Launches
ON RECORD19MISSIONS
19 of them succeeded. The earliest was in 1962 and the latest in 2024.
ARCHIVE // DAY OF YEAR
October 18 in spaceflight
19 launches flew on October 18, the earliest of them in 1962, and 19 of them succeeded. Wikipedia lists 7 spaceflight and astronomy events on October 18. 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 320.
Pictures from this date
NONE0IMAGES
There's no Astronomy Picture of the Day we can show for this date.
What happened on October 18
320
Pappus of Alexandria, Greek philosopher, observes an eclipse of the Sun and writes a commentary on The Great Astronomer (Almagest).
Pappus of Alexandria ↗1963
The first cat in space, later known as Félicette, launched aboard a French Véronique rocket.
Félicette ↗1967
The Soviet space probe Venera 4 became the first spacecraft to perform direct in situ analysis of the environment of another planet (Venus).
Venera 4 ↗1967
The Soviet probe Venera 4 reaches Venus and becomes the first spacecraft to measure the atmosphere of another planet.
Soviet Union ↗1989
The Space Shuttle Atlantis launches on STS-34 to deploy the Jupiter-bound Galileo space probe.
Space Shuttle Atlantis ↗1993
Space Shuttle Columbia is launched on STS-58 to perform life sciences research.
Space Shuttle Columbia ↗2019
NASA Astronauts Jessica Meir and Christina Koch take part in the first all-female spacewalk when they venture out of the International Space Station to replace a power controller.
NASA Astronaut Corps ↗
Launches on October 18Archive read 2026-11-05. Anything after that isn't listed here.
19 launches
ONLINE
- 2024Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 8-19SpXSUCCESS
- 2023Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 6-23SpXSUCCESS
- 2020Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink 13SpXSUCCESS
- 2009Atlas V 401 | DMSP-5D3 F18 (USA-210)ULASUCCESS
- 2003Titan II SLV | DMSP F-16USAFSUCCESS
- 2003Soyuz-FG | Soyuz TMA-3RFSASUCCESS
- 2001Delta II | QuickBird 2USAFSUCCESS
- 1999Soyuz-U-PVB | Globalstar 31,56,57,59RFSASUCCESS
- 1993Space Shuttle Columbia / OV-102 | STS-58LSOCSUCCESS
- 1989Space Shuttle Atlantis / OV-104 | STS-34LSOCSUCCESS
- 1984Tsiklon-3 | Tselina-D 46CCCPSUCCESS
- 1974Kosmos-3M | Zaliv 18CCCPSUCCESS
- 1974Voskhod | Zenit-4MK 31CCCPSUCCESS
- 1972Voskhod | Zenit-2M 33CCCPSUCCESS
- 1969Kosmos 11K63 | DS-P1-Yu 25CCCPSUCCESS
- 1967Thor Delta C1 | OSO 4USAFSUCCESS
- 1967R-36O 8K69 | OGCh 15CCCPSUCCESS
- 1963Vostok 8A92 | Zenit-2 13CCCPSUCCESS
- 1962Atlas Agena B | Ranger 5USAFSUCCESS
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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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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.