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August 5 in spaceflight

22 orbital launches flew on August 5, the earliest of them in 1962, and 21 reached orbit. Wikipedia records 4 spaceflight and astronomy events on August 5. Below are the pictures NASA published on August 5 in 6 different years — each one taken or released on this exact date.

DATE

Launches

ON RECORD

22MISSIONS

21 of them reached orbit. The earliest was 1962, the most recent 2026.

Recorded events

IN THE RECORD

4ENTRIES

Spaceflight and astronomy entries from Wikipedia's record of this date, oldest first — from 1888 onward.

Pictures from this date

PUBLISHED

6IMAGES

NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day for August 5, one per year. Some are public domain and some belong to the photographer — each says which.

Published on August 5

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

NASA Science

2026

NASA Science

This stairway in Chile brings you only a little bit closer to heaven. But ooh, the sky above it makes you wonder. For example, you may wonder about the dark lane of our own Milky Way galaxy rising behind the expansive Atacama Desert in Chile, the band of zodiacal light on the upper left, the green and red airglow just above the horizon, the star Spica in the zodiacal light stripe, and, at the very top on the right, the Small Magellanic Cloud galaxy. The Desert Staircase sculpture is in the foreground, and this image was timed to catch the picturesque peering perch just in front of the near-vertical Milky Way band. Upon close inspection of the horizon you can find, left to right, some Andes Mountains, the Licancabur volcano, and the town lights of San Pedro de Atacama. The featured wide-angle composite was captured in July 2025.Tomorrow's picture: open space

NASA · public domain

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.

NASA · public domain

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.

© Dong Liang — used with the credit NASA publishes

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.

© Vikas Chander — used with the credit NASA publishes

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.

© Eduardo Schaberger Poupeau — used with the credit NASA publishes

What happened on August 5

  1. 1888

    Bertha Benz made the first long-distance automobile trip, driving 106 km (66 mi) from Mannheim to Pforzheim, Germany, in a Benz Patent-Motorwagen.

    Bertha Benz ↗

  2. 1888

    Bertha Benz drives from Mannheim to Pforzheim and back in the first long distance automobile trip, commemorated as the Bertha Benz Memorial Route since 2008.

    Bertha Benz ↗

Every launch on August 5

22 launches

ONLINE
  1. 2026Falcon 9 Block 5 | BlueBird 11-13 (Block 2 #6-8)SpXSUCCESS
  2. 2026Smart Dragon 3 | OSE HS-01 & 02CHNRSUCCESS
  3. 2025Electron | The Harvest Goddess Thrives (iQPS Launch 4)RLSUCCESS
  4. 2021Long March 3B | Zhongxing 2E (Chinasat 2E)CASCSUCCESS
  5. 2019Proton-M/Briz-M | Blagovest No.14L (Kosmos 2539)KhSCSUCCESS
  6. 2016Long March 3B/E | Tiantong 1-01CASCSUCCESS
  7. 2014Falcon 9 v1.1 | Asiasat 8SpXSUCCESS
  8. 2011Atlas V 551 | JunoULASUCCESS
  9. 1997Soyuz-U | Soyuz TM-26RFSASUCCESS
  10. 1995Delta II | Mugunghwa 1USAFFAILURE
  11. 1994Molniya-M | US-K 75PRSCSUCCESS
  12. 1988Long March 2C | FSW-1 2CASCSUCCESS
  13. 1987Long March 2C | FSW-0 9CASCSUCCESS
  14. 1983N-2 | Sakura 2BNASDASUCCESS
  15. 1983Soyuz U | Resurs-F1 17F41 25LCCCPSUCCESS
  16. 1982Vostok 8A92M | Tselina-D 37CCCPSUCCESS
  17. 1978Soyuz U | Yantar-2K 8CCCPSUCCESS
  18. 1978Titan 34B | Quasar 3USAFSUCCESS
  19. 1973Proton | Mars-6CCCPSUCCESS
  20. 1971Voskhod | Zenit-4M 20CCCPSUCCESS
  21. 1964Thor SLV-2A Agena D | KH-4A 9USAFSUCCESS
  22. 1962Atlas Agena B | Samos-E6 4USAFSUCCESS

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.