Skip to content
DELTA-V

MARKED ON THIS DATE

ARCHIVE // DAY OF YEAR

August 25 in spaceflight

22 orbital launches flew on August 25, the earliest of them in 1958, and 16 reached orbit. Wikipedia records 11 spaceflight and astronomy events on August 25. Below are the pictures NASA published on August 25 in 6 different years — each one taken or released on this exact date.

DATE

Launches

ON RECORD

22MISSIONS

16 of them reached orbit. The earliest was 1958, the most recent 2026.

Recorded events

IN THE RECORD

11ENTRIES

Spaceflight and astronomy entries from Wikipedia's record of this date, oldest first — from 1609 onward.

Pictures from this date

PUBLISHED

6IMAGES

NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day for August 25, one per year. Some are public domain and some belong to the photographer — each says which.

Published on August 25

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

NASA Science

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

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.

© Andy Casely — 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.

© Lucy Yunxi Hu — 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.

NASA · public domain

What happened on August 25

  1. 1609

    Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei (pictured) demonstrated his first telescope to Venetian lawmakers.

    Galileo Galilei ↗

  3. 1835

    The first Great Moon Hoax article is published in The New York Sun, announcing the discovery of life and civilization on the Moon.

    Great Moon Hoax ↗

  4. 1981

    Voyager 2 spacecraft makes its closest approach to Saturn.

    Voyager 2 ↗

  5. 1989

    The NASA spacecraft Voyager 2 made its closest approach to Neptune and provided definitive proof of the existence of the planet's rings (pictured).

    NASA ↗

  6. 1989

    Voyager 2 spacecraft makes its closest approach to Neptune, the last planet in the Solar System at the time, due to Pluto being within Neptune's orbit from 1979 to 1999.

    Voyager 2 ↗

  7. 2001

    American singer Aaliyah and several members of her record company were killed when their overloaded aircraft crashed shortly after takeoff from Marsh Harbour Airport in The Bahamas.

    Aaliyah ↗

  8. 2001

    American singer Aaliyah and several members of her entourage are killed as their overloaded aircraft crashes shortly after takeoff from Marsh Harbour Airport, Bahamas.

    Aaliyah ↗

  9. 2003

    NASA successfully launches the Spitzer Space Telescope into space.

    NASA ↗

  10. 2012

    The NASA space probe Voyager 1 became the first man-made object to enter interstellar space.

    NASA ↗

  11. 2012

    Voyager 1 spacecraft enters interstellar space, becoming the first man-made object to do so.

    Voyager 1 ↗

Every launch on August 25

22 launches

ONLINE
  1. 2026Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 10-49SpXSUCCESS
  2. 2026Long March 6C | 7 satellitesCASCSUCCESS
  3. 2025Long March 8A | SatNet LEO Group 10CASCSUCCESS
  4. 2023Ceres-1 | Jilin-1 Wideband-02AGESUCCESS
  5. 2018SARGE | Launch 1 - "Pathfinder"EXOSPARTIAL
  6. 2009Naro-1 | STSat-2AKARIFAILURE
  7. 2003Delta II | Spitzer Space TelescopeUSAFSUCCESS
  8. 1998Ariane 44P | ST-1ASASUCCESS
  9. 1997Delta 7920-8 | ACEUSAFSUCCESS
  10. 1994Soyuz U | Progress M-24RFSASUCCESS
  11. 1991H-1 | Yuri 3BMHISUCCESS
  12. 1988Scout G-1 | Transit-O 25,31ASISUCCESS
  13. 1983Proton-K/DM | Raduga 13CCCPSUCCESS
  14. 1977Delta 2313 | Sirio 1USAFSUCCESS
  15. 1966Saturn IB | Apollo AS-202NASASUCCESS
  16. 1965Thor Delta C | OSO CUSAFFAILURE
  17. 1965Voskhod | Zenit-4 10CCCPSUCCESS
  18. 1964Scout X-4 | Explorer 20NASASUCCESS
  19. 1963Thor SLV-2A Agena D | KH-4A 1USAFSUCCESS
  20. 1962Molniya 8K78 | Venera 2aCCCPFAILURE
  21. 1961Scout X-1 | Explorer 13NASAFAILURE
  22. 1958Project Pilot | NOTS 4USNFAILURE

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.