posted 05-09-2024 12:17 PM               

The Exhibition tells eleven stories of human spaceflight 'above the Earth and to the Moon', told through a collection of artifacts from the Apollo, Soviet era and Space Shuttle programs, to the International Space Station and SpaceX, including objects brought back to Earth from the lunar surface, low-Earth orbit and outer space (as different from deep space).

More on the Exhibition is at thespacevault.org including a short virtual tour. The Exhibition at ESA has received visiting employees from around 30 UK space-related firms and organisations who form the 'UK Space-Cluster' on Harwell Technology and Science Campus near Oxford, and is where the ESA/ECSAT establishment is located.

On 1st July the Exhibition moves location and goes public at the Henley-on-Thames museum in south Oxfordshire, after which it will begin a five year tour of UK and Europe (and may even find its way to the US East Coast).

posted 04-11-2025 10:47 AM               

Images, unless otherwise noted, are courtesy: The Space Vault Exhibition Limited.

Unique Space Artifacts Land in Birmingham

The Space Vault exhibition is a unique collection of space artefacts that will be on display for the next year at Thinktank, Birmingham Science Museum, starting on Saturday 14 June 2025. The event will showcase a wide range of flown artefacts, documents and other objects from seven decades of space exploration.

Above: CDR Dave Scott, Apollo 15. Communications umbilical in image is on display in the Space Vault Exhibition (NASA)

The rare and historic objects are from the UK’s largest private collection of human space exploration artefacts, owned and curated by Dr. Michael Warner, an environmental manager in the international energy sector and a government advisor on public policy in renewable power. The Space Vault Exhibition had its inaugural showing in Oxfordshire in 2024, as part of a five-year UK and European tour that this year coincides with the 60th anniversary of Alexei Leonov’s first spacewalk from Voskhod 2 on 18 March 1965 and the 50th anniversary of Apollo-Soyuz a decade later.

Utilising immersive visuals and unique artifacts, visitors to the exhibition will travel through 12 curated stories of human space exploration. Flown objects include artifacts returned to Earth from the Moon and Earth orbit, ranging from the Apollo missions to the Space Shuttle and space station eras and on to the current commercial programmes such as SpaceX.

The display includes checklists from Apollo 13 and Apollo 17, as well as the communications umbilical from Dave Scott’s Apollo 15 EVA suit. There are artefacts from the Russian programme, such as a Mir Orlan EVA suit glove and Soyuz Sokol gloves, plus fragments of re-entry debris from Kosmos 1686, a heavily modified TKS spacecraft that was attached to the Salyut 7 space station between 1985 and 1991.

In addition to the display cases, there will be a programme of ‘space dates’ in the Museum’s planetarium, exploring the stories behind the objects. There is also a selection of the greatest space movies, termed a “cinema in the stars”.

As the museum press release states, this is a unique and unparalleled opportunity for visitors to experience a close-up view of objects which have returned from historic space missions. General entry to the Space Vault Exhibition is included in the admission price for Thinktank, Birmingham Science Museum.

An extended report about the exhibition will be featured in the October issue of Space Chronicle.

Acknowledgment: Thanks to the staff of the Birmingham Museum Trust, especially to Sue Smith, PR and Comms Officer and Eve Orford, Marketing Officer.