Editing Human spaceflight (section)

== Milestones ==

=== By achievement ===
; 12 April 1961
: [[Yuri Gagarin]] was the first human in space and the first in Earth orbit, on [[Vostok 1]].
; 17 July 1962 or 19 July 1963
: Either [[Robert Michael White|Robert M. White]] or [[Joseph A. Walker]] (depending on the definition of the [[space border]]) was the first to pilot a [[spaceplane]], the [[North American X-15]], on 17 July 1962 (White) or 19 July 1963 (Walker).
; 18 March 1965
: [[Alexei Leonov]] was first to [[Extravehicular activity|walk in space]].
; 15 December 1965
: [[Walter M. Schirra]] and [[Thomas P. Stafford|Tom Stafford]] were first to perform a [[space rendezvous]], piloting their [[Gemini 6A]] spacecraft to achieve [[Orbital station-keeping|station-keeping]] {{convert|1|ft|cm|spell=in}} from [[Gemini 7]] for over 5 hours.
; 16 March 1966
: [[Neil Armstrong]] and [[David Scott]] were first to [[docking and berthing of spacecraft|rendezvous and dock]], piloting their [[Gemini 8]] spacecraft to dock with an uncrewed [[Agena Target Vehicle]].
; 21–27 December 1968
: [[Frank Borman]], [[Jim Lovell]], and [[William Anders]] were the first to travel beyond low Earth orbit (LEO) and the first to orbit the Moon, on the [[Apollo 8]] mission, which orbited the Moon ten times before returning to Earth.
; 26 May 1969
: Apollo 10 reaches the fastest speed ever traveled by a human: 39,897 km/h (11.08 km/s or 24,791 mph), or roughly 1/27,000 of [[lightspeed]].
; 20 July 1969
: Neil Armstrong and [[Buzz Aldrin]] were first to land on the Moon, during [[Apollo 11]].
; 14 April 1970
: The crew of [[Apollo 13]] attained [[pericynthion]] above the Moon, setting the current record for the highest absolute altitude attained by a crewed spacecraft: {{convert|400,171|km|mi|abbr=off|sp=us}} from Earth.
; Longest time in space
: [[Valeri Polyakov]] performed the longest single spaceflight, from 8 January 1994 to 22 March 1995 (437 days, 17 hours, 58 minutes, and 16 seconds). [[Oleg Kononenko]] has spent the most total time in space on multiple missions, 1,110{{nbsp}}days, 14{{nbsp}}hours, 57{{nbsp}}minutes.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Cosmonaut Biography: Oleg D. Kononenko |url=http://spacefacts.de/bios/cosmonauts/english/kononenko_oleg_d.htm |access-date=2024-09-23 |website=spacefacts.de}}</ref> 
; Longest-duration crewed space station
:The [[International Space Station]] has the longest period of continuous human presence in space, 2 November 2000 to present ({{age in years and days|2 November 2000|sep=and}}). This record was previously held by [[Mir]], from [[Soyuz TM-8]] on 5 September 1989 to the [[Soyuz TM-29]] on 28 August 1999, a span of 3,644 days (almost 10 years).

=== By nationality or sex ===
; 12 April 1961
: [[Yuri Gagarin]] became the first Soviet and the first human to reach space, on [[Vostok 1]].
; 5 May 1961
: [[Alan Shepard]] became the first American to reach space, on ''[[Mercury-Redstone 3|Freedom 7]]''.
; 20 February 1962
: [[John Glenn]] became the first American to orbit the Earth.
; 16 June 1963
: [[Valentina Tereshkova]] became the first woman to go into space and to orbit the Earth.
; 2 March 1978
: [[Vladimír Remek]], a [[Czechoslovakia]]n, became the first non-American and non-Soviet in space, as part of the [[Interkosmos]] program.
; 2 April 1984
: [[Rakesh Sharma]], became the first Indian in space and to orbit the Earth, on [[Soyuz T-11]].
; 25 July 1984
: [[Svetlana Savitskaya]] became the first woman to [[Extravehicular activity|walk in space]].
; 15 October 2003
: [[Yang Liwei]] became the first Chinese in space and to orbit the Earth, on [[Shenzhou 5]].
; 18 October 2019
: [[Christina Koch]] and [[Jessica Meir]] conducted the first woman-only [[Extravehicular activity|walk in space]].<ref>{{cite web | url=https://blogs.nasa.gov/spacestation/2019/10/18/nasa-astronauts-wrap-up-historic-all-woman-spacewalk/ | title=NASA Astronauts Wrap Up Historic All-Woman Spacewalk | date=18 October 2019 | first=Mark | last=Garcia | publisher=NASA | access-date=23 January 2020}}</ref>

[[Sally Ride]] became the first American woman in space, in 1983. [[Eileen Collins]] was the first female Shuttle pilot, and with Shuttle mission [[STS-93]] in 1999 she became the first woman to command a U.S. spacecraft.

For many years, the USSR (later Russia) and the United States were the only countries whose astronauts flew in space. That ended with the 1978 flight of Vladimir Remek. {{As of|2010}}, citizens from 38 nations (including [[space tourism|space tourists]]) have flown in space aboard Soviet, American, Russian, and Chinese spacecraft.