On April 1, 1960, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) launched TIROS-1, the world’s first successful meteorological satellite.
Nearly 63 years ago, on October 4, 1957, the former Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite to be successfully placed in orbit around Earth. This feat ushered in the Space Age and sparked a space race between the United States and its Cold War rival.
This scramble for spaceflight superiority led to the establishment of our nation’s early space programs, and to the launch of Explorer-1 in 1958, the first operational U.S. satellite.
The United States’ earliest attempts to see Earth’s weather from space also began in the 1950s. Several experimental programs were developed and, by 1959, a pioneering weather exploration mission made its way to space onboard the Explorer VII satellite.
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