2024 in spaceflight

2024 in spaceflight

Clockwise from top: IM-1 lunar lander, Europa Clipper probe, Chang'e 6 lunar sampling area, and Starship booster return during flight test 5
Orbital launches
First	1 January
Last	31 December
Total	261
Successes	253
Failures	6
Partial failures	2
Catalogued	239
National firsts
Satellite	Croatia  Senegal
Space traveller	Belarus  Turkey
Rockets
Maiden flights	Angara A5 / Orion Ariane 62 Gravity-1 KAIROS Kuaizhou 1A Pro Long March 6C Long March 5B / YZ-2 Long March 12 Vulcan Centaur VC2S Zhuque-2E
Retirements	Delta IV Heavy Kuaizhou 1A Vega Starship Block 1
Crewed flights
Orbital	9
Orbital travellers	28
Suborbital	5
Suborbital travellers	30
Total travellers	58
v t e

In 2024, saw new world records for orbital launch attempts and successful orbital launches for the fourth consecutive year. Notable milestones included the successful maiden launches of the American Vulcan Centaur and China's Gravity-1, and Long March 12 rockets. The European Ariane 6 rocket also conducted its inaugural flight, though it experienced a partial failure. SpaceX advanced its Starship development, with flight test 5 achieving the first landing of its first stage. Additionally, the final launch of a Delta family rocket, a Delta IV Heavy variant, occurred in April.

In September, the private Polaris Dawn mission made history by performing the first commercial spacewalk, during which two crew members exited their Crew Dragon spacecraft. This mission set a new record for the number of individuals—four—simultaneously exposed to the vacuum of space.

Two significant scientific missions were launched in October: NASA's Europa Clipper to Jupiter's moon Europa to look for signs of an ocean under its icy surface and ESA's Hera to the Didymos binary asteroid system that was impacted four years earlier by the DART spacecraft to validate the kinetic impact method of redirecting an asteroid on a trajectory to collide with Earth. On Mars, NASA's Ingenuity helicopter concluded operations in January after completing 72 flights when its rotor blades sustained critical damage.

The year also featured notable lunar missions. CNSA's Chang'e 6 successfully completed the first-ever sample return mission from far side of the Moon. JAXA's SLIM and Intuitive Machines' IM-1 achieved soft landings on the lunar surface; however, both landers tipped over during their final descent, leading to the conclusion of their missions shortly thereafter. With SLIM, Japan became the fifth country to accomplish a soft landing on the Moon.

A record for the most people simultaneously in orbit was set on 11 September, with 19 individuals. This was achieved following the launch of the three-person Soyuz MS-26 mission to the International Space Station (ISS), joining the nine crew members already aboard the ISS, the three crew members of China's Tiangong space station, and the four crew members of Polaris Dawn.

Throughout the year, the ISS hosted long-duration Expedition 70, 71, and 72 missions, as well as two short-term missions: the four-person crew of the privately-operated Axiom Mission 3 (which included Alper Gezeravcı, the first Turkish astronaut) and the Russia's 21st Visiting Expedition (which included Maryna Vasileuskaya, the first Belarusian cosmonaut to reach space, excluding Soviet and Russian citizens of Belarusian origin). Meanwhile, Tiangong was visited by the long-term Shenzhou 18 and 19 missions.