysterious and exciting moons and the ring system.
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NEW HORIZONSNew Horizons launched on Jan. 19, 2006; it swung past Jupiter for a gravity boost and scientific studies in February 2007. It conducted a six-month-long reconnaissance flyby study of Pluto and its moons starting in early 2015. On July 14, 2015, New Horizons completed a historic flyby of Pluto getting as close as 12,500 km from its surface. If NASA approves an extended mission, the spacecraft could head farther into the Kuiper Belt to examine one or two of the ancient, icy mini-worlds in that vast region, at least a billion miles beyond Neptune’s orbit.
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JUNOJuno launched in 2011 and has been orbiting Jupiter since the 4th of July, 2016. To do this it had to travel 2.84 billion kilometres and survive the extreme radiation surrounding the giant gas planet.The slowly spinning spacecraft is in a special orbit around Jupiter's poles, instead of around its middle. It will swing far away, then back toward Jupiter, coming as close as 5,000 kilometres above the cloud tops. Juno will make 32 orbits of Jupiter over about one year.
During the parts of each orbit when it is closest to Jupiter, Juno will make measurements to find out whether Jupiter has a solid planetary core, map Jupiter's intense magnetic field, measure the amount of water and ammonia in the deep atmosphere, and observe the planet's auroras. It has already sent back amazing photographs showing us breathtaking detail of Juno's surface. Watch below ..... |
PARKES RADIO TELESCOPEParkes Radio Telescope or "The Dish" as it is affectionately known is one of the largest single dish telescopes in the southern hemisphere. With a diameter of 64 metres, it is instantly recognisable as an Australian icon, and has been involved in some of the most important space missions in history. From being one of the main receiving stations for the Apollo 11 mission to the Moon in 1969 to tracking Curiosity in its descent down to Mars in 2012, Parkes has played and continues to play a major role in the Deep Space Communication Network. It is also a major research telescope and has contributed massively to our understanding of pulsars - rapidly spinning neutron stars.
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VOYAGER SPACECRAFT
The Voyager spacecraft were launched in 1977 within a month of each other. Between them, Voyager 1 and 2 explored all the giant planets of our outer solar system, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune; 48 of their moons; and the unique system of rings and magnetic fields those planets possess.
They have continued to fly away from the Sun and in 1998 Voyager 1 became the most distant human-made object in space. As of 2018, both Voyager spacecraft have officially entered interstellar space - beyond the influence of the Sun. Watch the videos on the right for more information. |
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