Kansas Cosmosphere and Space Center
The Kansas Cosmosphere and Space Center , or Cosmosphere for short , is one of the most famous space museums in the world. Among other things, the landing capsule of the Apollo 13 mission , the reserve copy of the Sputnik-1 satellite and a decommissioned SR-71 Blackbird are exhibited there.
history
The Cosmosphere was founded in 1962 as a planetarium at an annual folk festival in Hutchinson (Kansas) . Four years later, the planetarium moved to the Hutchinson Community College campus due to lack of space. In 1976 it was decided to apply for the exhibition of objects from the Apollo mission, which was successful due to the large number of objects available. In 1980 the Cosmosphere was expanded to include more exhibition space and the world's first Omnimax Dome (now IMAX Dome ). In the second expansion phase in 1997, the museum was enlarged to an area of 9500 m². Since then, the second largest exhibition of American and Russian space objects in the world has been located in the Cosmosphere.
Well-known exhibits
- A V1 and a V2 rocket from World War II
- The reserve copy of the Sputnik-1 satellite
- The Liberty Bell 7 Mercury capsule
- A Vostok spaceship
- The spaceship Gemini 10
- A titanium rocket from the Gemini space program (see picture)
- The command module of the failed Apollo 13 mission
- The spacesuits by Jim Lovell and Svetlana Sawizkaja
- A decommissioned SR-71 Blackbird (strategic altitude reconnaissance aircraft)
- A 22 kg chunk of moon rock
- The largest meteorite found in the United States
Web links
- Cosmosphere site (English)
Coordinates: 38 ° 3 '54.6 " N , 97 ° 55' 17.6" W.