OTD…July 31 and STS-46

Scott Carpenter launched atop an Atlas rocket to become the second American to orbit the Earth today in 1962, flying for 4 hours and 39 minutes aboard Aurora 7 while making three revolutions of the globe.

Today in 1967…The astronauts of Apollo 1 lost their lives in a launch pad fire.

#OTD in 1999…Columbia launched with the first woman commander and the Chandra X-ray Observatory