Most meteorites that have reached Earth come from the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. But we have 1,000 or so ...

Before any human dared orbit the stars, a young chimpanzee named Ham took the leap. His journey from the jungles of Cameroon ...

Ham the Chimpanzee: Ham, the first chimpanzee trained for space travel, was launched aboard the Mercury-Redstone 2 mission in 1961. His flight played a key role in evaluating spacecraft systems and ...

Whereas Gilmour Space's vehicle never got as far as a terminal countdown and fuel never flowed, the Redstone's engines ignited as planned then shut down almost immediately, meaning the rocket barely ...

American NASA astronaut Alan B Shepard Jr (1923-1998), wearing his Mercury pressure suit, holding his helmet in his hands, poses for a portrait prior to his launch in a Mercury-Redstone 3 (MR-3 ...

On May 5, 1961, NASA astronaut Alan Shepard became the first American to go to space. He launched from Cape Canaveral on a Mercury-Redstone rocket in a space capsule named Freedom 7. This was the ...

Gayle King insists she was like Alan Shepard on her space ‘joyride’ A defensive King likened her Jeff Bezos space-tourism ride on Blue Origin to Alan Shepard’s historic 1961 mission.

On March 24, 1961, NASA's Mercury Redstone rocket launched on its last uncrewed flight before it started sending astronauts into space. The mission was known as the Mercury Redstone Booster ...

In its size and shape, its instincts and intelligence, it was the nearest thing to man that has yet made the perilous voyage into space and returned safely. The occupant of the capsule was a ...

Chimpanzee “Ham” in a space suit is fitted into the couch of the Mercury-Redstone 2 capsule #5 prior to its test flight which was conducted on January 31, 1961. The results from his test ...

From a Cape Canaveral blockhouse the seven Mercury astronauts watched tensely last week as the countdown neared zero. Atop a towering Redstone rocket rested the one-ton Mercury space capsule of the ...