When NASA selected seven men to become the country's first astronauts they ushered in a bold new space age. No one knew what the outcome would be, or if the rigorous training hours would prepare them for travelling in excess of 17,000 miles per hour on a converted intercontinental ballistic missile. With incredible footage of the mission this programme transports you to that historic time and invites you to experience the highs and lows alongside the astronauts that were undisputed heroes of their day.

Every stage of the space programme was driven forward by the United States' desire to be leaders of the space race, ahead of the Soviets. The future of the programme rested squarely on the shoulders of Ed White, the man chosen to perform the first spacewalk for NASA. The members of Project Gemini became some of the most famous astronauts in the world and their unflinching bravery and pioneering spirits lifted them above the status of ordinary men.

By 1967, the Apollo programme was preparing for the ultimate prize of the Space Race, landing humans on the Moon. But as the engineers tested the command module, NASA experienced its first disaster when a fire broke out in the pressurised capsule of Apollo 1, resulting in the deaths of Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee. It was an unprecedented tragedy that changed NASA forever. Apollo 8 was the most powerful rocket ever built and its mission of taking man to the dark side of the Moon for the first time paved the way for NASA's ultimate goal. 8 years, 1 month and 22 days after John F. Kennedy challenged America to land a man on the Moon, Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins, with the eyes of the world upon them, triumphantly took their place in history.

NASA made scientific research a primary objective for the flight of Apollo 13. But halfway to the Moon the astronauts were put to the ultimate test when their oxygen tanks exploded. All of a sudden the key objective of the mission had changed radically to one of pure survival. Without the skill and professionalism of both the crew and the engineers back at mission control these men would never have lived to tell the tale.

New requirements for a bigger cargo bay prompted a breakthrough in spacecraft design. The development of the reusable Shuttle sparked a revolutionary approach to space. The Shuttle, described as a butterfly on a bullet, departed on its maiden voyage in April 1981. It was an outstanding success but subsequent missions remained as dangerous as ever, as demonstrated by both the 1985 Challenger and 2003 Columbia Shuttle disasters. But the development of the International Space Station meant that the Shuttle could not be abandoned.

Billions of dollars over budget and ten years behind schedule, NASA finally launched the Hubble Space Telescope, which was expected to transform our understanding of the Universe, but it immediately became clear that NASA had a serious problem. Hubble, the all-seeing eye into deep space, was near-sighted. At the risk of becoming a laughing stock NASA sent a crack team of astronauts to fix the phenomenally costly problem. Their heroic efforts captured the public's imagination in a way not seen since the historic Moon landings, giving NASA the confidence to begin construction of the International Space Station.