Rockets A rocket works by expelling a gas out of the rear and pushing the rocket into the opposite direction. In a rocket fuel is burned to create a hot gas that is forced out of the back of the rocket.

Rocket Propulsion Hot gas is propelled out of the back of a rocket engine. The force of the gas in one direction (action) produces an opposing force (reaction) that propels the rocket forward.

Rockets The Chinese first launched rockets around the year 1000. These rockets used black powder In 1920 the American scientist Robert Goddard used liquid fuels which burned longer and more continuously In 1903 Russian named Konstantin Tsiolkovsky came up with the idea of multistage rockets.

Satellites A satellite is any natural or artificial object that revolves around an object in space, just as the moon revolves around Earth The first satellite was launched by the Soviet Union (Russia) on October 4, 1957. This satellite was named Sputnik 1 The United States then launched it’s first satellite Explorer 1 on Feb 1, 1958

Satellites Satellites and space stations are used for communications, navigation, collecting weather data, and research. Some satellites are in geosynchronous orbits, which means they revolve around Earth at the same rate that Earth rotates. Space stations are large satellites that humans can live in for long periods of times

Space Stations The first space station, the Soviet Union’s Salyut, was launched in 1971 In 1973, the United States launched Skylab, which carried a series of telescopes and scientific experiments. Today 16 countries including Russia and the US are using the International Space Station for a variety of scientific missions

1st person in space On April 12, 1961, Yuri Gagarin, a Soviet cosmonaut, orbited Earth, becoming the first person in space. On July 20, 1969, Apollo 11 astronaut Neil Armstrong became the first person to walk on the moon. When Armstrong first set foot on the moon, he said, “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind

Buzz Aldrin the second person to walk on the moon

The space shuttle In the late 1970s, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) developed the reusable space shuttles. They are called shuttles because they can go back and forth, or shuttle, between Earth and space. Since the first shuttle was launched in 1981, space shuttles have been the main way that the United States launches astronauts and equipment into space

Hubble space telescope In 1988 the US launched the Hubble telescope into orbit. It has sent back thousand of high quality pictures of stars, planets and galaxies A space probe is a ship with scientific instruments that is launched to explore objects in our solar system Many space probes become satellites when they orbit planets, moons or other objects in space