The first artificial satellite launched into the space. Soviet Union was the first country to reach the space. It was on 4th October, 1957 the Sputnik 1 left the earth and reached the low altitude of earth’s orbit. This launch ignited the cold war between USA and Soviet Union. It also created a technological advancement in the field of aeronautics across the world countries. This satellite was launched with the help of R-7 rocket. The Sputnik 1 was mainly constructed by the chief constructor M. S. Khomyakov. The satellite is equipped with a one watt radio transmitting unit. The radio signals send by this unit is used to get the information about electron density of the ionosphere. The main scientific tasks performed by the satellite include measuring the density of atmosphere, its ion composition, corpuscular solar radiation, magnetic fields, cosmic rays etc. These data’s are transmitted through two antennas located in the satellite having spherical radiation pattern. A ground observatory is build to receive the transmitted signal. This was the first satellite in the Sputnik series.
Aug 20 2010
This was when the US and Russia were fighting for space supremacy. But the launch of the Sputnik was a very important event in history.