1957

October 4: USSR launches first satellite Sputnik 1.

November 3: Russian dog Laika becomes first live animal in space but dies aboard Sputnik 2.

1958

January 31: United States launches first satellite Explorer 1.

October 1: American space agency National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) created.

1959

January 2: Soviet satellite Luna 1 launched towards the Moon, first craft to leave Earth's gravity.

September 12: Radio-controlled Soviet satellite Luna 2 crashes into the Moon.

October 7: Soviet probe Luna 3 transmits the first images of the hidden side of the Moon.

1961

April 12: Soviet cosmonaut Yury Gagarin becomes first man in space, completing a single, 108-minute orbit aboard Vostok 1.

May 5: US launches a Mercury spacecraft, carrying astronaut Alan Shepard in a sub-orbital flight. First American in orbit is John Glenn, in February 1962.

May 25: US President John F. Kennedy announces the Apollo programme and that America aims to place a man on the Moon by the end of the decade.

1962

February 20: American John Glenn completes three orbits of the Earth.

August 27: US launches a probe to Venus, USSR fires a probe to Mars in November.

1963: First space flight by a woman, Soviet cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova.

1965: Cosmonaut Aleksei Leonov undertakes first spacewalk during a 26-hour flight.

1967: Launchpad blaze kills all three astronauts, Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee, aboard Apollo 1 (January). Soviet cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov killed when Soyuz 1 parachute fails (April).

1968: Apollo 8 becomes first manned spaceship to fly around the Moon.

1969: Man lands on the Moon (Apollo 11). US astronauts Neil Armstrong, then Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin become first men to set foot on the Moon.

1971:

April 19: USSR launches first orbital space station, Salyut 1

June 29: Three cosmonauts on Soyuz 11, Georgi Dobrovolsky, Vladmir Volkov and Viktor Patsaiev die during descent of their module.

1972: Last manned flight to the Moon (Apollo 17).

1973: NASA launches Skylab station into orbit.

1975:

May 31: European Space Agency created.

July 18: A US Apollo spacecraft docks with a Soviet Soyuz spacecraft while in Earth orbit, in first international co-operative space flight.

1976

July 20: US Viking 1 lands on Mars.

1979

September 1: US Pioneer 11 probe passes Saturn and discovers an additional ring and two moons around the planet.

1981: Maiden voyage of the US space shuttle Columbia, the first reusable manned spacecraft.

1986: Space shuttle Challenger explodes on liftoff, killing all seven astronauts.

1990

April 24: Launch of of the Hubble Space Telescope, a joint venture between NASA and the European Space Agency, which has provides spectacular images that revolutionise the field of astronomy.

1997

September 11: US Mars Global Surveyor, begins orbiting the Red Planet to conduct a two-year mapping survey of Martian surface.

1999: China carries out first unmanned flight of its own spacecraft.

2000: Two Russians and one American become the first occupants of the International Space Station (ISS).

2001

March 23: Soviet-Russian space station Mir is destroyed after 15 years in service.

April 28: World's first space tourist, US millionaire Dennis Tito, scheduled to be taken to ISS.

2003

February 1: Shuttle Columbia disintegrates over Texas upon reentry killing seven astronaunts: six Americans and the first Israeli in space.

October 16: China becomes third nation to complete a space flight commanded by astronaut Yang Liwei.

2004

January 3: NASA's Spirit rover lands on Mars.

January 14: President George W. Bush unveils plans for a return to the Moon as early as 2015, as a launchpad for manned missions to Mars and "across our solar system."

June 21: A US rocket plane, SpaceShipOne, becomes the first privately-financed manned flight into space, reaching an altitude of 100 kilometres (62 miles) after being launched from Mojave, California, and is installed as favourite to take the 10-million dollar Ansari X Prize for the first mission to send three people into space within a two-week timespan.

August 8: A private rocket, built by Space Transport Corp and the latest contender for the Ansari X Prize, is launched off the north-west Pacific coast of the United States but blows up on take-off. Further teams from Argentina, Britain, Canada, Israel, Romania, Russia and the US have launches in the pipeline.

September 27: British airline magnate Richard Branson announces a plan for the world's first commercial space flights, saying "thousands" of fee-paying astronauts could be sent into orbit in the near future.

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