2021: Another Turning Point for Space?

Article

“2021: Another Turning Point for Space?” by Christopher Gainor
Published in Quest Volume: 28 #3 (2021)

Abstract

The year 2020 saw the end of the long gap between launches of crewed spacecraft from American soil when the first Crew Dragon spacecraft departed Kennedy Space Center for the International Space Station nearly nine years after end of the Space Shuttle program.

This year, 2021, is heralding the end of an even longer gap in human spaceflight—the decades that have passed since anyone has flown beyond low Earth orbit.

That began when Apollo 17 returned home from the Moon in December 1972, and NASA’s sights shifted to LEO with Skylab, Apollo-Soyuz, the Space Shuttle, and then what became the International Space Station.

Citation

Gainor, Christopher. “2021: Another Turning Point for Space?” Quest: The History of Spaceflight Quarterly 28, no. 3 (2021): 67.