Launches
ON RECORD21MISSIONS
18 of them reached orbit. The earliest was 1965, the most recent 2025.
ARCHIVE // DAY OF YEAR
August 3 in spaceflight
21 orbital launches flew on August 3, the earliest of them in 1965, and 18 reached orbit. Below are the pictures NASA published on August 3 in 6 different years — each one taken or released on this exact date.
Recorded events
NONE FOUND0ENTRIES
Wikipedia records no spaceflight or astronomy event on this date.
Pictures from this date
PUBLISHED6IMAGES
NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day for August 3, one per year. Some are public domain and some belong to the photographer — each says which.
Published on August 3
NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day, for this calendar date in each of the last several years.
2026
NASA Science
How many moons can you see? The best answer is five: four orbiting Jupiter and Luna orbiting Earth. This multi-moon picture was possible because Earth's Moon moved directly in front of Jupiter last week. The featured image is a series of exposures near alignment taken from Westchester, New York, USA. The sunlit crescent of Earth's Moon, on the lower left, is overexposed, while the Moon's night side, on the upper right, is faintly illuminated by Earthshine. Lined up nearly vertically above our Moon, listed from bottom to top, are Jupiter's bright Galilean satellites: Ganymede, Io, Callisto, and Europa. Callisto, Ganymede, and Io are larger than Earth's Moon, while Europa is only slightly smaller. NASA's robotic spacecraft Juno is currently orbiting Jupiter and has made close passes near three of these moons.Tomorrow's picture: stairway to heaven
NASA · public domain
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.
NASA · public domain
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.
© Cem Özkeser — used with the credit NASA publishes
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.
© Robert Nemiroff — used with the credit NASA publishes
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
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
Every launch on August 3
21 launches
ONLINE
- 2025New Shepard | NS-34BOSUCCESS
- 2023Falcon 9 Block 5 | Galaxy 37SpXSUCCESS
- 2023Long March 4C | Fengyun-3FCASCSUCCESS
- 2021Hyperbola-1 | Jilin-1 Mofang-01A (?)i-SpaceFAILURE
- 2013H-IIB 304 | Kounotori 4 (HTV-4)MHISUCCESS
- 2008Falcon 1 | Flight 3SpXFAILURE
- 2004Delta II | MessengerUSAFSUCCESS
- 1995Ariane 42L | PAS 4ASASUCCESS
- 1994Atlas IIA | DirecTV 2USAFSUCCESS
- 1994Pegasus | APEXOSCSUCCESS
- 1990Soyuz-U-PVB | Yantar-4K2 54CCCPSUCCESS
- 1987Soyuz-U2 | Progress 31CCCPSUCCESS
- 1985Scout G-1 | Transit-O 24,30USAFSUCCESS
- 1983Kosmos-3M | Strela-2M 32CCCPSUCCESS
- 1982Soyuz U | Zenit-4MT 23CCCPSUCCESS
- 1981Delta 3913 | Dynamics Explorer 1 & 2USAFSUCCESS
- 1979Soyuz U | Zenit-4MT 16CCCPSUCCESS
- 1977Soyuz U | Bion 4CCCPSUCCESS
- 1971Kosmos 11K63 | DS-P1-Yu 44CCCPFAILURE
- 1965Atlas SLV-3 Agena D | KH-7 21USAFSUCCESS
- 1965Voskhod | Zenit-4 9CCCPSUCCESS
FIELD KIT / LIBRARY
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General-audience astronomy and spaceflight — none of it a textbook.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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.