Editing Satellite (section)

=== First satellites ===
[[File:Sputnik asm.jpg|alt=Steel ball with 4 antennas|thumb|Replica of the [[Sputnik 1]]]]
The first artificial satellite was [[Sputnik 1]], launched by the [[Soviet Union]] on 4 October 1957 under the [[Sputnik program]], with [[Sergei Korolev]] as chief designer. Sputnik 1 helped to identify the density of high [[Earth's atmosphere#Temperature and layers|atmospheric layers]] through measurement of its orbital change and provided data on radio-signal distribution in the [[ionosphere]]. The unanticipated announcement of Sputnik 1's success precipitated the [[Sputnik crisis]] in the United States and ignited the so-called Space Race within the [[Cold War]].

In the context of activities planned for the [[International Geophysical Year]] (1957–1958), the [[White House]] announced on 29 July 1955 that the U.S. intended to launch satellites by the spring of 1958. This became known as [[Project Vanguard]]. On 31 July, the Soviet Union announced its intention to launch a satellite by the fall of 1957.

[[Sputnik 2]] was launched on 3 November 1957 and carried the first living passenger into orbit, a dog named [[Laika]].<ref name="nasa_animals">{{cite web |title=A Brief History of Animals in Space |url=https://history.nasa.gov/animals.html |first1=Tara |last1=Gray |first2=Steve |last2=Garber |publisher=[[NASA]] |date=2 August 2004 |access-date=12 July 2017 |archive-date=11 October 2004 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20041011053912/https://history.nasa.gov/animals.html |url-status=live}}</ref> The dog was sent without possibility of return.

In early 1955, after being pressured by the [[American Rocket Society]], the [[National Science Foundation]], and the International Geophysical Year, the Army and Navy worked on [[Project Orbiter]] with two competing programs. The army used the [[Jupiter-C IRBM|Jupiter C rocket]], while the civilian–Navy program used the [[Vanguard (rocket)|Vanguard rocket]] to launch a satellite. [[Explorer 1]] became the United States' first artificial satellite, on 31 January 1958.<ref>{{cite news |title=50th anniversary of first U.S. satellite launch celebrated |url=http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2008/01/30/state/n151715S68.DTL |agency=[[Associated Press]] |first=Alicia |last=Chang |work=San Francisco Chronicle |date=30 January 2008 |url-status=dead |archive-date=1 February 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080201193510/http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=%2Fn%2Fa%2F2008%2F01%2F30%2Fstate%2Fn151715S68.DTL}}</ref> The information sent back from its radiation detector led to the discovery of the Earth's [[Van Allen radiation belt]]s.<ref name="Allen">{{cite web |title=James A. Van Allen |url=http://www.nmspacemuseum.org/halloffame/detail.php?id=86 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180515112204/http://www.nmspacemuseum.org/halloffame/detail.php?id=86 |archive-date=15 May 2018 |access-date=14 May 2018 |website=nmspacemuseum.org |publisher=New Mexico Museum of Space History}}</ref> The [[TIROS-1]] spacecraft, launched on April 1, 1960, as part of NASA's [[Television Infrared Observation Satellite]] (TIROS) program, sent back the first television footage of weather patterns to be taken from space.<ref name="Tatem">{{cite journal |last1=Tatem |first1=Andrew J. |last2=Goetz |first2=Scott J. |last3=Hay |first3=Simon I. |date=2008 |title=Fifty Years of Earth-observation Satellites |journal=American Scientist |volume=96 |issue=5 |pages=390–398 |doi=10.1511/2008.74.390 |pmc=2690060 |pmid=19498953 |issn=0003-0996 }}</ref>

In June 1961, three and a half years after the launch of Sputnik 1, the [[United States Space Surveillance Network]] cataloged 115 Earth-orbiting satellites.<ref>{{cite web |first1=David S. F. |last1=Portree |first2=Joseph P. Jr. |last2=Loftus |url=http://ston.jsc.nasa.gov/collections/TRS/_techrep/TP-1999-208856.pdf |title=Orbital Debris: A Chronology |page=18 |work=[[Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center]] |year=1999 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20000901071135/http://ston.jsc.nasa.gov/collections/TRS/_techrep/TP-1999-208856.pdf |archive-date=1 September 2000 |access-date=21 November 2008}}</ref>

While Canada was the third country to build a satellite which was launched into space,<ref>{{cite book |last=Burleson |first=Daphne |title=Space Programs Outside the United States |publisher=[[McFarland & Company]] |year=2005 |isbn=978-0-7864-1852-7 |page=43}}</ref> it was launched aboard an [[United States|American]] rocket from an American spaceport. The same goes for Australia, whose launch of the first satellite involved a donated U.S. [[PGM-11 Redstone|Redstone]] rocket and American support staff as well as a joint launch facility with the United Kingdom.<ref>{{cite book |author=Mike Gruntman |title=Blazing the Trail |publisher=[[American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics]] |year=2004 |isbn=978-1-56347-705-8 |page=426 |author-link=Mike Gruntman}}</ref> The first Italian satellite [[San Marco 1]] was launched on 15 December 1964 on a U.S. [[Scout rocket]] from [[Wallops Island]] (Virginia, United States) with an Italian launch team trained by [[NASA]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Harvey |first=Brian |title=Europe's Space Programme |publisher=[[Springer Science+Business Media]] |year=2003 |isbn=978-1-85233-722-3 |page=114}}</ref> In similar occasions, almost all further first national satellites were launched by foreign rockets.{{citation needed|date=September 2023}}

France was the third country to launch a satellite on its own rocket. On 26 November 1965, the [[Astérix (satellite)|Astérix]] or A-1 (initially conceptualized as FR.2 or FR-2), was put into orbit by a [[Diamant]] A rocket launched from the CIEES site at [[Hammaguir]], [[Algeria]]. With Astérix, France became the sixth country to have an artificial satellite.