- April 28
- Soyuz TM-32 lifts off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, carrying the first space tourist, American Dennis Tito. [22]
- May 6
- Space tourist Dennis Tito returns to Earth aboard Soyuz TM-31. Soyuz TM-32 is left docked at the International Space Station as a new lifeboat. [22]
- May 22
- A large trans-Neptunian object (28978 Ixion) is found during the Deep Ecliptic Survey. [22]
- September 21
- Deep Space 1 flies within 2,200 km of Comet Borrelly. [5]
- October 15
- NASA's Galileo spacecraft passes within 112 miles of Jupiter's moon Io. [22]
- November 27
- The Hubble Space Telescope detects the first atmosphere (in this case, hydrogen) on an extrasolar planet (on Osiris). [5]
2002
- February 19
- NASA's Mars Odyssey space probe begins to map the surface of Mars using its thermal emission imaging system. [5] [23]
- March 1
- The Envisat environmental satellite successfully reaches an orbit 800 km above the Earth using an Ariane 5 on its 11th launch, carrying the heaviest payload to date at 8500kg. [23]
- Space Shuttle Columbia flies the Hubble Space Telescope service mission, its last before STS-107. [23]
- April 25
- Soyuz TM-34: South African Mark Shuttleworth blasts off from the Baikonur cosmodrome; he had paid £15 million for the trip. [23]
- May 12
- The Russian Shuttle Buran is destroyed when the roof of the hangar collapses, killing eight workers. [23]
- May 26
- The Mars Odyssey finds signs of huge water ice deposits on the planet Mars. [23]
- May 28
- The Mars Odyssey finds signs of large ice deposits on the planet Mars. [5]
- June 4
- The planetoid Quaoar is discovered orbiting the Sun in the Kuiper belt. [23]
- June 10
- An annular solar eclipse occurs. [23]
- June 15
- Near Earth Asteroid 2002 MN misses our planet by 75,000 miles (120,000 km) about one third the distance to the moon. [23]
- October 7
- The discovery of Quaoar, a planet-like body orbiting the Sun, is announced. [23]
- December 4
- A total solar eclipse occurs. [23]
2003
- January 6
- Astronomers in Seattle, Washington, announce the discovery of planet OGLE-TR-56b. The planet, about 5000 light-years from Earth, has a surface temperature of 1600 degrees C, and an orbit of 29 hours around its parent star. [161.69]
- January 22
- The last successful contact arrives from the spacecraft Pioneer 10, one of the most distant man-made objects. [5]
- January 23
- Communication ends between Earth and Pioneer 10. [5]
- February 1
- American Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrates over Texas upon re-entry, killing all seven astronauts onboard: Michael P. Anderson (born 1959), David M. Brown (born 1956), Kalpana Chawla (born 1961), Laurel Clark (born 1961), Rick Husband (born 1957), William McCool (born 1961), Ilan Ramon (Israeli, born 1954). [24] [129] [180.79]
- March 28
- Japan launches two spy satellites into orbit. North Korea calls it "a hostile act". [238.40]
- June 10
- NASA begins its Mars Exploration Rover mission by launching Spirit Rover. [5]
- August 22
- A rocket explosion kills 21 at the Brazilian rocket complex in Alcântara, Brazil, due to the premature ignition of a solid rocket booster. [24]
- August 27
- Mars makes its closest approach to Earth in over 50,000 years. [24]
- September 3
- Hubble Space Telescope starts Hubble Ultra Deep Field. [24]
- September 21
- Galileo mission is terminated by sending the probe into Jupiter's atmosphere, where it is crushed by the pressure at the lower altitudes. [5]
- September 27
- In French Guiana, the European Space Agency launches its first space probe to the Moon, the SMART-1 on an Arian 5 rocket. [24] [524.45]
- October 15
- China launches Shenzhou 5, their first manned space mission. [24]
- November 9
- A lunar eclipse is seen in the Americas, Europe, Africa, and Central Asia. [24]
- November 23
- A total solar eclipse is seen over Antarctica. [24]
- December 25
- Beagle 2 is scheduled to land on Mars, but nothing is heard from the lander. [24]
2004
- January 4
- NASA's MER-A (Spirit) lands on Mars at 04:35 UTC. [5] [25]
- January 24
- At 05:05 UTC, NASA's MER-B (Opportunity) rover lands on Mars. [5] [25]
- February 13
- The Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics discovers the universe's largest known diamond, white dwarf star BPM 37093. [5]
- March 2
- NASA announces that the Mars rover MER-B (Opportunity) has confirmed that its landing area was once drenched in water. [25]
- June 8
- The first transit of Venus since 1882 occurs; the next one will occur in 2012. [25]
- June 21
- In Mojave, California, SpaceShipOne becomes the first privately-funded spaceplane to achieve spaceflight. [25]
- July 1
- The Cassini-Huygens spacecraft arrives at Saturn. [25]
- September 29
- Asteroid 4179 Toutatis crosses path of Earth within 1.5 million km. [523.184]
- October 4
- SpaceShipOne reaches space for the second time, winning US$10 million in the Ansari x Prize challenge. [108.66]
- October 23
- Brazil's "Operation Cajuana" launches its first rocket into space, the VSB-30, just 14 months after its space program experienced a deadly launch pad accident. [5] (October 24 [25])
- October 26
- The Cassini probe passes within 1,200km of Titan. [25]
- November 16
- The European Space Agency probe, Smart 1, passes from Earth orbit into the orbit of the Moon. [25]
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