1970 in spaceflight of the Venera Venus probes with Venera 7, the first man-made spacecraft to successfully land on another planet and to transmit data back to Earth, though it only survived 23 minutes on the surface. This is a list of spaceflights launched in 1970. <br> 1970 in spaceflight Japan and China each launched their first satellites in 1970, bringing the total number of nations with independent launch capability to five. Apollo 13 was launched; after suffering an explosion in deep space it had to circumnavigate the moon and use the LM as a life boat. Apollo 13 was a successful disaster
Apollo program landings. The S-IC first stage burned RP-1/LOX for a rated thrust of , which was upgraded to . The second and third stages burned liquid hydrogen, and the third stage was a modified version of the S-IVB, with thrust increased to and capability to restart the engine for translunar injection after reaching a parking orbit. NASA's Director of Flight Crew Operations during the Apollo program was Donald K. "Deke" Slayton, one of the original Mercury Seven astronauts who was medically grounded in September 1962 due to a heart murmur. Slayton was responsible for making all Gemini and Apollo crew assignments.