This is what names mean in space exploration

Sputnik has been the first artificial satellite orbiting the Earth. Sputnik is Russian and translates as companion. This is obvious because the small satellite with a diameter of 58 centimeters and a mass of 83.6 kg orbited the Earth and thus accompanied it. On October 04, 1957 it was put into orbit by the Russians, at that time still the USSR. It did not stay there for a long time, because it orbited the Earth in a relatively low orbit (elliptical orbit with a distance of 215 km to 939 km). After about three months, Sputnik re-entered the atmosphere and burned up. Nevertheless, the mission was a success. Because it managed to prove that it is possible to launch satellites into space. This in turn triggered the so-called "Sputnik shock" in the United States. 

The Americans' fear was also partly based on failures of their own programs. One such was Vanguard, which was launched as an underpinning to the 1955 announcement of putting their own satellites into space. Vanguard ran from 1957 to 1959.

The program was implemented by the Naval Research Laboratory, a civilian research facility of the United States Navy and the United States Marine Corps. The civilian nature of space flight was to be emphasized, and President Eisenhower wanted to use it to support his "open skies" proposal. Indeed, at the first U.S.-Soviet summit since the 1955 Potsdam Conference in Geneva, the President had proposed to the Russians that they grant each other overflight rights over their own territory as a sign of rapprochement. This was clearly rejected by the Soviet Union. Vanguard was therefore also a provocation to the Soviet Union.

While Vanguard was still running, the Americans launched another space program called "Explorer" in 1958. The name of the program was inspired by great names such as Christopher Columbus (* around 1451, † May 20, 1506; considered the modern discoverer of America) or Fernando Magellan (* before 1485, † April 27, 1521; the first to circumnavigate the earth). After the Vanguard disaster, Explorer 1 was the third satellite in space and the first American "spacecraft" to actually make it into space. The program was started by the Army Ballistic Missile Agency as a competition program to Vanguard. In the program, which continues to this day - under NASA's name - 105 satellites have been launched so far, the last one on October 11, 2019. Another launch is planned for the 4th quarter of 2021, with six satellites scheduled for launch in 2023 and another in 2024/25.

After the success of Sputnik, the Russians launched the Venera space program, which translates as "Venus," just a few years later. This clarifies what this program was about: sending probes to Venus, Earth's inner neighboring planet. The program ran from 1961 to 1983 and within these 22 years several probes were sent to Venus. The Russians approached the surface probe by probe, but only Venera 7 succeeded in landing on December 15, 1970.

This made it the first probe ever to land on an extraterrestrial planet. Venera 7 was able to withstand the conditions on Venus (92 bar pressure, average surface temperature of 464 °C / 867 °F) for probably 23 minutes. For that time at least, a weak signal reached Earth, after which it fell silent. Venera 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 and 14 also landed on Venus and provided images and measurement data from the surface. Incidentally, France, Austria and the GDR, among others, were involved in building the instruments for individual missions.

Also in 1961, the Russians launched the "Vostok" program. This translates as "East" and was intended to demonstrate the USSR's supremacy in the space race. Vostok was primarily used to refer to spacecraft, but also to the rockets used for the launches. What makes Vostok special is that it was the USSR's first manned space program. After the Soviet Union had already reached a milestone in space flight with Sputnik, another one was to follow with Vostok.

In several test flights, among others, dogs were successfully brought into space and back to earth. Vostok 1 then had the first ever human being on board: Yuri Alexeyevich Gagarin (* March 9, 1934, † March 27, 1968). He orbited the Earth once in 108 minutes on April 12, 1961, and then landed safely in the Volga region. On June 16, 1963, Valentina Tereshkova (* March 6, 1937) flew into space with Vostok 6. And that, too, is a record: not only was she the first woman to do so, but to this day she is the only one to have done so alone - without any other crew members.

The follow-up program to Vostok was called Voskhod - translated as "sunrise" - and ran from 1964 to 1966. The new designation was intended to fool the West (above all the United States) into believing that a completely new system was being used. As we know today, however, this was not the case. Rather, the technology used on Vostok was modified and continued to be used. One of the most serious changes was that the ejection seats were removed to allow space for a total of three astronauts. Despite the modifications, there was very limited space in the capsule, so the cosmonauts had to fly without the usual pressure suits. This was a daring maneuver, but it succeeded. Russian propaganda portrayed it as a sign of the safety of Russian space systems.

Abraham "Abe" Silverstein (* September 15, 1908, † June 1, 2001), who worked at NASA for many years as manager and director of space development, suggested the name Mecury for the first manned space program of the USA. He was referring to Roman mythology, in which Mercury is the messenger of the gods (in Greek, it is Hermes). The program ran from 1958 to 1963 and on May 5, 1961, only about four weeks after Yuri Gagarin, launched Alan B. Shepard as the first American into space.

Unlike Gagarin, however, he did not orbit the Earth, but flew in a ballistic orbit to an altitude of 187 km - and thus, by definition, into space - but landed back on Earth just 15 minutes and 22 seconds later. The first official astronauts of the USA, who were introduced to the public as "Mercury Seven", achieved special fame. In addition to Shepard, they were Virgil I. Grissom, John H. Glenn, Malcom Scott Carpenter, Walter M. Schirra Jr, Donald K. Slayton and Leroy Gordon Cooper. The program was terminated early because of its successes, and the successor Gemini program was fast-tracked. This was to keep the promise made by John F. Kennedy to achieve a lunar landing within the 1960s.

After the Mercury program was successfully terminated ahead of schedule, the Gemini successor program was launched ahead of schedule. In Latin, Gemini stands for the constellation Gemini, whose two most conspicuous stars are named Pollux (brightest star of the constellation) and Castor (second brightest star of the constellation). In Greek mythology, Castor and Pollux are inseparable twin brothers and sons of Zeus.

NASA asked for names to be proposed for this "bridge program" between Mercury and Apollo. Among all the submissions, Gemini was represented twice. Whether by chance or not, the number two also has a special significance with regard to the goal of this program. The core objective of the Gemini program was to put several people into space at the same time. In addition, techniques were to be tested that were indispensable for the moon landing planned as part of the Apollo program: Among other things, coupling maneuvers of two spacecraft or moving in free space.

On May 25, 1961, the President of the United States, John F. Kennedy, gave a speech to the U.S. Congress that is considered the starting point for what is probably the most famous space program in human history: Apollo.

I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth. No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind or more important for the long-range exploration of space; and none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish.

John F. Kennedy, excerpt from speech to the U.S. Congress, May 25, 1961

The Luna program was launched by the USSR in 1958. Here, too, the name literally says it all: Luna means moon and the exploration of our natural satellite was also the main goal. Originally, Luna ran until 1976, but it is to be restarted in a further phase from 2021 to 2027. ESA will then also be involved in the restart. A total of 44 missions can be attributed to the program so far, 15 of which were successful. However, due to the fact that the program ran during the Cold War and therefore not all data was published, there are also deviating data. According to other sources, there were only 39 missions, of which 22 were failures, four were partial successes and 13 were successes.

The first missions of this program were not very promising: Some rockets exploded during launch (Luna E-1 No. 1), some probes could not leave the orbit (Luna E-6 No. 2 / Sputnik 25) or missed the moon either narrowly (Luna 1, 5,900 km) or enormously (Luna 6, 166,000 km).

However, it is undisputed that the first successful soft landing on the moon occurred on February 3, 1966. The probe Luna 9 collected data for three days and also sent an image of the surface back to Earth. Its successor was Luna 13, which also successfully touched down on the surface on December 24, 1966. Luna 10, 11, 12 and 14, on the other hand, were orbiters that were only supposed to orbit the moon.

A restart of the Luna program is planned for 2021. Roskosmos and ESA plan to jointly carry out a total of three missions by 2027: Luna 25 (launch no earlier than 2021), Luna 26 and Luna 27. In this context, Luna 25 will be a kind of advance command that is to land on the moon and gain important knowledge for subsequent missions. Two years later, Luna 26 will launch, perform remote measurements and remain in lunar orbit as a communications relay. Luna 27 will launch another year later, land in the south pole region of the moon and search for (frozen) water there using a drill.

The contents of the Zond program do not seem to follow any particular logic at first glance. Translated, Zond means probe, from which only limited deductions can be made. All in all, the program is considered to be very heterogeneous, since many missions were carried out under this name. Primarily, several probes of the same type were to be launched on different celestial bodies. But at least since the end of the Cold War it is known that Zond was also a program to cover up Russian efforts of a manned moon landing. Since this race was won by the Americans with the landing of Apollo 11 on July 20, 1969, Zond was discontinued in 1970 at the latest.

Named after the Vikings who sailed to America well before Columbus, the Americans launched the Viking program in 1975. The goal of the two missions was to launch two probes on our outer neighboring planet. To accomplish this, two Titan 3E/Centaur rockets launched in quick succession from launch pad LC-41 at Cape Canaveral: Viking 1 on August 20, Viking 2 on September 9, 1975. According to the launch sequence, the two probes also reached Mars. The Viking 1 lander landed on July 20, 1976; Viking 2 touched down on the Red Planet on September 3, 1976.

The Viking probes were the first to provide detailed images of the Martian surface. In the immediate vicinity of Viking 2's landing site, Utopia Planitia (from the Greek for nowhere), the Chinese Mars probe Tianwen-1 is also scheduled to land at the end of May / beginning of June 2021 to investigate the water ice deposits found there in more detail. The Perseverance rover of NASA's Mars2020 mission already landed in the nearby Jerzero crater on February 18, 2021.

Voyager means "traveler" or "sailor". The first ideas for this program were already being considered in the 1960s. It was based on calculations by the U.S. mathematician Michael Minovitch of JPL (Jet Propulsion Labority). He had demonstrated that spacecraft could gain further speed through so-called swing-by maneuvers. This was extremely important for the program's goal of sending probes to the outer planets of our solar system. This was because the necessary planetary constellations occurred between 1976 and 1978, and not again until 2152.

NASA did not want to miss this opportunity and launched the Voyager program in July 1972. Voyager 1 set off on its journey from Cape Canaveral on September 5, 1977, and its sister probe Voyager 2 on August 20, 1977. Originally, four to five probes were to be launched, but due to the high budget involved, only two were to be built. Also the life span of the probes should be limited to four years, in order to save costs. However, the engineers secretly ignored this and used many of the already developed systems in the two probes Voyager 1 and Voyager 2.

Das aktuelle Raumfahrtprogramm der Europäischen Raumfahrtagentur ESA heißt Cosmic Vision 2015 – 2025. Der Name ist mit “Kosmischer Vision” nur bedingt gut zu übersetzen, letzten Endes geht es jedoch darum: Visionen. So stehen im Mittelpunkt des Programms auch vier Fragen, auf die langfristig Antworten gefunden werden sollen.

1. Was sind die Bedingungen für die Planetenbildung und die Entstehung von Leben?
2. Wie funktioniert das Sonnensystem?
3. Welches sind die grundlegenden physikalischen Gesetze des Universums?
4. Wie ist das Universum entstanden und woraus besteht es?

Cosmic Vision startete bereits 2005 und beinhaltet mehrere kleine Missionen, die eben erwähnte Fragen beantworten helfen sollen. Die Missionen innerhalb des Programms werden nach klein (S-Mission), mittel (M-Mission), groß (L-Mission) und schnell (F-Mission) gestaffelt.

Tianwen ist ein Programm der chinesischen Raumfahrtagentur CNSA. Der Name geht auf den chinesischen Schriftsteller Qu Yuan zurück, der 340–278 v. Chr. gelebt hat. In einem Gedichtband stellte er die Astronomie seiner Zeit in Frage. Unter anderem, warum die Himmelsekliptik in 12 Abschnitte aufgeteilt ist. Antworten hat er jedoch nicht geliefert; das soll jetzt das Raumfahrtprogramm nachholen.

Dass zwischen dem Start des Programms im März 2007 bis zum erfolgreichen Start von Tianwen-1 am 23. Juli 2020 insgesamt 13 Jahre liegen, begründet sich im ersten Fehlschlag. Denn zunächst war vorgesehen, in Zusammenarbeit mit Roskosmos eine Sonde (Mars-1 (ursprünglich Yinghuo-1, dt. Glühwürmchen)) “Huckepack” auf der Phobos-Grunt-Mission zum Mars zu bringen. Aufgrund eines technischen Fehlers konnte die Sonde jedoch nicht in die Flugbahn zum Mars eingeschossen werden und verblieb in einer niedrigen Umlaufbahn – dem Parkorbit – um die Erde. Ohne die Möglichkeit, die Flugbahn von der Erde aus zu beeinflussen, näherte sich die Sonde immer weiter der Oberfläche an und trat letztlich in die Atmosphäre ein. Am 15. Januar 2012 verglühte Phobos-Grunt gemeinsam mit Yinghuo-1 über dem Ostpazifik.

Tiangong ist ein astronautisches Raumfahrtprogramm der VR China, das hierzulande jedoch relativ unbekannt sein dürfte. Der Name Tiangong bedeutet „Himmelspalast“, womit chinesische Raumstationen bezeichnet wurden. Erste Planungen für das Programm gab es bereits 1992, seit 1993 läuft es und es wurde auf der Expo 2000 in Hannover erstmals der Öffentlichkeit vorgestellt.

Tjangong 1 startete am 29. September 2011 in einen Erdorbit. Der Kontakt zur Raumstation ging allerdings am 2. April 2018 unerwartet verloren. Daraufhin kam zu einem ungeplanten Eintritt in die Erdatmosphäre und dem Absturz im Südpazifik. Tiangong 2 startete am 15. September 2016 und wurde am 19. Juli 2019 kontrolliert zum Absturz gebracht. Bei beiden Abstürzen waren die Raumstationen unbemannt. Die mit Tiangong 1 und 2 gemachten Erfahrungen sollen in die modulare chinesische Raumstation einfließen, welche ab Frühjahr 2021 aufgebaut werden soll. Die Fertigstellung ist für Ende 2022 geplant.

2019 startete die NASA das nach Apollo zweite Raumfahrtprogramm, das Menschen zum Mond bringen soll. Der Name Artemis lässt sich von Apollo ableiten, denn in der griechischen Mythologie ist Artemis die Zwillingsschwester von Apollon.

Geplant war die Landung des “nächsten Mannes und der ersten Frau” (Wortlaut NASA) auf dem Mond für das Jahr 2024. Dass dieser Termin gehalten werden kann, scheint aktuell unwahrscheinlich. Grund hierfür sind unter anderem Verzögerungen bei der Konstruktion der für die Reise geplanten Rakete Space Launch System (SLS). Aber auch das zur Verfügung stehende Budget reicht laut NASA nicht aus, um den ambitionierten Zeitplan einzuhalten. Ein großer Schritt, um den nächsten riesigen Sprung zu machen, war hingegen der erfolgreiche Test der vier RS-25-Triebwerke des SLS in einem so genannten Green Run Hot Fire Test am 18. März 2021.

Chandrayaan, was sich als Mondfahrzeug übersetzen lässt, ist ein indisches Raumfahrtprogramm, in dessen Zentrum die Erkundung des Mondes steht. Im Ausland ist es auch unter dem Namen Indian Lunar Exploration Programme bekannt. Eine erste Mission startete 22. Oktober 2008 und brachte eine Sonde zum Mond, die ihn zwei Jahre lang umkreisen sollte. Der Kontakt brach allerdings nach 312 Tagen und mehr als 3.400 Umrundungen ab. Im Jahr 2017 gab die NASA bekannt, dass sie durch die Kooperation mehrerer Radioteleskope die Sonde wieder gefunden hat und diese sich in einem Mondorbit befindet.

Am 22. Juli 2019 startete Chandrayaan 2, deren Missionsziel die weiche Landung eines Landers auf der Oberfläche war. Allerdings schlug dieses Vorhaben fehl und der Lander wurde bei der Landung zerstört. Der Orbiter umkreist hingegen – wie Chandrayaan 1 – weiterhin den Mond. Aktuell konzentriert sich die ISRO jedoch auf das – durch die Corona-Pandemie zusätzlich verschobene – Indian Human Spaceflight Programme, das 2022/23 erstmals Inder:innen mit eigens entwickelter Technik ins All bringen soll.