4 Facts about NASA, The World's Leading Space Institution

TheIndonesia.id - NASA or the National Aeronautics and Space Administration is an aviation and space agency whose job is to conduct space research and exploration, as well as provide reports on everything related to earth and outer space.

This space agency is one of the best and most prestigious space agencies in the world. 

Here are four facts about NASA that you might not know.

1. History of NASA

NASA was founded 62 years ago on July 26, 1958. At first, the Soviet Union launched the satellite Sputnik I on October 4, 1957, followed by Sputnik II the following month. The launch of this satellite greatly surprised America and made the country anxious that the Soviets sent missiles into American territory.

With all its ambitions, the United States does not want to bear the shame on the world stage. As reported on the History page, in 1958 a congress was formed in the United States which aimed to form a special agency dealing with extraterrestrial events. This agency was later named NASA, which is currently the best space agency owned by the United States.

2. NASA's first mission

As written on the NASA page, in 1959 NASA carried out its first mission called the Mercury Project. This mission was carried out for several years and succeeded in flying humans into space, competing with the Soviet Union at that time.

After the success of Mercury, NASA re-published a new mission called Gemini. The Gemini mission is the foundation of the Apollo mission which successfully landed humans on the moon for the first time.

3. Success in sending humans to the moon

After experiencing several failures, finally on July 20, 1969, NASA successfully landed the first humans on the moon via Apollo 11. Neil Armstrong was the first astronaut to set foot on the moon, followed 19 minutes later by Buzz Aldrin.

As reported on the NASA website, there were three crew members on the Apollo 11 mission, but only Neil Armstrong and Adwin E. Aldrin Jr (Buzz Aldrin) stepped onto the lunar surface, while Michael Collins was in charge of driving the main plane around the moon while waiting. Both counterparts are on the surface of the moon.

4. Currently, NASA is focusing on exploring Mars

NASA is currently busy with an exploration mission to Mars. As reported by Space, NASA has the ambition to send the first humans to Mars. It is a very big and risky ambition considering that landing on Mars will be much more difficult than landing on the moon.

Currently, NASA has sent advanced equipment to the red planet several times, including reconnaissance robots. This 2-ton robot will become a data collection tool that NASA scientists need.