This article documents notable spaceflight events during the year 2020.
Overview
Exploration of the Solar System
Three
missions to Mars
Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and the second-smallest planet in the Solar System, only being larger than Mercury. In the English language, Mars is named for the Roman god of war. Mars is a terrestrial planet with a thin at ...
were launched in 2020, including two rovers, two orbiters, and a lander.
NASA
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil List of government space agencies, space program ...
has launched the
Mars 2020 mission, which includes the
''Perseverance'' rover and
''Ingenuity'' helicopter, and will
cache samples for eventual return to
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's surfa ...
.
The
China National Space Administration (CNSA) has launched its
Tianwen-1 mission, which includes an orbiter, a lander, a small rover and a group of deployable and remote cameras; it is China's first mission to another planet using its own delivery vehicle.
Finally, the
United Arab Emirates
The United Arab Emirates (UAE; ar, اَلْإِمَارَات الْعَرَبِيَة الْمُتَحِدَة ), or simply the Emirates ( ar, الِْإمَارَات ), is a country in Western Asia ( The Middle East). It is located at t ...
, in partnership with American universities, has launched the
Hope Mars Mission orbiter on a
Japanese rocket.
In November, China launched
Chang'e 5
Chang'e 5 () was the fifth lunar exploration mission of the Chinese Lunar Exploration Program, and China's first lunar sample-return mission. Like its predecessors, the spacecraft is named after the Chinese moon goddess Chang'e. It launched ...
, the first
sample-return mission to the Moon since
Luna 24
''Luna 24'' was a robotic probe of the Soviet Union's Luna programme. The last of the Luna series of spacecraft, the mission of the ''Luna 24'' probe was the third Soviet mission to return lunar soil samples from the Moon (the first two sampl ...
in 1976. Chang'e 5 used the recently developed
Long March 5
Long March 5 (LM-5; zh, s=长征五号 , p=Chángzhēng wǔ hào), or Changzheng 5 (CZ-5), and also by its nickname "''Pang-Wu''" (胖五, "''Fat-Five''"), is a Chinese heavy-lift launch vehicle developed by the China Academy of Launch Vehic ...
heavy-lift rocket. The mission performed the first-ever robotic
lunar orbit rendezvous
Lunar orbit rendezvous (LOR) is a process for landing humans on the Moon and returning them to Earth. It was utilized for the Apollo program missions in the 1960s and 1970s. In a LOR mission, a main spacecraft and a smaller lunar lander travel to ...
and returned of
lunar soil
Lunar soil is the fine fraction of the regolith found on the surface of the Moon. Its properties can differ significantly from those of terrestrial soil. The physical properties of lunar soil are primarily the result of mechanical disinteg ...
and rock samples on 16 December.
NASA's
OSIRIS-REx
OSIRIS-REx (Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security, Regolith Explorer) is a NASA asteroid-study and sample-return mission. The mission's primary goal is to obtain a sample of at least from 101955 Bennu, a carbona ...
mission landed on asteroid
101955 Bennu
101955 Bennu (provisional designation ) is a carbonaceous asteroid in the Apollo group discovered by the LINEAR Project on 11 September 1999. It is a potentially hazardous object that is listed on the Sentry Risk Table and has the highest cumul ...
in October to obtain a surface sample for return to earth.
JAXA's
Hayabusa2 mission returned samples of
162173 Ryugu
162173 Ryugu, provisional designation , is a near-Earth object and a potentially hazardous asteroid of the Apollo group. It measures approximately in diameter and is a dark object of the rare spectral type Cb, with qualities of both a C-type ...
to Earth on 5 December 2020, with its re-entry vehicle recovered in
Woomera, Australia
Woomera, unofficially Woomera village, refers to the domestic area of RAAF Base Woomera. Woomera village has always been a Defence-owned and operated facility. The village is located on the traditional lands of the Kokatha people in the Far ...
.
One solar mission was launched:
ESA
, owners =
, headquarters = Paris, Île-de-France, France
, coordinates =
, spaceport = Guiana Space Centre
, seal = File:ESA emblem seal.png
, seal_size = 130px
, image = Views in the Main Control Room (120 ...
's
Solar Orbiter
The Solar Orbiter (SolO) is a Sun-observing satellite developed by the European Space Agency (ESA). SolO, designed to obtain detailed measurements of the inner heliosphere and the nascent solar wind, will also perform close observations of th ...
, on 10 February 2020, intended to study the Sun's
heliosphere
The heliosphere is the magnetosphere, astrosphere and outermost atmospheric layer of the Sun. It takes the shape of a vast, bubble-like region of space. In plasma physics terms, it is the cavity formed by the Sun in the surrounding interstell ...
.
Parker Solar Probe
The Parker Solar Probe (PSP; previously Solar Probe, Solar Probe Plus or Solar Probe+) is a NASA space probe launched in 2018 with the mission of making observations of the outer corona of the Sun. It will approach to within 9.86 solar radii ...
, launched in 2018, decreased its minimal distance to the Sun further to 14.2 million km.
Human spaceflight
In the United States,
SpaceX's
Dragon 2
Dragon 2 is a class of partially reusable spacecraft developed and manufactured by American aerospace manufacturer SpaceX, primarily for flights to the International Space Station (ISS). SpaceX has also launched private missions such as Ins ...
spacecraft made its first crewed flight to the
International Space Station
The International Space Station (ISS) is the largest modular space station currently in low Earth orbit. It is a multinational collaborative project involving five participating space agencies: NASA (United States), Roscosmos (Russia), JAXA ( ...
on 31 May 2020 as part of the
Commercial Crew Program
The Commercial Crew Program (CCP) provides commercially-operated crew transportation service to and from the International Space Station (ISS) under contract to NASA, conducting crew rotations between the expeditions of the International S ...
, enabling American human orbital spaceflight capability for the first time since the
Space Shuttle
The Space Shuttle is a retired, partially reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft system operated from 1981 to 2011 by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as part of the Space Shuttle program. Its official program ...
's retirement in 2011. Dragon 2 became the first commercial system to fly humans to Earth orbit. The second crewed Dragon mission and its first operational mission,
Crew-1
SpaceX Crew-1 (was also known as USCV-1 or simply Crew-1) was the first operational crewed flight of a Crew Dragon spacecraft, and the maiden flight of the Crew Dragon ''Resilience'' spacecraft. It was also the second crewed orbital flight l ...
, launched on 15 November 2020.
China conducted an uncrewed flight test of a
next generation crewed spacecraft in May 2020,
and continues preparations for the 2021 launch of the
Tianhe Core Cabin Module of the
Chinese Space Station.
NASA astronaut
Christina Koch set a women's record-breaking 328 days spaceflight ending on 6 February 2020.
Scott Kelly still holds the all-time American record with 340 days; Cosmonaut
Valeri Polyakov
Valeri Vladimirovich Polyakov (russian: Валерий Владимирович Поляков, born Valeri Ivanovich Korshunov, russian: Валерий Иванович Коршунов, 27 April 1942 – 7 September 2022) was a Soviet and Rus ...
holds the all-time spaceflight length record of 437 days. Koch also participated in the first all-female spacewalk with
Jessica Meir on 18 October 2019.
Rocket innovation
SpaceX made three atmospheric test flights with prototypes of its fully reusable two-stage-to-orbit vehicle
Starship.
The trend towards cost reduction in access continued and several rockets made their maiden flights in 2020. Despite the increasing competition the cost of delivering cargo to the
ISS
The International Space Station (ISS) is the largest modular space station currently in low Earth orbit. It is a multinational collaborative project involving five participating space agencies: NASA (United States), Roscosmos (Russia), JAXA (J ...
went up.
Satellite innovation
SpaceX started operation of its
Starlink
Starlink is a satellite internet constellation operated by SpaceX, providing satellite Internet access coverage to 45 countries. It also aims for global mobile phone service after 2023. SpaceX started launching Starlink satellites in 2019. As ...
constellation in late 2020. As of 2 December 2020, 955 satellites have been launched and Starlink is in a public beta testing phase.
OneWeb
OneWeb (legally Network Access Associates Ltd) is a communications company that aims to build broadband satellite Internet services. The company is headquartered in London, and has offices in Virginia, US and a satellite manufacturing facility ...
planned to start service in 2020 as well, but filed for bankruptcy in March 2020 after 74 satellites were launched. OneWeb emerged from bankruptcy and plans to restart launches in December 2020.
The
Mission Extension Vehicle
A Mission Extension Vehicle (MEV) is a type of spacecraft designed to extend the functional lifetime of another spacecraft through on-orbit satellite servicing. They are 2010s-design small-scale in-space satellite-refueling spacecraft first lau ...
MEV-1 became the first
telerobotically-operated spacecraft to service another satellite on-orbit when it completed the first phase of a 5-year mission to extend the life of the
Intelsat 901
Intelsat 901 (IS-901) was the first of nine new Intelsat satellites launched in June 2001 at 18° West, providing Ku-band spot beam coverage for Europe and C-band coverage for the Atlantic Ocean region. It is capable of selectable split upli ...
(I-901) satellite. In February 2020, MEV-1 captured the
communications satellite
A communications satellite is an artificial satellite that relays and amplifies radio telecommunication signals via a transponder; it creates a communication channel between a source transmitter and a receiver at different locations on Earth ...
, which had been moved to graveyard orbit some months before. In April 2020, MEV-1 successfully brought Intelsat-901 it back to position in
geosynchronous
A geosynchronous orbit (sometimes abbreviated GSO) is an Earth-centered orbit with an orbital period that matches Earth's rotation on its axis, 23 hours, 56 minutes, and 4 seconds (one sidereal day). The synchronization of rotation and orbital ...
orbit where it is now expected to operate for another five years. This was a space industry first as
satellite servicing had previously been accomplished only with on-orbit human assistance, during the missions to service the
Hubble Space Telescope
The Hubble Space Telescope (often referred to as HST or Hubble) is a space telescope that was launched into low Earth orbit in 1990 and remains in operation. It was not the first space telescope, but it is one of the largest and most vers ...
in the early 2000s.
Orbital launches
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January
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February
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March
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April
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May
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June
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July
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August
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September
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October
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November
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December
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Suborbital flights
Launches from the Moon
-
Deep-space rendezvous
Extravehicular activities (EVAs)
Orbital launch statistics
By country
For the purposes of this section, the yearly tally of orbital launches by country assigns each flight to the country of origin of the rocket, not to the launch services provider or the spaceport. For example,
Soyuz launches by Arianespace in Kourou are counted under Russia because
Soyuz-2
Soyuz-2 ( GRAU index 14A14) is a modernized version of the Soviet Soyuz rocket. In its basic form, it is a three-stage launch vehicle for placing payloads into low Earth orbit. Compared to the previous versions of the Soyuz, the first-stage ...
is a Russian rocket. Launches from the Moon are not included in the statistics.
By rocket
By family
By type
By configuration
By spaceport
By orbit
Suborbital launch statistics
By country
For the purposes of this section, the yearly tally of suborbital launches by country assigns each flight to the country of origin of the rocket, not to the launch services provider or the spaceport. Flights intended to fly below 80 km (50 mi) are omitted.
First successful orbital launch
*
Ceres-1
Galactic Energy () is a Chinese private space launch enterprise flying the Ceres-1 and developing the Pallas-1 and 2 orbital rockets. The company's long-term objective is to mine asteroids for rare metals and minerals.
History
Galactic Energ ...
*
Long March 5B
Long March 5 (LM-5; zh, s=长征五号 , p=Chángzhēng wǔ hào), or Changzheng 5 (CZ-5), and also by its nickname "''Pang-Wu''" (胖五, "''Fat-Five''"), is a Chinese heavy-lift launch vehicle developed by the China Academy of Launch Vehicle ...
*
Long March 8
*
Qased
See also
*
Timeline of Solar System exploration#2020s
*
2020 SO, a near-Earth object orbiting Earth and Sun that was confirmed to be a
remnant
Remnant or remnants may refer to:
Religion
* Remnant (Bible), a recurring theme in the Bible
* Remnant (Seventh-day Adventist belief), the remnant theme in the Seventh-day Adventist Church
* ''The Remnant'' (newspaper), a traditional Catholic ne ...
of
1966 in spaceflight
The year 1966 saw the peak and the end of the Gemini program. The program proved that docking in space and human EVA's could be done safely. It saw the first launch of the Saturn IB rocket, an important step in the Apollo program, and the ...
in December
Notes
References
External links
{{Portal bar, Spaceflight
Spaceflight by year
2020-related lists
Spaceflight
Spaceflight (or space flight) is an application of astronautics to fly spacecraft into or through outer space, either with or without humans on board. Most spaceflight is uncrewed and conducted mainly with spacecraft such as satellites in o ...