Launch of Kepler Space Telescope

Date: March 7, 2009 • Location: Rome, Italy

The Kepler space telescope (depicted), designed to discover Earth-like planets orbiting other stars, was launched.

The Kepler space telescope was a space telescope launched by NASA in 2009 to discover Earth-sized planets orbiting other stars. Named after astronomer Johannes Kepler the spacecraft was launched into an Earth-trailing heliocentric orbit. The principal investigator was William J. Borucki. After nine and a half years of operation, the telescope's reaction control system fuel was depleted, and NASA announced its retirement on October 30, 2018.