The First Rocket Launch from Cape Canaveral

A new chapter in Space Flight began in 1950 with the launch of the first Rocket from Cape Canaveral, Florida: the Bumper V-2.

Featured here, the Bumper V-2 was an ambitious two-stage Rocket program that topped a V-2 missile base with a WAC Corporal Rocket. The upper stage was able to reach then-record altitudes of almost 400 kilometers, about the height of the modern International Space Station. Launched under the direction of the General Electric Company, the Bumper V-2 was used primarily for testing Rocket systems and for research on the Upper Atmosphere.

Bumper V-2 rockets carried small payloads that allowed them to measure attributes including air temperature and Cosmic Ray impacts. Seven years later, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik I and Sputnik II, the first satellites into Earth orbit. In response in 1958, 60 years ago today, the USA created NASA.

Anniversary: NASA: 60 Years and Counting