Chronicle of Spaceflight

Orbital Archives – Exploring the stories, missions, and milestones of space history through official imagery, archival insights, and detailed mission overviews.

[gemini-enthusiast]

Departure of lunar module Antares, Apollo 14.

[edwhiteandblue]

May 27, 1999: STS-96 Discovery launches to the International Space Station

STS-96 was a logistics and resupply mission and Discovery was the first Shuttle to dock to the ISS, which at the time consisted of only two modules— the Russian Zarya and the American Unity. Discovery carried a crew of seven, parts for the Russian cargo crane Strela, and a Spacehab module filled with cargo.

[gemini-enthusiast]

Gemini VII rendezvous, Gemini VI-A.

[gemini-enthusiast]

Lunar surface from orbit, Apollo 15.

[orbitalarchives]

Intermittently playing KSP again.

[gemini-enthusiast]

Pics from tonight's Starship launch stream, the first launch of a Starship V3.

[gemini-enthusiast]

Gemini VII rendezvous, Gemini VI-A.

[gemini-enthusiast]

Gemini VII rendezvous, Gemini VI-A.

[gemini-enthusiast]

Gemini III crew Gus Grissom and John Young in Gemini III spacecraft during test, Gemini III

[lonestarflight]

"Space Shuttle Enterprise is rolled into a protective hangar at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City. Enterprise, a prototype built to test aspects of the space shuttle design, will be displayed at the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum in New York."

Photo credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett.

Date: May 12, 2012

source

[lonestarflight]

Apollo and Skylab "Rendez-vous"

SCAN AND REMASTERED by Dan Beaumont: link

"Artist's rendering shows how Command Service Module (CSM) will dock with the Orbiting Workshop (OWS) during the Skylab mission. Assisting in the docking is the VHF Ranging System designed and built by RCA Government Communications Systems, Camdem, N.J. The system provides the CMS pilot with the range between the two spacecraft. Ranging is performed by sending radio tones from the CSM to the workshop, which retransmits them to the CSM. The range is determined by measuring the time between the transmission of the tones and receipt of the OWS retransmitted."

Date: May 12, 1973

NASA ID: 73-HC-432

[orbitalarchives]

I don't know how to explain it but the CH-53K is just the chibi version of the CH-53D

[gemini-enthusiast]

Mission Control operations during Gemini IV

[orbitalarchives]

The aurora australis arcs above Earth’s horizon and fades into the airglow as the International Space Station orbited 265 miles above the Indian Ocean east of Perth, Australia, at approximately 2:03 a.m. local time. In the foreground, the Soyuz MS-28 crew spacecraft is shown docked to the Rassvet module. In the background, the Pirs docking module is attached to the Nauka science module.

NASA/Chris Williams

[nasa]

Roman is Ready to Go!

After being assembled, our Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope has passed final tests, and is being prepared to move to our Kennedy Space Center in Florida, where teams will work to prepare it for a launch in early September 2026.

With a field of view at least 100 times larger than Hubble's, Roman can potentially measure light from a billion galaxies in its lifetime. It will also be able to block starlight to directly see exoplanets and planet-forming disks, complete a statistical census of planetary systems in our galaxy, and settle essential questions in the areas of dark energy, exoplanets, and infrared astrophysics.

The observatory is named after Dr. Nancy Grace Roman, NASA’s first chief astronomer who made cosmic vistas readily accessible to all by paving the way for telescopes based in space.

Want to learn more about Roman? Check out our #Roman Space Telescope tag and visit our mission page.

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[orbitalarchives]

NASA’s X-59 quiet supersonic research aircraft sits in a run stall during sunrise on Tuesday, March 20, 2026, near NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center in Edwards, California, ahead of its second flight.

NASA/Carla Escamilla

[orbitalarchives]

20 April 2026 - NASA moved the core stage, or the largest section, of the SLS (Space Launch System) rocket that will launch the crewed Artemis III mission in 2027 from the agency’s Michoud Assembly Facility to the agency’s Pegasus barge in New Orleans on April 20. The barge will ferry the top four-fifths – the section containing the liquid hydrogen tank, liquid oxygen tank, intertank, and forward skirt – of the SLS core stage to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida to complete outfitting and vertical integration.

Teams with NASA and Boeing, the SLS core stage lead contractor, used specialized transporters to guide the top four-fifths from the NASA rocket factory to Pegasus. Prior to the move, technicians added an engine section transportation simulator to the rocket stage for shipment to the Space Coast.

Next year’s Artemis III mission will launch astronauts to Earth’s orbit aboard the Orion spacecraft on top of SLS to test rendezvous and docking capabilities between Orion and commercial spacecraft needed to land Artemis IV astronauts on the Moon in 2028. NASA’s SLS is the only rocket capable of sending Orion, astronauts, and supplies to the Moon in a single launch.

NASA/Michael DeMocker