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September 19 in spaceflight

21 orbital launches flew on September 19, the earliest of them in 1967, and 19 reached orbit. Wikipedia records 2 spaceflight and astronomy events on September 19. Below are the pictures NASA published on September 19 in 3 different years — each one taken or released on this exact date.

DATE

Launches

ON RECORD

21MISSIONS

19 of them reached orbit. The earliest was 1967, the most recent 2025.

Recorded events

IN THE RECORD

2ENTRIES

Spaceflight and astronomy entries from Wikipedia's record of this date, oldest first — from 1622 onward.

Pictures from this date

PUBLISHED

3IMAGES

NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day for September 19, one per year. Some are public domain and some belong to the photographer — each says which.

Published on September 19

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

NASA Science

2026

NASA Science

How was the Saturn system imaged so clearly? Astrophotographer Tom Williams captured such exquisite details due to one night of exceptional atmospheric conditions above the United Kingdom. This means more than a cloudless sky. Pockets of air at different temperatures and densities move around and bend light as it travels through Earth’s atmosphere, distorting astronomy images. This is called “seeing”. Less atmospheric turbulence means clearer images. The astrophotographer reduced the impact of seeing with the lucky imaging technique: thousands of short-exposure images are taken very quickly with a high-speed camera and the clearest images are added up. Which object in this smörgåsbord interests you? Perhaps Titan or the icy stripes of Enceladus? Maybe the gaps and spokes in Saturn’s rings? Saturn's opposition, when Earth passes in between the planet and the Sun, occurred on October 4th. Due to the planet's proximity and full illumination from the Sun, now is a great time of year to observe it!Tomorrow's picture: bumpy

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.

© Davide Broise — used with the credit NASA publishes

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

What happened on September 19

  1. 1622

    Imperial-Spanish forces under the count of Tilly and Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba capture Heidelberg, the capital of the Palatinate during the Thirty Years' War.

    Johann Tserclaes, Count of Tilly ↗

  2. 1852

    Annibale de Gasparis discovers the asteroid Massalia from the north dome of the Astronomical Observatory of Capodimonte.

    Annibale de Gasparis ↗

Every launch on September 19

21 launches

ONLINE
  1. 2025Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 17-12SpXSUCCESS
  2. 2024Long March 3B/YZ-1 | Beidou-3 M25 & M27CASCSUCCESS
  3. 2023Electron | We Will Never Desert You (Capella Acadia 2)RLFAILURE
  4. 2022Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 4-34SpXSUCCESS
  5. 2019Long March 11 | Zhuhai-1-03CASCSUCCESS
  6. 2018Long March 3B / YZ-1 | Beidou-3 M13 & M14CASCSUCCESS
  7. 2015Long March 6 | 20 Amateur satellitesCASCSUCCESS
  8. 2008Proton-M Briz-M | Nimiq 4KhSCSUCCESS
  9. 2007Long March 4B | Zi Yuan 1-2BCASCSUCCESS
  10. 1991Soyuz U | Yantar-4K2 60CCCPSUCCESS
  11. 1988Shavit | Ofeq-1ISASUCCESS
  12. 1985Soyuz U | Zenit-8 21CCCPSUCCESS
  13. 1985Tsiklon-2 | US-P 22CCCPSUCCESS
  14. 1981Feng Bao 1 | Shi Jian 2, 2A, 2BCASCSUCCESS
  15. 1980Soyuz U | Zenit-6U 25CCCPSUCCESS
  16. 1978Soyuz U | Zenit-2M 90CCCPSUCCESS
  17. 1974Kosmos-3M | Strela-1M 73-80CCCPSUCCESS
  18. 1972Molniya-M | US-K 1CCCPSUCCESS
  19. 1968Thor Delta M | INTELSAT III F-1USAFFAILURE
  20. 1967Titan IIIB | KH-8 8USAFSUCCESS
  21. 1967R-36O 8K69 | OGCh 13CCCPSUCCESS

FIELD KIT / LIBRARY

SPONSORED

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

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  • 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.