Launches
ON RECORD22MISSIONS
16 of them succeeded. The earliest was in 1958 and the latest in 2026.
MARKED ON THIS DATE
1989 · 37 years ago today
Voyager 2 at Neptune
Voyager 2 passed within five thousand kilometres of Neptune's cloud tops and found nitrogen geysers on Triton.
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August 25 in spaceflight
22 launches flew on August 25, the earliest of them in 1958, and 16 of them succeeded. Wikipedia lists 7 spaceflight and astronomy events on August 25. Pick another date to see what happened on it.
Recorded events
IN THE RECORD7ENTRIES
Spaceflight and astronomy entries from Wikipedia for this date, oldest first, starting in 1609.
Pictures from this date
NONE0IMAGES
There's no Astronomy Picture of the Day we can show for this date.
What happened on August 25
1609
Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei (pictured) demonstrated his first telescope to Venetian lawmakers.
Galileo Galilei ↗1989
The NASA spacecraft Voyager 2 made its closest approach to Neptune and provided definitive proof of the existence of the planet's rings (pictured).
NASA ↗1989
Voyager 2 spacecraft makes its closest approach to Neptune, the last planet in the Solar System at the time, due to Pluto being within Neptune's orbit from 1979 to 1999.
Voyager 2 ↗2012
The NASA space probe Voyager 1 became the first man-made object to enter interstellar space.
NASA ↗2012
Voyager 1 spacecraft enters interstellar space, becoming the first man-made object to do so.
Voyager 1 ↗
Launches on August 25Archive read 2026-11-05. Anything after that isn't listed here.
22 launches
ONLINE
- 2026Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 10-49SpXSUCCESS
- 2026Long March 6C | 7 satellitesCASCSUCCESS
- 2025Long March 8A | SatNet LEO Group 10CASCSUCCESS
- 2023Ceres-1 | Jilin-1 Wideband-02AGESUCCESS
- 2018SARGE | Launch 1 - "Pathfinder"EXOSPARTIAL
- 2009Naro-1 | STSat-2AKARIFAILURE
- 2003Delta II | Spitzer Space TelescopeUSAFSUCCESS
- 1998Ariane 44P | ST-1ASASUCCESS
- 1997Delta 7920-8 | ACEUSAFSUCCESS
- 1994Soyuz U | Progress M-24RFSASUCCESS
- 1991H-1 | Yuri 3BMHISUCCESS
- 1988Scout G-1 | Transit-O 25,31ASISUCCESS
- 1983Proton-K/DM | Raduga 13CCCPSUCCESS
- 1977Delta 2313 | Sirio 1USAFSUCCESS
- 1966Saturn IB | Apollo AS-202NASASUCCESS
- 1965Thor Delta C | OSO CUSAFFAILURE
- 1965Voskhod | Zenit-4 10CCCPSUCCESS
- 1964Scout X-4 | Explorer 20NASASUCCESS
- 1963Thor SLV-2A Agena D | KH-4A 1USAFSUCCESS
- 1962Molniya 8K78 | Venera 2aCCCPFAILURE
- 1961Scout X-1 | Explorer 13NASAFAILURE
- 1958Project Pilot | NOTS 4USNFAILURE
FIELD KIT / LIBRARY
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LISTING
Cosmos, by Carl Sagan
Sagan's tour of the universe and how we came to understand it. It keeps the science in.
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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.
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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.
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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.