The most exciting adventure of all mankind began in the middle of the 20th century, shortly after the end of the main tragedy of the century - World War II. A revolution took place that captured the minds and souls of people from different countries, and the first conquerors of space of the 20-21st century appeared. We broke out into outer space and mastered it relentlessly and irresistibly. How did this tectonic shift in people's lives and the development of technology take place, what awaits us now, in the 21st century?
Start of space exploration
Space exploration was initially carried out by two superpowers - the USSR and the USA, the confrontation of which resulted not only in political skirmishes and an arms race, but also in rivalry in science and technology. Despite the efforts and great financial opportunities, the United States at the dawn of the space age could not become pioneers and leaders in it. Space explorers of the 20th and 21st centuries, they will later make up for lost time - they will create manned shuttles, super-powerful telescopes and send rovers to study the Red Planet. In the meantime, we'll start by describing the first space launch.
The criterion for classifying a flight as a space flight is the crossing of the Karman line at an altitude of 100 kilometers.
PS-1, created and launched by the Soviet Union, was able to develop the necessary speed, overcome the gravity of the Earth and was launched into orbit by a launch vehicle in October 1957. The satellite could not say a memorable, soul-touching phrase about steps for humanity like the one that Neil Armstrong said. PS-1 only broadcast "Beep-Beep!", but that was enough to open a new era in the history of our civilization.
The first space explorers of the 20-21st century
When asked to remember the pioneers of space, the smiling face of Yuri Gagarin appears before the eyes of any person. But still, the first living organism sent into Earth's orbit was not he, but Drosophila. Ordinary fruit flies were launched by the Americans in 1947 in order to study the effect of high altitude on the degree of radiation in the body.
The flies returned alive and he althy, and just a year later, a macaque named Albert I flew away to replace them. Albert I was less fortunate - he died of suffocation before reaching the Karman line, which means that he had not actually been in space.
Then there were several more Alberts, but still the first mammals to rise to a height of more than 100 km and return alive were two dogs - Dezik and Gypsy. The USSR was engaged in their launch in 1951. The dogs did not reach orbit. There were several more attempts.to conduct an orbital flight, but the first, with a successful return home, happened only in 1960. Belka and Strelka, and with them four dozen mice and two rats, flew around the Earth and returned alive and unharmed. Shortly after the end of the flight, Strelka became the mother of six puppies, whose fate was taken up by Nikita Khrushchev. He gave one of the space dog puppies to the daughter of the President of America, Carolyn Kennedy. Thus, the first space explorers of the 20th and 21st centuries were our smaller brothers who need to pay tribute and memory.
First man in space
Nothing will ever change the fact that the first cosmonaut of the planet was a Soviet citizen Yuri Gagarin. Having said the world-famous phrase “Let's go!”, He entered the near-Earth orbit on the Vostok-1 spacecraft.
The flight did not last long - 108 minutes, but all this time downstairs people in different countries listened to the radios and did not take their eyes off the TV screens. They did not yet understand, rather they felt the significance of this flight for all living on the planet.
Relatively little time has passed, and now the space explorers of the 20-21st century are breaking the record again. The duration of Valery Polyakov's flight is amazing. The Russian cosmonaut spent more than a year at the Mir station.
The most significant space events of the 20th century
Having broken away from the Earth, humanity did not intend to stop. Science fiction writers wrote books in which people explore and colonize other planets, filmmakersthe first space battles were conceived and the conquerors of space of the 20-21st century went forward. The comparative table will later show how the development of the era of astronautics proceeded.
The dream of stepping on the surface of a celestial body different from the native planet was embodied in the landing of American astronauts on the moon. The man who conquered the only natural satellite of our planet was Neil Alden Armstrong. He disturbed the Sea of Tranquility on July 20, 1969.
After studying the nearest celestial bodies, astrophysicists have chosen a new target - Mars. And now the Mars 2 station, belonging to the USSR, rushed towards him. With its help, an object created by the efforts of human hands and mind first landed on the surface of the Red Planet, and in 1983, on the American Pioneer 10, the first man-made object left the boundaries of our solar system.
The last known achievement in the delivery of objects created by mankind away from Earth was the exit of the American ship Voyager 1 beyond the boundaries of the solar system, then, years later, reached interstellar space.
Space explorers of the 20th-21st century: a comparative table of achievements of the USSR and the USA
| Period | Indicators | USSR | USA |
| 60s | Manned flights | 69 | 86 |
| Cosmonauts / Astronauts | 87 | 106 | |
| 70s | Manned flights | 248 | 270 |
| Cosmonauts / Astronauts | 337 | 386 | |
| 80s | Manned flights | 497 | 448 |
| Cosmonauts / Astronauts | 516 | 900 | |
| 90s | Manned flights | 785 | 969 |
| Cosmonauts / Astronauts | 808 | 2032 | |
| 2000-2009 | Manned flights | 982 | 1440 |
| Cosmonauts / Astronauts | 991 | 2799 |
Summary table "Space explorers of the 20-21st century"
| 1961-2009 | ||
| Flights | Cosmonauts / Astronauts | |
| USSR | 2421 | 2739 |
| USA | 3151 | 6223 |
Conclusions: the backlog of the USSR in quantitative indicators of space exploration began to grow from the 1970s of the 20th century. The gap became significant in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
Modernastronautics
The 20th century saw a space boom, a revolution, but the surge cannot last. The development of cosmonautics has reached a qualitatively new level and since then has continued consistently and without shocks. And this is what the space explorers of the 20th and 21st centuries fought for. In physics, the acquired knowledge is systematized, achievements in theory and practical research, taken far beyond the earth's shell, are summarized.
One of the main directions is the development of more advanced manned spacecraft and ships with a nuclear module for interplanetary flights.
The conquerors of space of the 20-21st century are rushing into outer space again. In physics and astronomy, the possibilities of colonization are being systematically investigated in the event of the exhaustion of the Earth's resources or its overpopulation. The space military industry is developing, while at the stage of spy satellites. Regular flights and launches of satellites have raised the question of cleaning space above the Earth from space debris.
