CHRONOLOGY – FEBRUARY 2009

3/23/06

445 Years Ago - 1564

Feb 15: Galileo Galilei born, Pisa, Italy.

50 Years Ago - 1959

Feb 6: First successful Titan flight, ESMC.

Feb 17: Vanguard 2 launched, 10:55 a.m., EST, ESMC. First fully instrumented Vanguard payload.

First Earth photos from satellite.

Feb 28: Discoverer 1 launched, 16:49 EST, WSMC.

45 Years Ago - 1964

Feb. 26: First visual telecast via communications satellite of the Liston vs Clay Championship fight using Relay 2 communications satellite.

40 Years Ago - 1969

Feb 5: Intelsat I11 F-3 launched, 7:39 p.m., EST, ESMC

Feb 25: Mariner 6 launched, 8:29 p.m., EST, ESMC. First Mariner launch with the Atlas/Centaur launch vehicle (Atlas/Centaur 20)

Feb 26: ESSA 9 launched, 2:49 a.m., ESMC.

35 Years Ago - 1974

Feb 11: First launch of Titan/Centaur launch vehicle. Titan-Centaur Proof Flight [Titan IIIE-Centaur D]

Feb 18: San Marco 4 launched, 6:05 a.m., EDT, from San Marco Range.

30 Years Ago - 1979

Feb 18: SAGE (Stratospheric Aerosol & Gas Experiment launched, 11:18 a.m., WFF.

Feb 24: Solwind (STP 78-1) launched, 12:20 a.m., PST, WSMC.

25 Years Ago - 1984

Feb 3: STS 41B (Space Shuttle Challenger) launched from KSC, 8:00 a.m., deployed Westar 6 and Palapa B2, which failed to orbit. Astronauts Vance Brand, Bob Gibson, Bruce McCandless, Ron McNair, and Bob Stewart. First use of Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU). First untethered space walks performed in space. [B. McCandless/R. Stewart]

First satellite refurbished & flown again [SPAS].

First Shuttle landing at Kennedy Space Center on 2/11/1984 @ 7:16 am.

First woman test conductor during U.S. space launch. [R. Wyrick]

Feb 8: Soyuz T-10 launched, Baikonur, USSR. Docked with Salyut 7, crew of Leonid Kizim, Vladimir Solovev, and Oleg Atkov, set 237 day space duration record. Returned in Soyuz T-11.

20 Years Ago – 1989

Feb 14: GPS (Block IIR) launched, 1:30 p.m., EST, ESMC. First in series of Navstar Global Positioning Satellites launched by Delta II.

15 Years Ago – 1994

Feb 3: STS 60 (Discovery) launched from KSC, 7:10 a.m. EST. Carried SPACEHAB-02 facility to conduct 12 experiments. Astronauts Charles F. Bolden, Kenneth S. Reightler, Jr., N. Jan Davis, Ronald M. Sega, Franklin R. Chang-Diaz, and Sergei K. Krikalev. Krikalev is first Russian cosmonaut to fly aboard the Space Shuttle. First flight of the Wake Shield Facility-1

Landed at KSC February 11 at 2:18 p.m. EST. Mission time: 8 days, 7 hours, 10 minutes.

10 Years Ago - 1999

Feb 9: STARDUST probe launched atop a Delta II rocket from Florida's Cape Canaveral Air Station at 4:04 p.m. EST to become the first U.S. mission destined for a comet, and the first-ever spacecraft sent to bring a comet sample back to Earth.

5 Years Ago - 2004

Feb 26: International Space Station (ISS) Expedition 8 crew -- First spacewalk outside a space station without a human crewmember inside. [M. Foale/A. Kaleri]