Launch Vehicles
Redstone
United States
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An American liquid-fueled launch vehicle adapted from the U.S. Army's Redstone ballistic missile, developed under Wernher von Braun's team. Its Mercury-Redstone variant carried Alan Shepard on Freedom 7 in May 1961, the first American spaceflight, a suborbital hop that opened the crewed side of the U.S. space program.
Facts
Vehicle ClassSingle-stage expendable suborbital launch vehicle 1 Manufacturer First Flight DateDate of the first crewed Mercury-Redstone flight, Freedom 7; the Redstone missile itself first flew as a ballistic missile in 1953. StatusRetired; flew six Mercury-program missions, two crewed, before Project Mercury moved to the larger Atlas launch vehicle for orbital flights. 2 Cross-Tradition Connections
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