Remembering Sputnik

Today, we take for granted the hundreds of satellites that float above our heads. We use satellite technology every day: from our televisions, telephones, and Internet connections to traffic and weather reports. Children can't imagine a time when we didn't have these technologies at our fingertips, and many adults have gotten so used to these conveniences that they no longer wonder how they ever got along without them. Still, it was only 50 years ago today that the first satellite was sent into outer space.

On October 4, 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik-1 aboard an R-7 rocket, a launch vehicle that was designed to carry nuclear weapons. This was a time when the world worried about war between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R, and listened anxiously whenever the Cold War rivals rattled their nuclear sabers. Still, Sputnik's "Chief Designer", an aerospace engineer named Sergei Pavlovich Korolyov, had a spaceward dream - and planned to accomplish it at all costs.

Sputnik capped a series of successes in the Soviet space program. Several months earlier, on August 21, 1957, the USSR had launched an R-7 rocket that flew more than 4000 miles. According to some historians, Western intelligence agencies dismissed Soviet talk about a successful test as just another piece of propaganda. These skeptics could not imagine that the Soviets would be the first to send a satellite into outer space.

While the world worried about war, Sputnik's Chief Designer was hard at work, designing and building his satellite. Securing funding for his project had been difficult, especially since Sputnik competed for rubles with several nuclear-weapons programs. With funding in place, however, Sergei Pavlovich Korolyov went on to face many technical challenges. Unable to replicate the lightweight materials of his American rivals, the Chief Designer decided to design a more powerful rocket to launch a heavier satellite. He also modified his original design to use less-sophisticated radio equipment which, along with batteries and a cooling system, was sealed inside a 30-pound metal ball that measured less than 2 feet in diameter.

Sputnik's metal ball was a significant accomplishment in itself. The ball had to be extremely reflective and free from dents or scratches in order to protect the satellite's instruments from the intense heat. Still, by mid-September 1957, the shiny ball was complete, with four long antennas attached. In total, the entire satellite weighed about 180 pounds.

On October 3, 1957, Sputnik's R-7 rocket was moved to the launch pad. The next day, shortly before 6 AM, crews began to load the launch vehicle with liquid oxygen and kerosene. When combined and ignited, the rocket fuel would provide 876,000 pounds of thrust. Finally, around midnight on October 4^th, the countdown ended and Sputnik raced into outer space at approximately 18,000 miles per hour. The USSR celebrated its historic accomplishment, but the leader of the USSR did not appreciate its magnitude.

Sputnik-1 made 1400 orbits around the Earth - about one every 90 minutes – and spent approximately 2100 hours (87.5 days) in space. Although the Soviet Union's accomplishment was an important Cold War triumph, Sputnik also heralded an age in which non-military technologies use satellite communications.

CR4 Aerospace Blog