Today in military history: Soviet Union launches Sputnik
On Oct. 4, 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik I, becoming the first country to put a satellite in space. Sputnik, which means “satellite” or “fellow traveler” in Russian, was…
How the CIA stole a secret Soviet satellite during the Space Race
In 1967, the Space Race was in full swing. The Soviet Union had made a number of historic firsts, but the United States was racing to catch up while making…
This is how GPS actually works – and why some devices might stop working
Developed over the course of decades, GPS has become far more ubiquitous than most people realize. Not just for navigation, its extreme accuracy in time keeping (+/- 10 billionths of a second) has been used by countless businesses the world over for…