Human Spaceflight: 07 Feb 1967. The third unmanned Soyuz test flight, listed only as Kosmos 140, is best by problems when the spacecraft fails to maintain the correct orientation for its solar panels to power it properly, uses excessive fuel to try and orient itself, and lands short after re-entry.

Human Spaceflight: 05 Feb 1967. Lunar Orbiter 3 continues the photographic reconnaissance of the lunar surface to identify future landing sites, with resolution down to 1m. Among the over 550 images returned was one that showed Surveyor 1 sitting on the surface, where it had been since May 1966

Still time for a trip to the magic realms. Watch out for talking bears with magic stones, though...

Human Spaceflight: 27 Jan 1967. Apollo 1. At 6.31pm during a routine ground test, an electrical fault ignites a fire that quickly spreads across the spacecraft interior. Unable to escape due to the inward-opening hatch, the crew of Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffe are dead 30 seconds later.

Human Spaceflight: 27 Jan 1967. Apollo 1. At 6.31pm during a routine ground test, an electrical fault ignites a fire that quickly spreads across the spacecraft interior. Unable to escape due to the inward-opening hatch, the crew of Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffe are dead 30 seconds later.

Human Spaceflight: 14 Dec 1966. A second attempt at an uncrewed Soyuz launch goes badly wrong. At ignition the engines shut down. Just under half an hour later the automatic escape rockets fired, which led to a fire on the rocket that eventually blew it up. Three men lost their lives as a result.

Human Spaceflight: 28 Nov 1966. If you've been following these posts you may have noticed things have been quiet on the Russian front. While NASA forged ahead with Gemini, not a single Soviet launch occurred. On this day Kosmos 133 was launched, the significance of which was not known for decades.

The Care Bears seem to have let themselves go a bit in this trip into the magical realms...

Human Spaceflight: 15 Nov 1966. Project Gemini comes to an end as Gemini 12 splashes down. Often overlooked, this was an absolutely vital part of NASA's goal of landing men on the Moon in Project Apollo, and for spaceflight in general. The tools, techniques and technology were proved here.

We have the co-ordinates for Star One and we are plunging out into infinity, the space between the island galaxies. Well, the line between Kent and London, anyway. We shall rendezvous with a fan flotilla at the BFI to stand against the alien fleet…

Human Spaceflight: 13 Nov 1966. Buzz Aldrin climbs out of Gemini 12 and spends over two hours testing tools, restraints and techniques for EVA. In contrast to the previous attempts, he manages a highly successful set of activities and does not get excessively fatigued or have to cut the EVA short.

Porridge - Disturbing the Peace (7th November 1975). Fletch is less than pleased to run into an old nemesis - 'Napper' Wainwright (Peter Jeffrey).

"Durkhim, no-one knows where Star One is. No-one at all!" According to our interrogation teams it's at the BFI, Supreme Commander. The fans can be there tomorrow at 11:00 hours. Very well. Interrogate Justin Johnson and Dick Fiddy just to make sure, and try not to kill them!

"Durkhim, no-one knows where Star One is. No-one at all!" According to our interrogation teams it's at the BFI, Supreme Commander. The fans can be there tomorrow at 11:00 hours. Very well. Interrogate Justin Johnson and Dick Fiddy just to make sure, and try not to kill them!

Human Spaceflight: 11 Nov 1966. Astronauts Jim Lovell and Buzz Aldrin climb aboard Gemini 12 to undertake the last crewed flight of the Gemini programme. Rendezvous and docking is old hat now, but EVA remains a concern, with all previous astronauts who tried it finding it excessively exhausting.

Plenty of time to catch up with Penelope Pitstop and her various Perils brought about by the convoluted connivances of the evil Hooded Claw....

Human Spaceflight: 06 Nov 1966. Continuing a more detailed examination of the lunar surface for possible landing sites, Lunar Orbiter 2 is launched today. Among the 800 images it captures is a stunning oblique view of the crater Copernicus, one of the most prominent near-side features.

If you ask me the rot set in when they started making TVs and DVD players without any actual controls on them, thus making us dependent on the remote (and its batteries) rather than the remote being a convenient extra tool or an accessibility aid.....

Human Spaceflight: 03 Nov 1966. On this day the Gemini 2 spacecraft, having been refurbished and modified as part of the US Air Force's Manned Orbiting Laboratory programme, was sent into space on a Titan IIIC rocket on the programme's one and only test flight.

When did 'close' on a desktop window stop meaning close the programme and become close the window but keep the programme running somewhere you can't see it? Drives me absolutely spare. Why do designers feel the need to take a perfectly simple system and assume we want it to do something else?

Human Spaceflight: 14 Sep 1966. The final full day of Gemini 11 saw a number of experiments with the spacecraft and Agena connected by a 50-foot tether. By moving to stretch the tether and setting the whole assembly spinning, a tiny amount of artificial gravity was detected in the spacecraft.

✨New Episode!✨ Welcoming special guest @whorod.bsky.social to the podcast to talk about the sublime 'Perils of Penelope Pitstop', a series full of absurd antics and convoluted contrivances. Heyulp! open.spotify.com/episode/1fgE...

Human Spaceflight: 13 Sep 1966. The second day of Gemini 11 saw Dick Gordon perform an EVA. He was to leave the spacecraft and attach a 50-foot tether to the docked Agena, then proceed to the rear and use the manoeuvring unit that Gene Cernan had been unable to use on Gemini 9.

A new episode is out tomorrow but there's still time to drop in on the 31st century before then...

Human Spaceflight: 12 Sep 1966. Astronauts Pete Conrad, on his second Gemini flight after Gemini 5, and Dick Gordon, a rookie, lift off on Gemini 11. Their first objective was a direct ascent rendezvous with an Agena target vehicle launch about 90 minutes prior.

NEWS: Toby Hadoke Podcast Toby Hadoke, plus a host of Doctor Who luminaries, have recorded a very special podcast about missing episodes. Fantasy Film Cans (Part One) is, as Toby states: ‘Pure fantasy: a parlour game turned into a podcast.’ But what great fun! x.com/tobyhadoke/s...

The clouds parted tonight just long enough to capture the Moon. Taken using an iPhone SE pointed down the eyepiece of my trusty almost 25-year-old Skywatcher EQ2 102mm Maksutov-Cassegrain telescope from Woodchurch Memorial Hall car park. Sinus Iridum was particularly prominent.

I’m amazed at the number and quality of folk who contributed to this podcast (a Doctor! 3 companions! Writers! Actors! Lost Episode Finders! Fans of Yore!) It’s just a bit of fun: a countdown of the most desired missing episodes of Doctor Who. Plus much arcana, natch: www.podbean.com/eas/pb-8epk3...

Amy's response is spot on. These 'obvious clues' showing fakery have been debunked over and over for decades (I've been doing it myself for about 25 years!). Spiler alert, but as Amy says at the end, don't go to bloody TikTok if you want to actually learn and understand.

Human Spaceflight: 25 Aug 1966. AS-202 is the second uncrewed test of the block I Apollo command and service module. It tested the Saturn IB launch vehicle, as well as the guidance system, fuel cells and heat shield. The flight was a complete success.

Human Spaceflight: 10 Aug 1966. With Project Apollo proceeding apace, NASA needs more detailed imagery of the lunar surface to identify suitable landing sites. The Ranger probes sent back useful information but to get better results they really need to orbit the Moon. Lunar Orbiter 1 launches today.

Prunella Scales and Patricia Routledge in the same year. 😢 www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

A massive thank you to all the regular contributors to the Hamster Book Club, reading so much of this wonderful nonsense and committing their time to take notes and record. It’s been quite a journey we’ve gone on so far.

✨New episode!✨ Another pair of trips in the 31st century, in which we wonder what Ulysses has against birds, and how he fails to notice that he's just run into two guys with the same name. open.spotify.com/episode/6S8x...

Human spaceflight: 20 Jul 1966. Gemini 10 becomes the first spacecraft to rendezvous with two different targets, as it undocks from its own Agena and rendezvous with the one from Gemini 8. Mike Collins does an EVA to retrieve a micrometeoroid collector from the Agena.

A new episode is out on Monday, but there's still plenty of time to catch up with our latest visit to the magical realms.

Human Spaceflight: 19 Jul 1966. Gemini 10 continues as astronauts Collins and Young fire the Agena's engine to lower their orbit to match that of the Agena target vehicle from Gemini 8, still orbiting. They will dock with it the next day. Collins does a 'standup EVA' with a UV camera.

Human Spaceflight: 18 Jul 1966. Michael Collins and John Young climb aboard Gemini 10 for a further mission to explore rendezvous, docking and EVA. The Agena target vehicle lifted off on its Atlas booster first, and successfully entered orbit. Here it is seen with Gemini 10 in the foreground,

For an upcoming podcast. We’re talking Red Dwarf. Which is the best series/era? Or best episode? Best joke?

Human Spaceflight: 05 Jul 1966. AS-203 is the second Saturn IB test flight. This time it did not carry an Apollo spacecraft. Instead a simple nosecone topped the rocket, as it was actually intended to study the behaviour of the liquid hydrogen fuel in the upper S-IVB stage.

Human Spaceflight: 06 Jun 1966. The second major objective of Gemini 9A was another spacewalk. While Ed White on Gemini 4 had reported it to be quite easy to move around, Gene Cernan discovered it was anything but when he tried to undertake a particular set of activities outside his spacecraft.

Steve Walker and I are back in the magical realms once more. Care to join us? Watch out for Demodragons and Nightwalkers....

Human Spaceflight: 03 Jun 1955. Gemini 9A finally gets off the ground, and when they get into orbit they confirm the telemetry from the Augmented Target Docking Adapter, the payload shroud has indeed failed to properly separate. The result was described as looking like an 'angry alligator'.

Human Spaceflight: 01 Jun 1966. After the failure of the Agena launch for Gemini 9 some weeks before, the backup plan of launching the Augmented Target Docking Adapter (ATDA) was implemented. It was launched into orbit on this date on an Atlas launch vehicle and successfully reached space.

As copies of The Collection: Season 13 start to drop onto doormats across the land this weekend, whet your appetite with our field report from the BFI screening of Terror of the Zygons Special Edition Apple: tinyurl.com/bddnecev Spotify: tinyurl.com/4yap3dn6 Podbean: tinyurl.com/37z92v2e

Human Spaceflight: 30 May 1966. Inan effort to learn more about the lunar surface itself, NASA launches the Surveyor 1 probe on an Atlas-Centaur rocket. Three days later it successfully soft-lands and sends back TV images of the surrounding surface.

Human Spaceflight: 25 May 1966. A milestone for the Apollo programme as the Saturn V SA-500F facilities checkout vehicle is rolled out to the launchpad. This rocket was never intended to fly and was built purely to checkout the ground equipment. It's identifiable by its unique paint scheme.

This wasn't our first visit to Third Earth to check on the thundery felines. Way back in episode 42 we saw them escape their doomed planet. open.spotify.com/episode/3DtU...

Still plenty of time to catch up on the latest episode with @docoho44.bsky.social. And while you're at it check out his amazing collection of podcasts, including the legendary 'Hamster with a Blunt Penknife' series. As we celebrate 100 episodes, so he recently celebrated 1000!

Human Spaceflight: 17 May 1966. After the problems on Gemini 8, Gemini 9 is intended to carry out the full mission with rendezvous, docking and a spacewalk. The crew board the Gemini and the Atlas Agena lifts off the pad, but things almost immediately go wrong.