A rail-launched A4 was considered from the beginning of the project. At the end of 1942 the first train launcher wagon was completed and trials began from Test Stand VII at Peenemuende. In service the trains would have hidden in double-tracked train tunnels. Development was interrupted to get the vehicle-towed standard version of the weapon into service.

Design of the Big Joe spacecraft for the Project Mercury reentry test (the spacecraft would be boosted by an Atlas launch vehicle over a ballistic trajectory) was accomplished by the Space Task Group. Construction of the spacecraft was assigned as a joint task of the Langley and Lewis Research Centers under the direction of the Space Task Group. The instrument package was developed by Lewis personnel assigned to the Space Task Group, and these individuals later became the nucleus of the Space Task Group's Flight Operations Division at Cape Canaveral.

While the probability of the ballistic missile division developing a military manned space system was rapidly diminishing, military and civilian demand for space boosters was accelerating. Except for certain strictly military applications it was plain the Air Force would play mainly a supporting role in the nation's space program, supplying boosters and launch facilities to the civilian .space agency and the Advanced Research Projects Agency. On this date there were approximately 11 scheduled programs, several only in the planning stage. One of the firm programs was the civilian agency's man in space which was scheduled to launch its first experimental Atlas C payload in May 1959 and start a series of nine Atlas D launches beginning December 1959. (Ltr, Col L. D. Ely, Asst Dep Cmdr, Military Space Sys, AFBMD, to Col C. H. Terhune, 1 Dec 58, subj: Atlas Boosters for Space Projects.)

Twelve nations signed a treaty making the Antarctic continent a preserve for scientific research, immune from political and military strife. Signatories were Argentina, Australia, Great Britain, Chile, France, New Zealand, Norway, Belgium, Japan, South Africa, the Soviet Union, and the United States. Legal experts have suggested that the Antarctic Treaty provided a precedent for similar agreements demilitarizing the moon and other bodies in space.

The Soviet Union launched its third spaceship satellite, Korabl Sputnik III, or Sputnik VI. The spacecraft, similar to those launched on May 15 and August 19, carried the dogs Pcheka and Mushka in addition to other animals, insects, and plants. Deorbited December 2, 1960 7:15 GMT. Burned up on reentry due to steep entry angle (retrofire engine did not shut off on schedule and burned to fuel depletion).
Officially: Medical and biological research under space flight conditions.
Officially: Medical and biological research under space flight conditions.

Two Roksonde meteorological sounding rockets were successfully fired from Cape Canaveral, telemetered measurements of winds and temperatures at altitudes above 180,000 feet. Produced by Marquardt for the Army, Roksondes had already completed a series of tests at White Sands Missile Range and Pacific Missile Range.

In a letter to Apollo Program Director Samuel C. Phillips regarding tentative spacecraft development and mission planning schedules, Joseph F. Shea, Apollo Spacecraft Program Manager, touched upon missions following completion of Apollo's prime goal of landing on the Moon. Such missions, Shea said, would in general fall under the heading of a new program (such as Apollo X). Although defining missions a number of years in the future was most complex, Shea advised that MSC was planning to negotiate program package contracts with both North American and Grumman through Fiscal Year 1969, based upon the agency's most recent program planning schedules.

George E. Mueller, Associate Administrator for Manned Space Flight, and MSFC Director Wernher von Braun discussed Marshall's briefing on the S-IVB Workshop concept presented at Headquarters the previous day. Mueller asked that MSFC formulate a program development plan and present it at the next meeting of the Manned Space Flight Management Council. Specifically, Mueller demanded that the plan include experiments to be carried aboard the Workshop; funding arrangements; and where development work should be done (in house, or elsewhere). In addition, he asked that MSFC submit two such plans, one for the unpressurized and another for the pressurized version of the Workshop. In effect, Mueller gave Marshall the 'green light' to begin the Orbital Workshop program. At von Braun's request, the Workshop received the status of a separate project, with William Ferguson as Project Manager.

The High Explosive Simulation Technique (HEST) Test began at a Minuteman I, Wing V, launch facility at Francis E. Warren AFB, Wyoming. Developed by the Air Force Weapons Laboratory, the HEST Test was intended to use high explosives to simulate ground motions associated with, and induced by, a nuclear airblast and thus validate hardness assessment of ground facilities and the degree of structural survivability.

NASA Hq. announced that, as concurred in by the Center Apollo Program Managers, the following decisions, based on the results of the Apollo 4 mission, were firmly established:

• CSM 020 would be flown on the Apollo 6 mission.
• Boilerplate 30 was assigned to the AS-503 unmanned mission.
• If Apollo 6 was successful, AS-503 would be flown as the first Saturn V manned mission.

Yuri Semenov proved his management abilities in the successful unmanned launches and recoveries of Zond 7 and 8 on circumlunar missions. At the final state commission on the L1 program, VPK Deputy Chairman Tyulin said that if had been in charge instead of Mishin, the N1 would have succeeded. Semenov proved himself skilful in coordinating the work of four major, often hostile organizations -- TskBEM, NIIAP, TsKBM, and ZIKh. This would lead to his assignment to head the DOS/Salyut space station programme, and ultimately, head RKK Energia.

Bushuyev tells Chertok that the lunar base work did not interest Glushko. The VPK Military-Industrial Commission was only interested in duplicating the American shuttle, not in any other ventures in space. With the N1-Sr booster, Russia could have had a six man lunar base established with 8 to 10 launches in the late 1970's. Bushuyev died on 26 October 1978, having seen his dream completely tossed away.

HQ USAF issued a Program Management Directive for the STS program which provided for a four-year launch facilities construction program at Vandenberg, with an initial launch capability of six/year. The PMD constituted the final solution to the budgetary problems that SAMSO had briefed to HQ AFSC and HQ USAF in January.

Stationed at 158 deg E. Domestic communications. Launching states: Japan and France. Launch time 2248 GMT. Positioned in geosynchronous orbit at 158 deg E in 1993-1999 As of 31 August 2001 located at 157.95 deg E drifting at 0.011 deg W per day. As of 2007 Mar 9 located at 158.03E drifting at 0.006W degrees per day.

Endeavour was launched on an assembly mission to the to the International Space Station (ISS). The main mission was to install a 72 m x 11.4 m, 65 kW double-wing solar panel on the Unity module of the ISS. The external tank and the Orbiter entered a 74 x 325 km orbit at 0314 GMT. Endeavour's OMS burn raised its perigee to 205 km at around 0347 GMT; the ET re-entered over the Pacific. Endeavour docked with the Station's PMA-3 docking port at 1959 GMT on December 2. Astronauts then installed the P6 solar panel truss to the station during a series of spacewalks. The P6 was made up of the LS (Long Spacer), PV-1 IEA (Integrated Equipment Assembly) and the PVAA (Photovoltaic Array). The LS carried two Thermal Control Systems with radiators to eject waste heat from the Station; these radiators were to be moved to truss segments S4 and S6 later in assembly. The PVAA had solar array wings SAW-2B and SAW-4B, which deployed to a span of 73 meters. Only after completion of three station assembly space walks on December 3, 5, and 7 did the Endeavour crew enter the station (at 1436 GMT on December 8), delivering supplies to Alpha's Expedition One crew. Hatches were closed again at 1551 GMT December 9, and Endeavour undocked at 1913 GMT the same day. After one flyaround of the station, Endeavour fired its engines to depart the vicinity at 2017 GMT December 9. The deorbit burn was at 2158 GMT on December 11, changing the orbit from 351 x 365 km to 27 x 365 km, with landing at Runway 15 of Kennedy Space Center at 2303 GMT.

The payload bay of Endeavour for STS-97 contained a total cargo of 18740 kg:

• Bay 1-2:
  • Orbiter Docking System 1800 kg
  • 3 EMU spacesuits (S/N unknown) 360 kg
  • FPPU experiment (in airlock) 23 kg. The FPPU (Floating Potential Probe Experiment) was installed on P6 to measure charge build-up as the arrays pass through the ionosphere plasma. P6 had devices to bleed off excess charge, and FPPU would monitor their effectiveness.
  • APCU Assembly Power Converter Unit 35 kg
  • APCU Assembly Power Converter Unit 35 kg
• Bay 3-6:
  • ITS P6 Long Spacer 4000 kg
  • TCS radiator (aft) 500 kg
  • TCS radiator (starboard) 500 kg
• Bay 8-11:
  • ITS P6 Integrated Equipment Assembly 7200 kg
  • PV radiator P6 500 kg
• Bay 12-13:
  • ITS P6 Photovoltaic Array/Beta Gimbal Assembly. 1000 kg
  • Solar array wing 2B 1070 kg
  • Solar array wing 4B 1070 kg
• Bay 13S: IMAX Cargo Bay Camera 238 kg
• Sill: Canadarm RMS 303 410 kg

It was planned to use the Mobile Transporter as a base for the SSRMS arm during the spacewalk. The MT was moved from worksite 4 on S0 to worksite 7 at the end of P1. Motion began at 1621 UTC but the MT got stuck a few meters short of its goal. The crew fell back on contingency training and opened the hatch of the Quest module at 1924 UTC. Instead of using the SSRMS for transport they spacewalked down the truss to the location of the MT. Here it was found that the MT was blocked by the undeployed P1 UHF antenna. The astronauts deployed it, clearing the MT's path. The MT finally reached its destination at 0011 UTC. This incident indicated problems with ISS configuration control but also showed the value of the astronauts' ability to handle unforeseen contingencies. During the spacewalk, the astronauts installed more fixes to the Station's ammonia line connectors, although dealing with the MT problem meant not all of the planned work could be completed.

This was the first launch of the Brazilian sounding rocket VSB-30, replacing the British Skylark, from Esrange. The speed when leaving the launcher was about 60 m/s and after 45 seconds of acceleration the max speed was over 200 m/s. During the flight the experiments onboard spent approximately 6 minutes of microgravity and all experiments worked successfully. The payload was brought back for analysis at Esrange by helicopter within one hour after landing.

Unmanned lunar rover. Boosted into a 210 x 389 109 km x 28.5 deg lunar transfer orbit. On December 6 at 09:50 GMT the spacecraft entered a 100 km polar orbit around the Moon. The 3,800 kg wet / 1,200 kg at landing spacecraft had a descent engine and landing legs, and a variety of lunar surface science experiments. It also carried Yutu, a small 140 kg rover. On December 10 at 13:20 GMT the orbit was lowered from 100 x 100 to 15 x 100 km. At 12:59:52 GMT December 14, near perilune, the descent engine was turned on to decelerate the probe and fly it down to the surface. Chang'e-3 touched down at 13:11:18 GMT, at 19.51W 44.12N, about 43 km south of crater Laplace F in the Mare Imbrium. This was the first lunar soft landing since the USSR's Luna-24 in 1976.

Lunar rover delivered to lunar surface by Chang'e-3. At 20:35 GMT on December 14 the `Yutu hao' (`rabbit') rover drove down the Chang'e-3 ramp onto the lunar surface. Yutu and Chang'e-3 are both solar powered, but also carry small Pu-238 radioactive heater units to keep systems from freezing during the 14-day lunar night. Yutu had six wheels.

The launch vehicle failed during third stage burn and its debris fell in the Tuva Republic. Lost with the rest of the cargo was the first Orlan-MKS spacesuit. Reports suggested the Progress separated from the rocket third stage prematurely and the accelerating stage then crashed into the Progress.