Launches
ON RECORD24MISSIONS
21 of them succeeded. The earliest was in 1960 and the latest in 2026.
ARCHIVE // DAY OF YEAR
August 18 in spaceflight
24 launches flew on August 18, the earliest of them in 1960, and 21 of them succeeded. Wikipedia lists 3 spaceflight and astronomy events on August 18. Pick another date to see what happened on it.
Recorded events
IN THE RECORD3ENTRIES
Spaceflight and astronomy entries from Wikipedia for this date, oldest first, starting in 1868.
Pictures from this date
NONE0IMAGES
There's no Astronomy Picture of the Day we can show for this date.
What happened on August 18
1877
American astronomer Asaph Hall discovered Phobos, the larger of Mars's two moons, six days after discovering Deimos, the smaller one.
Asaph Hall ↗
Launches on August 18Archive read 2026-11-05. Anything after that isn't listed here.
24 launches
ONLINE
- 2026Zhuque-3 | Honghu-03LSSUCCESS
- 2025Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 17-5SpXSUCCESS
- 2021Long March 4B | Tianhui-2-02CASCSUCCESS
- 2020Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink 10SpXSUCCESS
- 2017Atlas V 401 | TDRS-MULASUCCESS
- 2011Long March 2C | Shijian 10-04CASCFAILURE
- 2008Proton-M Briz-M | Inmarsat 4 F3KhSCSUCCESS
- 1999Soyuz-U-PVB | Yantar-4K2 79RVSN RFSUCCESS
- 1996Long March 3 | Zhongxing 7CASCFAILURE
- 1990Delta 6925 | Marcopolo 2USAFSUCCESS
- 1989Delta 6925 | GPS-2 3USAFSUCCESS
- 1988Proton | Gorizont 16CCCPSUCCESS
- 1987Tsiklon-3 | Meteor-2 16CCCPSUCCESS
- 1985Mu-3S-II | SuiseiISASSUCCESS
- 1981Soyuz U | Zenit-6U 45CCCPSUCCESS
- 1976Kosmos 11K63 | DS-P1-I 18CCCPSUCCESS
- 1972Voskhod | Zenit-4MK 8CCCPSUCCESS
- 1970Titan 23B | KH-8 28USAFSUCCESS
- 1966Scout A | Transit-O 10USAFSUCCESS
- 1964Kosmos 65S3 | Strela-1 1,2,3CCCPSUCCESS
- 1964Scout X-4A | Reentry-4ANASASUCCESS
- 1962Kosmos-2I 63S1 | Sputnik 18CCCPSUCCESS
- 1960Thor DM-21 Ablestar | Courier 1AUSAFFAILURE
- 1960Thor Agena A | Discoverer 14USAFSUCCESS
FIELD KIT / LIBRARY
SPONSORED
Astronomy and spaceflight books for a general reader. No textbooks.
As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Buying through these links doesn't cost you anything extra.
- VIEW
LISTING
Cosmos, by Carl Sagan
Sagan's tour of the universe and how we came to understand it. It keeps the science in.
- VIEW
LISTING
Pale Blue Dot, by Carl Sagan
Sagan's case for people leaving Earth one day, and an honest look at how hard that would be.
- VIEW
LISTING
Project Hail Mary, by Andy Weir
A science-fiction novel from the author of The Martian, built around solving one engineering problem after another.
BROWSE opens an Amazon search. It isn't a pick of one product.
LINKS AMAZON.COM
Sources and licences
Event text and thumbnails come from Wikipedia and are used under CC BY-SA 4.0. Images come only from Wikimedia Commons, which doesn't accept non-free content. Each thumbnail links to its file page, which lists its licence and author.
Launch records are from The Space Devs’ Launch Library 2. Pictures are NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day. Many of them belong to the photographer or a partner agency, so we only show the ones credited to NASA alone.