Launches
ON RECORD23MISSIONS
21 of them succeeded. The earliest was in 1965 and the latest in 2026.
MARKED ON THIS DATE
1976 · 50 years ago today
Viking 2 lands on Utopia Planitia
Viking 2 set down on the northern plains of Mars and kept working for more than three years.
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ARCHIVE // DAY OF YEAR
September 3 in spaceflight
23 launches flew on September 3, the earliest of them in 1965, and 21 of them succeeded. Wikipedia lists 1 spaceflight and astronomy event on September 3. Pick another date to see what happened on it.
Recorded events
IN THE RECORD1ENTRY
Spaceflight and astronomy entries from Wikipedia for this date, oldest first, starting in 1976.
Pictures from this date
NONE0IMAGES
There's no Astronomy Picture of the Day we can show for this date.
What happened on September 3
1976
Viking program: The American Viking 2 spacecraft lands at Utopia Planitia on Mars.
Viking program ↗
Launches on September 3Archive read 2026-11-05. Anything after that isn't listed here.
23 launches
ONLINE
- 2026GSLV Mk II | GISAT-1A (EOS-05)ISROSUCCESS
- 2025Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 10-22SpXSUCCESS
- 2025Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 17-8SpXSUCCESS
- 2024Long March 4B | Yaogan 43 Group 02CASCSUCCESS
- 2021Firefly Alpha | FLTA001 (Maiden Flight)FAFAILURE
- 2020Starship SN6 | 150m HopSpXSUCCESS
- 2020Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink 11SpXSUCCESS
- 2020Vega | SSMS PoCASASUCCESS
- 2016Falcon 9 Full Thrust | Amos 6 (Failure before launch)SpXFAILURE
- 1995Soyuz-U2 | Soyuz TM-22RFSASUCCESS
- 1993Atlas I | UHF F/O F2GDSUCCESS
- 1990Long March 4A | Feng Yun 1BCASCSUCCESS
- 1987Proton-K/DM | EkranCCCPSUCCESS
- 1987Soyuz U | Zenit-8 52CCCPSUCCESS
- 1986Kosmos-3M | Taifun-2 22CCCPSUCCESS
- 1986Soyuz U | Zenit-8 37 (Kosmos 1775)CCCPSUCCESS
- 1983Soyuz U | Zenit-4MKT 24CCCPSUCCESS
- 1982N-I | Kiku-4NASDASUCCESS
- 1981Titan IIID | KH-11 4USAFSUCCESS
- 1980Soyuz U | Resurs-F1 17F41 14LCCCPSUCCESS
- 1976Soyuz U | Zenit-4MK 66CCCPSUCCESS
- 1970Thor Burner 2 | DSAP-5A F2USAFSUCCESS
- 1965Kosmos 65S3 | Strela-1 20 to 24CCCPSUCCESS
FIELD KIT / LIBRARY
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Astronomy and spaceflight books for a general reader. No textbooks.
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- 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.
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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.