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January 9 in spaceflight

16 orbital launches flew on January 9, the earliest of them in 1970, and 15 reached orbit. Wikipedia records 3 spaceflight and astronomy events on January 9. Below are the pictures NASA published on January 9 in 6 different years — each one taken or released on this exact date.

DATE

Launches

ON RECORD

16MISSIONS

15 of them reached orbit. The earliest was 1970, the most recent 2026.

Recorded events

IN THE RECORD

3ENTRIES

Spaceflight and astronomy entries from Wikipedia's record of this date, oldest first — from 1962 onward.

Pictures from this date

PUBLISHED

6IMAGES

NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day for January 9, one per year. Some are public domain and some belong to the photographer — each says which.

Published on January 9

NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day, for this calendar date in each of the last several years.

NASA Science

2026

NASA Science

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

© Robert Nemiroff — used with the credit NASA publishes

NASA Science

2025

NASA Science

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

© Dave Doctor — used with the credit NASA publishes

NASA Science

2024

NASA Science

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

NASA · public domain

NASA Science

2023

NASA Science

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

NASA · public domain

NASA Science

2022

NASA Science

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

NASA · public domain

NASA Science

2021

NASA Science

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

NASA · public domain

What happened on January 9

  1. 1962

    Apollo program: NASA announces plans to build the C-5 rocket launch vehicle, then known as the "Advanced Saturn", to carry human beings to the Moon.

    Apollo program ↗

  2. 1992

    Radio astronomers Aleksander Wolszczan and Dale Frail announced the discovery of two pulsar planets orbiting PSR B1257+12 (depicted), the first confirmed detection of exoplanets.

    Aleksander Wolszczan ↗

  3. 1992

    The first discoveries of extrasolar planets are announced by astronomers Aleksander Wolszczan and Dale Frail. They discovered two planets orbiting the pulsar PSR 1257+12.

    Exoplanet ↗

Every launch on January 9

16 launches

ONLINE
  1. 2026Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 6-96SpXSUCCESS
  2. 2024Long March 2C | Einstein ProbeCASCSUCCESS
  3. 2023LauncherOne | Start Me UpVOFAILURE
  4. 2023Ceres-1 | 5 satellitesGESUCCESS
  5. 2018Long March 2D | SuperView-1 (Gaojing 1-03 & Gaojing 1-04)CASCSUCCESS
  6. 2017Kuaizhou 1A | Multiple payloadsEPSUCCESS
  7. 2014Antares 120 | Cygnus CRS Orb-1 (S.S. C. Gordon Fullerton)OSCSUCCESS
  8. 2012Long March 4B | Ziyuan 3 & VesselSat-2CASCSUCCESS
  9. 2001Long March 2F | Shenzhou-2CASCSUCCESS
  10. 1990Space Shuttle Columbia / OV-102 | STS-32LSOCSUCCESS
  11. 1987Soyuz U | Yantar-4K2 28CCCPSUCCESS
  12. 1986Kosmos-3M | Strela-1M 297-304CCCPSUCCESS
  13. 1985Soyuz U | Yantar-4K2 12CCCPSUCCESS
  14. 1981Molniya-M | Molniya-3 25LCCCPSUCCESS
  15. 1980Soyuz U | Zenit-6U 15CCCPSUCCESS
  16. 1970Voskhod | Zenit-2M 7CCCPSUCCESS

FIELD KIT / LIBRARY

SPONSORED

General-audience astronomy and spaceflight — none of it a textbook.

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Links here cost you nothing extra.

  • LISTING

    Cosmos — Carl Sagan

    Still the best single argument for why any of this matters, and it leaves the arithmetic in. For a reader who wants the science, not just the awe.

    VIEW

  • LISTING

    Pale Blue Dot — Carl Sagan

    The case for leaving Earth, written by someone unsentimental about how hard that is. Suits readers who want the argument rather than the poster.

    VIEW

  • LISTING

    Project Hail Mary — Andy Weir

    Hard-SF problem solving in The Martian's key — for anyone who liked the engineering more than the peril. The only novel on this list.

    VIEW

BROWSE opens an Amazon search, not a specific recommendation.

LINKS AMAZON.COM

Sources and licences

Event text and thumbnails come from Wikipedia and are used under CC BY-SA 4.0. Images are drawn only from Wikimedia Commons, which does not accept non-free content — each thumbnail links to its file page, where its licence and author are recorded.

Launch records are from The Space Devs’ Launch Library 2. Pictures are NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day; NASA imagery is generally not subject to copyright, but individual APOD entries are frequently the property of the photographer, and each caption says which applies.