Space Flight Trivia Questions and Answers

Tap a choice for the answer, its reason and its source, from Sputnik to the last shuttle flights.

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What did Yuri Gagarin call out as his rocket lifted off?

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Unofficial practice questions, not affiliated with any school, exam board or quiz show. Bank checked October 2, 2026.

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How it works

These space flight trivia questions and answers run from Sputnik in 1957 to the last shuttle flights of 2011. About three in four are NASA trivia questions; the rest follow Soviet, European and Japanese flights.

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Four rounds, in date order

First satellites and first people in orbit covers 1957 to 1966: Sputnik, the dogs Belka and Strelka, Gagarin, Glenn and Gemini. The Moon program runs from the Saturn V to the night launch of Apollo 17. The shuttle and the space stations takes in Skylab, Mir and the first parts of the International Space Station. Probes and telescopes goes from Mariner 4 to Kepler.

Quiz a table or yourself

Tap a choice to check it; the reason and the page it was read on appear with the answer. Scored round asks 20 before it marks any. Team scores go on paper.

Tips
  • The Moon round settles a misquote: the Apollo 13 crew radioed "Houston, we've had a problem".

Questions and answers

What are some easy space flight trivia questions?

How many astronauts did a Gemini capsule carry? What struck Apollo 12 twice just after liftoff? What does the name Soyuz mean? The answers are two, lightning and union.

Who was the first American in space?

Alan Shepard, on May 5, 1961. His flight lasted about 15 minutes and did not circle the Earth. John Glenn circled it three times in February 1962.

How many space shuttle missions were there?

135, flown between 1981 and 2011 by five orbiters: Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, Atlantis and Endeavour. Discovery flew the most, 39 in all.

How were the answers checked?

Each was read on October 2 or 3, 2026 on the page linked under it: NASA's history and mission pages for six questions, Wikipedia for the rest. Records a later flight could break are left out. This site is not affiliated with NASA.

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All 92 questions with answers

First satellites and first people in orbit 23

  • About how long did Sputnik 1 take to circle the Earth once? Answer: 98 minutes. Source: NASA: Dawn of the Space Age
  • Alan Shepard became the first American in space on May 5, 1961. How long did his flight last? Answer: About 15 minutes. Source: Wikipedia: Mercury-Redstone 3
  • At which university did President Kennedy give the speech that says "We choose to go to the Moon"? Answer: Rice University. Source: Wikipedia: We choose to go to the Moon
  • Belka and Strelka flew in August 1960. Who were they? Answer: Two dogs that orbited the Earth and came back alive. Source: Wikipedia: Soviet space dogs
  • During the first spacewalk, in March 1965, why could Alexei Leonov hardly get back inside? Answer: His suit had stiffened in the vacuum. Source: Wikipedia: Voskhod 2
  • Gherman Titov flew Vostok 2 in August 1961. Which first was his? Answer: First person to spend a full day in orbit. Source: Wikipedia: Vostok 2
  • How did Yuri Gagarin reach the ground at the end of his flight? Answer: He was ejected from the capsule and landed by parachute. Source: Wikipedia: Vostok 1
  • How many astronauts did a Gemini capsule carry? Answer: Two. Source: Wikipedia: Project Gemini
  • How many times did John Glenn circle the Earth in February 1962? Answer: Three. Source: Wikipedia: Mercury-Atlas 6
  • In December 1965 Gemini 6A and Gemini 7 carried out the first what? Answer: Meeting of two crewed spacecraft in orbit. Source: Wikipedia: Gemini 7
  • Luna 1 missed the Moon in January 1959. What did it become instead? Answer: The first spacecraft in orbit around the Sun. Source: Wikipedia: Luna 1
  • NASA was created in 1958 out of which older body? Answer: The National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics. Source: NASA: Dawn of the Space Age
  • On December 6, 1957 the United States tried to launch its first satellite on the rocket Vanguard TV-3. What happened? Answer: It rose about a meter and fell back onto the pad. Source: Wikipedia: Vanguard TV-3
  • The Russian word sputnik was built from two parts. What do they mean together? Answer: Fellow traveler. Source: Wikipedia: Sputnik 1
  • Sergei Korolev led the rocket teams behind Sputnik and Vostok. What was he called in public while his name was a state secret? Answer: The Chief Designer. Source: Wikipedia: Sergei Korolev
  • Sputnik 1 was launched during which worldwide science event? Answer: The International Geophysical Year. Source: NASA: Dawn of the Space Age
  • What did an astronaut smuggle aboard Gemini 3 in March 1965? Answer: A corned beef sandwich. Source: Wikipedia: Gemini 3
  • What did Yuri Gagarin call out as his rocket lifted off? Answer: Poyekhali! Source: Wikipedia: Vostok 1
  • What happened to Gus Grissom's capsule, Liberty Bell 7, after it splashed down in July 1961? Answer: It sank. Source: Wikipedia: Mercury-Redstone 4
  • What was new about the Soviet flight Voskhod 1 in October 1964? Answer: It carried more than one person. Source: Wikipedia: Voskhod 1
  • Which flight of May 1963 was the last of Project Mercury? Answer: Gordon Cooper's Faith 7. Source: Wikipedia: Mercury-Atlas 9
  • Who was Ham, who rode a Mercury capsule in January 1961? Answer: A chimpanzee. Source: Wikipedia: Ham (chimpanzee)
  • Yuri Gagarin's capsule of April 1961 took its name from the Russian word for east. What was it called? Answer: Vostok 1. Source: Wikipedia: Vostok 1

The Moon program 22

  • About how long did the Apollo 11 lander stay on the Moon? Answer: 22 hours. Source: NASA: Apollo 11
  • About how much Moon rock and soil did the Apollo program bring to Earth? Answer: 382 kilograms. Source: Wikipedia: Apollo program
  • Alan Shepard, the first American in space, walked on the Moon ten years later as commander of which mission? Answer: Apollo 14. Source: Wikipedia: Apollo 14
  • Apollo 10 was a full rehearsal in May 1969. How close did its lunar module come to the surface of the Moon? Answer: About 14 kilometers. Source: Wikipedia: Apollo 10
  • Apollo 11 left a panel of reflectors on the Moon. What are such reflectors used for? Answer: Measuring the distance to the Moon with a laser. Source: Wikipedia: Lunar Laser Ranging experiments
  • Apollo 17 was the only Apollo crew to lift off at what time of day? Answer: At night. Source: Wikipedia: Apollo 17
  • Before it struck the Moon in July 1964, what did the American probe Ranger 7 send back? Answer: Close-up pictures of the surface. Source: Wikipedia: Ranger 7
  • Finish the words on the plaque that Apollo 11 left on the Moon: "We came in peace for ..." Answer: all mankind. Source: Wikipedia: Apollo 11
  • How long was the quarantine that the Apollo 11 astronauts began when they came home? Answer: 21 days. Source: Wikipedia: Apollo 11
  • How many stages did the Saturn V have? Answer: Three. Source: Wikipedia: Saturn V
  • How many times did Apollo 8 circle the Moon in December 1968? Answer: Ten. Source: Wikipedia: Apollo 8
  • How was a Saturn V rocket carried from its assembly building to the launch pad? Answer: On a giant tracked crawler. Source: Wikipedia: Crawler-transporter
  • On Apollo 15 an astronaut dropped a hammer and what else, to show that they fall at the same rate where there is no air? Answer: A feather. Source: Wikipedia: Apollo 15
  • The Soviet Union built a giant rocket, the N1, for its own Moon landing. How did its four test launches go? Answer: All four failed. Source: Wikipedia: N1 (rocket)
  • What nickname was given to a rock at least four billion years old that Apollo 15 brought back from the Moon? Answer: The Genesis Rock. Source: Wikipedia: Genesis Rock
  • What struck Apollo 12 twice just after liftoff in November 1969? Answer: Lightning. Source: Wikipedia: Apollo 12
  • What was the Apollo 11 command module called? Answer: Columbia. Source: Wikipedia: Apollo 11
  • Which aircraft carrier picked up the Apollo 11 crew from the Pacific? Answer: USS Hornet. Source: Wikipedia: Apollo 11
  • Which mission, in October 1968, was the first Apollo flight to carry a crew? Answer: Apollo 7. Source: Wikipedia: Apollo 7
  • Which part of Apollo 13 kept the crew alive on the way home? Answer: The lunar module, Aquarius. Source: Wikipedia: Apollo 13
  • Which rocket sent the Apollo crews toward the Moon? Answer: Saturn V. Source: Wikipedia: Saturn V
  • Which words did the Apollo 13 crew radio after their oxygen tank failed? Answer: "Houston, we've had a problem". Source: Wikipedia: Apollo 13

The shuttle and the space stations 23

  • From which state did every Space Shuttle mission lift off? Answer: Florida. Source: Wikipedia: Space Shuttle
  • How did a Space Shuttle orbiter come home at the end of a mission? Answer: It glided to a runway landing. Source: Wikipedia: Space Shuttle
  • How many astronauts flew on the first shuttle mission, in April 1981? Answer: Two. Source: Wikipedia: STS-1
  • How many main engines did a shuttle orbiter have? Answer: Three. Source: Wikipedia: Space Shuttle
  • How many missions did the Space Shuttle fly between 1981 and 2011? Answer: 135. Source: Wikipedia: Space Shuttle
  • How many Space Shuttle orbiters flew in space? Answer: Five. Source: Wikipedia: Space Shuttle
  • In the name of every shuttle mission, such as STS-1, what does STS stand for? Answer: Space Transportation System. Source: Wikipedia: Space Shuttle program
  • Kibo is Japan's laboratory on the International Space Station. What does its name mean? Answer: Hope. Source: Wikipedia: Kibō (ISS module)
  • Mir, assembled between 1986 and 1996, was the first space station to be built in which way? Answer: From modules joined together in orbit. Source: Wikipedia: Mir
  • The orbiter Atlantis was named after what? Answer: A sailing ship used for ocean research. Source: Wikipedia: Space Shuttle Atlantis
  • The orbiter Endeavour was named after the ship of which explorer? Answer: James Cook. Source: Wikipedia: Space Shuttle Endeavour
  • Skylab lost a shield during launch and began to overheat. What did its first crew put up? Answer: A sunshade like a parasol. Source: Wikipedia: Skylab
  • What does the name of the Russian spacecraft Soyuz mean? Answer: Union. Source: Wikipedia: Soyuz (spacecraft)
  • What does the Russian name Salyut, given to the first Soviet space stations, mean? Answer: Salute or fireworks. Source: Wikipedia: Salyut programme
  • What happened to the shuttle's two solid rocket boosters after they burned out? Answer: They parachuted into the ocean and were used again. Source: Wikipedia: Space Shuttle Solid Rocket Booster
  • What protected a shuttle orbiter from the heat of re-entry? Answer: Heat-resistant tiles. Source: Wikipedia: Space Shuttle
  • What was the test orbiter Enterprise used for in 1977? Answer: Gliding and landing tests in the air. Source: Wikipedia: Space Shuttle Enterprise
  • What was Unity, carried into orbit by Endeavour in December 1998? Answer: The first American-built part of the International Space Station. Source: Wikipedia: Unity (ISS module)
  • Which laboratory did the European Space Agency add to the International Space Station in February 2008? Answer: Columbus. Source: Wikipedia: Columbus (ISS module)
  • Which orbiter began life as a test frame for strength trials and was rebuilt to fly? Answer: Challenger. Source: Wikipedia: Space Shuttle Challenger
  • Which orbiter flew the most missions, 39 in all? Answer: Discovery. Source: Wikipedia: Space Shuttle Discovery
  • Who developed Spacelab, the laboratory that rode in the shuttle's cargo bay? Answer: The European Space Agency. Source: Wikipedia: Spacelab
  • Why was the shuttle's big external fuel tank orange? Answer: It was left unpainted. Source: Wikipedia: Space Shuttle external tank

Probes and telescopes 24

  • The Cassini orbiter was named after an astronomer who discovered what? Answer: Divisions in Saturn's rings and four of its moons. Source: Wikipedia: Cassini–Huygens
  • The Compton observatory circled the Earth from 1991 to 2000. Which rays was it named for and built to detect? Answer: Gamma rays. Source: Wikipedia: Compton Gamma Ray Observatory
  • How did the Galileo mission to Jupiter end in September 2003? Answer: The probe was steered into Jupiter. Source: Wikipedia: Galileo (spacecraft)
  • How did the Kepler space telescope, launched in 2009, find planets around other stars? Answer: It watched for a star to dim as a planet crossed it. Source: Wikipedia: Kepler space telescope
  • How many telescopes made up NASA's Great Observatories, launched between 1990 and 2003? Answer: Four. Source: Wikipedia: Great Observatories program
  • How many times did shuttle astronauts visit the Hubble Space Telescope to service it? Answer: Five. Source: NASA Science: About Hubble
  • How wide is the main mirror of the Hubble Space Telescope? Answer: 2.4 meters. Source: Wikipedia: Hubble Space Telescope
  • In 1965, while a computer was still processing the first picture sent by Mariner 4, how did the team get an early look at it? Answer: They colored in a printout of its numbers by hand, with pastels. Source: Wikipedia: Mariner 4
  • In 1967 Venera 4 made the first chemical analysis of the air of Venus. Which gas did it find most of? Answer: Carbon dioxide. Source: Wikipedia: Venera 4
  • In September 1985 a probe renamed ICE became the first spacecraft to visit which kind of body? Answer: A comet. Source: Wikipedia: International Cometary Explorer
  • IRAS, launched in 1983, was the first space telescope to survey the whole sky in which kind of light? Answer: Infrared. Source: Wikipedia: IRAS
  • The Magellan probe of 1989 was the first interplanetary mission to leave the Earth in which way? Answer: It was launched from a Space Shuttle. Source: Wikipedia: Magellan (spacecraft)
  • The Mars rover Sojourner of 1997 was named after a woman of the Civil War era. What did she campaign for? Answer: The end of slavery and the rights of women. Source: Wikipedia: Sojourner (rover)
  • The rover Opportunity was planned to work on Mars for 90 days. In which year did contact with it end? Answer: 2018. Source: Wikipedia: Opportunity (rover)
  • SOHO, launched in December 1995, was built to study what? Answer: The Sun. Source: Wikipedia: Solar and Heliospheric Observatory
  • Ulysses, launched in 1990, was built to fly over which part of the Sun? Answer: Its poles. Source: Wikipedia: Ulysses (spacecraft)
  • The Voyager probes fly too far from the Sun for solar panels. What supplies their electricity? Answer: Heat from decaying plutonium. Source: Wikipedia: Voyager 1
  • What did the lander of Venera 9 send home in October 1975? Answer: The first picture from the surface of another planet. Source: Wikipedia: Venera 9
  • What did the satellite COBE, launched in 1989, map across the whole sky? Answer: The faint microwave glow left from the early universe. Source: Wikipedia: Cosmic Background Explorer
  • What did the Stardust capsule bring back to Earth in January 2006? Answer: Dust from a comet. Source: Wikipedia: Stardust (spacecraft)
  • What is engraved on the metal plaques fixed to Pioneer 10 and Pioneer 11? Answer: A man, a woman and a map of where the craft came from. Source: Wikipedia: Pioneer plaque
  • Which comet did the probe Giotto fly close to in March 1986? Answer: Halley's Comet. Source: Wikipedia: Giotto (spacecraft)
  • Which was the only one of NASA's four Great Observatories that did not ride into orbit on a space shuttle? Answer: The Spitzer Space Telescope. Source: Wikipedia: Spitzer Space Telescope
  • Who led the committee that chose what went on the Voyagers' Golden Record? Answer: Carl Sagan. Source: NASA Science: Voyager
How this list was compiled

Written for this site; nothing was copied from another list. Questions and wrong choices are our own. Each explanation restates, in our own sentences, facts from the page named and linked beside it. Each answer was checked on 2026-10-02 against that page, fetched that day (two questions asked a new way were checked on 2026-10-03): four history and mission pages of NASA (https://www.nasa.gov and https://science.nasa.gov, United States government works: Dawn of the Space Age, Apollo 11, Voyager and About Hubble) for 6 of the 92 questions, and the English Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org, text under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license) for the rest. This site is not affiliated with NASA or any space agency. Dated history only: the flights run from 1957 to the last shuttle missions of 2011, plus the later end dates of a few probes. Left out on purpose: records that a later flight could break, anything described as current, the accidents in which crews died, and living people as answers. Dropped after checking: questions whose fact another quiz on this site already asks (Luna 2 and Luna 3, the first American spacewalk, the tortoises of Zond 5, Mariner 2, Mariner 10, Pioneer 10, the Viking life experiments, the airbags of Mars Pathfinder, Huygens, Deep Impact, Chandra, NEAR Shoemaker, Hayabusa, the radiation belts found by Explorer 1, Kennedy's Moon goal of 1961, the landing of Luna 9, the one flight of Buran, the first close-up pictures of Mars and the radar of Magellan) and facts the linked page did not state plainly. Levels are our estimate: easy is fair for any table, medium suits people who follow space flight, hard will stump most of them. Each round is stored easiest first, and each question carries the date its page was read. Licence: own work