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Juno II | Beacon

Army Ballistic Missile Agency | United States of America
Cape Canaveral, FL, USA
Aug. 15, 1959, 12:31 a.m.
Status: Launch Failure
Mission:

Beacon 2 was launched an a three stage Juno 2 rocket. The vehicle ran into trouble three minutes into flight and an array of failures caused the GNC system to fail causing the satellite to fall short of orbit.

Low Earth Orbit
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Thor Agena A | Discoverer 5

McDonnell Douglas | United States of America
Vandenberg SFB, CA, USA
Aug. 13, 1959, 7 p.m.
Status: Launch Successful
Mission:

Discoverer 5 was the fifth in a series of reconnaissance satellites, however, it failed to return its capsule when it was accidentally sent into a higher orbit.

Polar Orbit
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Thor Able III | Explorer 6

McDonnell Douglas | United States of America
Cape Canaveral, FL, USA
Aug. 7, 1959, 2:24 p.m.
Status: Launch Successful
Mission:

Explorer 6 was an American satellite designed to study trapped radiation of various energies, galactic cosmic rays, geomagnetism, radio propagation and the flux of micrometeorites. It also tested a scanning device designed for photographing the Earth's cloud cover, and transmitted the first pictures of Earth from a satellite.

Elliptical Orbit
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Juno II | NASA S-1

Army Ballistic Missile Agency | United States of America
Cape Canaveral, FL, USA
July 16, 1959, 5:37 p.m.
Status: Launch Failure
Mission:

The S-1 satellite was a geoscience satellite equipped with a suite of scientific instruments to study the environment around the Earth. It was destroyed 5 seconds into launch when the launch vehicle exploded due to an issue with the launch vehicles power supply.

Elliptical Orbit
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Thor Agena A | Discoverer 4

McDonnell Douglas | United States of America
Vandenberg SFB, CA, USA
June 25, 1959, 10:47 p.m.
Status: Launch Failure
Mission:

Discoverer 4 was the fourth in a series of reconnaissance satellites, however, it failed to reach orbit when the Agena engine underperformed and failed to place the capsule into orbit.

Polar Orbit
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Vanguard | Vanguard

Lockheed Martin | United States of America
Cape Canaveral, FL, USA
June 22, 1959, 8:16 p.m.
Status: Launch Failure
Mission:

Vanguard is a scientific satellite to measure the Earth's magnetic field, solar X-ray radiation and its effects on the Earth's atmosphere and the near-Earth micrometeoroid environment.

Low Earth Orbit
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Vostok-L 8K72 | Luna-2a

Energia | Russia
Baikonur Cosmodrome, Republic of Kazakhstan
June 18, 1959, 8:08 a.m.
Status: Launch Failure
Mission:

Luna E-1 number 5 was a Soviet spacecraft intended to impact the moon but was lost in a launch failure.

Lunar Impactor
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Thor Agena A | Discoverer 3

McDonnell Douglas | United States of America
Vandenberg SFB, CA, USA
June 3, 1959, 8:09 p.m.
Status: Launch Failure
Mission:

The Discoverer 3 reconnaissance satellite failed to reach orbit due to a failure of the Agena A upper stage.

Polar Orbit
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Vanguard | Vanguard

Lockheed Martin | United States of America
Cape Canaveral, FL, USA
April 14, 1959, 2:49 a.m.
Status: Launch Failure
Mission:

The Vanguard satellite was a 13 inch spherical satellite which contained a precise magnetometer to map the Earth's magnetic field. The satellite was lost together with the Vanguard Balloon when the Vanguard launch vehicle second stage was damaged during staging.

Low Earth Orbit
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Thor Agena A | Discoverer 2

McDonnell Douglas | United States of America
Vandenberg SFB, CA, USA
April 13, 1959, 9:18 p.m.
Status: Launch Successful
Mission:

Discoverer II successfully reached orbit and took photos of Earth. However, when the capsule with the data was ejected in order to re-enter the atmosphere there was a timer malfunction meaning it seperated too early and landed over the North Pole rather than the intended target of Hawaii. The capsule was never recovered.

Polar Orbit
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