---
title: "33 Interesting Facts About Spacecrafts"
url: https://www.kickassfacts.com/spacecraft-facts/
date: 2018-07-04
modified: 2018-07-04
lang: en
author: "jazz"
description: "Here are 33 Interesting Spacecraft facts. 1-5 Spacecraft Facts 1. Japan successfully landed an unmanned spacecraft on an asteroid, collected samples in 2005. The probe returned to earth in 2010...."
categories:
  - "Fact List"
  - "Science"
  - "Technology"
image: https://www.kickassfacts.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/spacecraft-article.jpg
word_count: 1007
---

# 33 Interesting Facts About Spacecrafts

Here are 33 Interesting Spacecraft facts.

## 1-5 Spacecraft Facts

![](https://www.kickassfacts.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Hayabusa.jpg)

1. Japan successfully landed an unmanned spacecraft on an asteroid, collected samples in 2005. The probe returned to [earth](https://www.kickassfacts.com/25-interesting-facts-about-earth-part-2/) in 2010. - [Source](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hayabusa)

2.  To calculate the position of the Voyager 1 spacecraft some 12.5 billion miles away, you only need to use the first 15 digits of the value of Pi to be accurate within 1.5 inches. - [Source](https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/edu/news/2016/3/16/how-many-decimals-of-pi-do-we-really-need/)

3. There is an area in the middle of the Pacific Ocean where no longer needed spacecraft are and have been routinely deposited. It is known as the "Spacecraft cemetery", and notably it is also the place where the defunct Mir space station rests. - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spacecraft_cemetery)

4. The CIA once "kidnapped" a Soviet spacecraft overnight, took it apart, studied it, reassembled it, and sent it back without the Soviets realizing. - [Source](https://www.popsci.com/cias-bold-kidnapping-soviet-spacecraft)

5.  Three LEGO figurines representing Galileo and the gods Jupiter and Juno were sent aboard the Juno spacecraft on a mission to Jupiter. - [Source](https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/juno/news/lego20110803.html)

## 6-10 Spacecraft Facts

![](https://www.kickassfacts.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/NASA-Bacteria-TersicoccusPhoenicis.jpg)

6. There is a [bacteria](https://www.kickassfacts.com/30-interesting-facts-about-bacteria/) that can survive with almost no nutrients in the spacecraft assembly clean room and is resistant against the sterilization measures used there. - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tersicoccus_phoenicis)

7. NASA is well on its way to developing a reactionless propulsion system for spacecraft. - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_vacuum_thruster)

8. When the Space Shuttle Columbia landed in White Sands, New Mexico in 1982, sand got everywhere. So much gypsum dust got into the spacecraft that sand kept coming out from nooks and crannies of Columbia for the next two decades. - [Source](http://www.americaspace.com/2013/03/30/a-kind-of-wheelie-the-salty-landing-of-sts-3/)

9. In 1999, [NASA](https://www.kickassfacts.com/25-kickass-and-interesting-facts-about-nasa-part-3/) spacecraft burned up in [Mars](https://www.kickassfacts.com/20-kickass-interesting-facts-mars/)' atmosphere because all the units were in the metric system except for one contractors' (Lockheed Martin) numbers, which were in U.S. Industrial units. - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Climate_Orbiter)

10. The spacecraft Solar Probe Plus which is scheduled to be launched in 2018 will achieve a speed of 432,000 mph, making it the fastest man-made object ever built. - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parker_Solar_Probe)

## 11-15 Spacecraft Facts

![](https://www.kickassfacts.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Skylon_front_view.jpg)Image credit: en.m.wikipedia.org

11. The British are close to having a single stage spacecraft capable of over 180 spaceflights a year. - [Source](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skylon_(spacecraft))

12. The memory used in the Apollo spacecraft's computer was based on weaving thin copper wires around magnetic doughnuts. Half a mile of wire gave them 65 KBits of information. - [Source](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIBhPsyYCiM&feature=player_detailpage#t=1235)

13. The Voyager 1 spacecraft is still alive and well. In December of last year, it used its rockets to maneuver for the first time in 37 years. - [Source](https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/voyager-1-fires-up-thrusters-after-37)

14. The Flyby Anomaly is when spacecraft do Earth-flybys at certain angles, they experience a small but sudden velocity increase, which is still unexplained. One of the proposed explanations is the existence of a ring of dark matter around [Earth](https://www.kickassfacts.com/25-interesting-facts-about-earth-part-2/). - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Flyby_anomaly)

15. Apollo 12 landed within 600 feet of the Surveyor 3 spacecraft that had arrived 2 years earlier. Parts of the spacecraft were retrieved and taken back home for examination. - [Source](https://www.nasa.gov/content/astronauts-pay-a-visit-to-surveyor-3)

## 16-20 Spacecraft Facts

![](https://www.kickassfacts.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Huygens.jpg)Image credit: en.wikipedia.org

16. There was a design flaw in the Huygens lander's communications system. Scientists were unable to make a firmware update on the Cassini spacecraft, so they plotted an alternative orbital trajectory that would use the Doppler effect to correct the programming error. - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huygens_(spacecraft)#Critical_design_flaw_partially_resolved)

17. NASA's Kepler spacecraft has discovered over 2,325 exoworlds, which is more than 2/3rd of the known planets currently in our galaxy. - [Source](https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/05/160510-new-planets-kepler-nasa-earth-space/)

18. Spacecraft designers have to contend with a poorly-understood phenomenon known as "cold welding" where clean metal surfaces can spontaneously weld themselves together in the vacuum of space. - [Source](http://www.esa.int/About_Us/ESA_Publications/STM-279_Assessment_of_the_Cold_Welding_between_Separable_Contact_due_to_Impact_and_Fretting_under_Vacuum)

19. A theoretical spacecraft was designed to travel 92% the speed of light, granting humans the ability to travel to different star systems within their lifetimes. - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Valkyrie)

20. As NASA's Jupiter-bound Juno spacecraft swung past Earth on Oct. 9, 2013, amateur radio operators around the world sent a Morse Code "HI" to the spacecraft, and Juno heard them! - [Source](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yqHy_MpNiQ&feature=share)

## 21-25 Spacecraft Facts

![](https://www.kickassfacts.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/1982_CPA.jpg)

21. The Venera 14 spacecraft landed on Venus in 1982 to measure the compressibility of the soil. It ended up measuring the compressibility of its own lens cap, which landed right where the spacecraft was to measure the soil. - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venera_14)

22. Had the effects of the sun's radiation pressure on the spacecraft of the Viking program been ignored, the spacecraft would have missed Mars orbit by about 15,000 kilometers. - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_pressure)

23. The Rosetta spacecraft, while studying comet 67P, discovered electrons cause the rapid breakup of [water](https://www.kickassfacts.com/30-kickass-interesting-facts-water/) and carbon dioxide molecules erupting from the surface, not photons (light) as previously thought. - [Source](https://www.space.com/29672-rosetta-comet-eruptions-surprising-discovery.html)

24. While Armstrong was still on the surface of the [moon](https://www.kickassfacts.com/30-kickass-and-interesting-facts-about-moon/), a Soviet spacecraft crashed into a Luna mountain range. - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luna_15)

25. The first view of the far side (or "dark side") of the moon was carried out in 1959 by the Soviet spacecraft Luna 3. - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luna_3)

## 26-30 Spacecraft Facts

![](https://www.kickassfacts.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Apollo_Pad_Abort_Test_-2.jpg)

26. The tower on top of the Apollo spacecraft contained a launch escape system, which could eject the crew module safely away from an imminent rocket explosion. The tower contained a solid-fueled rocket and used the craft's parachutes to get the crew to safety. - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Launch_escape_system)

27. The first spacecraft to reach another planet was launched from Kazakhstan. - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venera_3)

28. The Mariner 1 spacecraft exploded after takeoff due to a single digit of code missing from its software, a failure that cost [NASA](https://www.kickassfacts.com/30-kickass-interesting-facts-about-nasa-part-1/) $18,000,000 in 1962. - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mariner_1)

29. Using a planet's gravity assist to accelerate spacecraft slightly slows the rotation of the [planet](https://www.kickassfacts.com/25-kickass-and-amazing-facts-about-planets/). - [Source](http://www.planetary.org/blogs/guest-blogs/2013/20130926-gravity-assist.html)

30. By the time Pioneer 11, launched in 1973, became the first spacecraft to fly by [Saturn](https://www.kickassfacts.com/saturn-facts/) in 1979, both of the next-generation Voyager probes had already passed Jupiter. - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pioneer_11#Saturn_encounter)

## 31-33 Spacecraft Facts

![](https://www.kickassfacts.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Almaz_drawing.png)

31. The USSR launched a highly secret, weaponized space station program called Almaz. The space station was armed with a rapid-fire cannon, making it the only weaponized spacecraft in human space-flight history. - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Almaz)

32. NASA launches spacecraft from different sites based on the direction of orbit; from Cape Canaveral for spacecraft requiring a west-east orbit, from Vandenberg Air Force Base for spacecraft requiring a north-south orbit. - [Source](https://www.nasa.gov/centers/kennedy/launchingrockets/sites.html)

33. The Galileo spacecraft remotely detected life on Earth through experiments designed by Carl Sagan. - [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galileo_%28spacecraft%29#Remote_detection_of_life_on_Earth)