Space History Photos

Cosmonaut Valery Polyakov, who logged the single longest stay in space, has died at the age of 80. Polyakov launched on two missions to the space station Mir. In total, he was off Earth for 678 days.

With just a month left before its reopening, you can now claim your space to see the National Air and Space Museum's new galleries.

Soviet-era cosmonaut Anatoly Filipchenko, who launched on two docking tests, first for a possible Russian moon landing and then the first joint flight with the United States, has died at age 94.

The countdown is now on for the launch of the first reimagined galleries in the National Air and Space Museum. The Smithsonian announced that it will reopen half of the flagship building on Oct. 14.

Samantha Cristoforetti posted numerous photos of her historic International Space Station spacewalk July 21, when she became the first European female spacewalker.

Bill Ingalls has been a professional photographer for three decades and has served as the Senior Contract Photographer for NASA Headquarters since 1989.

An early American spacecraft that survived two launches has touched down at a museum in Long Island, New York. Mercury-Redstone 1A (MR-1A) is now on display at the Cradle of Aviation.

Russian cosmonaut Valery Ryumin, who launched on four space station missions including the final U.S. space shuttle flight to dock with the former Mir outpost, has died.

The first Swiss watch worn in space has been found in time to celebrate the 60th anniversary of its mission. Breitling revealed the watch Scott Carpenter used on the second U.S. orbital spaceflight.

A trio of monuments at NASA's home for human spaceflight pays tribute to the control teams of the past by inviting visitors to sit down and reflect on what was made possible in Mission Control.

Russia's invasion of Ukraine has destroyed a "large" part of its space history, with reports confirming the fate of an enormous aircraft that was originally built to transport Soviet space shuttles.

The astronauts on the International Space Station, who are the latest to follow John Glenn into orbit, and the city that lit up for his mission 60 years ago marked the legacy of Glenn's spaceflight.

Artifacts that were recovered from the fallen space shuttle Challenger and prepared for presentation to the President of the United States have been recovered again, 36 years later.

NASA released a new video today (Jan. 27) to remember the three crews and other fallen astronauts who lost their lives in the pursuit of space exploration.

The remains of a V2 rocket fired by Nazi Germany at London during World War II have been unearthed in a field in the southeast of England, where it crashed and exploded before reaching its target.

A team of Hollywood prop and visual artists are offering replicas of the Apollo command module control panel.

Billionaire Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon and the spaceflight company Blue Origin, will donate $200 million to the Smithsonian, the Institution announced Wednesday (July 14).

A new exhibit at the museum of flight is lifting the curtain on the strange-but-true history of aerospace medicine.

It was 60 years ago today (May 5) that Alan Shepard, America's first spaceflyer, urged nervous flight controllers to ''fix your little problem and light this candle" to send him into space.