The world's first coin to be struck in 2024 highlights Australian space exploration history.
"Out of this World - Australia in Space" was chosen by the Royal Australian Mint as its 2024 theme "to showcase Australia's history and significance as one of the earliest nations to launch its own satellite."
The coin's reverse, or tails side, depicts an Australian astronaut on a spacewalk and the launch of WRESAT-1 on a modified U.S. Redstone rocket in 1967. The satellite, which carried upper atmospheric radiation measurement experiments, established Australia as the seventh nation to put a satellite into orbit and the third country to launch from its own territory, after the Soviet Union and United States.
The coin's design also includes Earth, with the Australian continent clearly visible, and the moon, the latter an homage to the country's role in relaying the live television signal during Apollo 11, the first moon landing, and to an Australian-built robotic rover that will explore the lunar surface as part of NASA's Artemis program.
Though not stated by the mint, the astronaut could be a nod to Andrew Thomas, the first Australia-born career astronaut to fly into space and who performed a spacewalk on his third of four spaceflights with NASA. The depiction could also be a reference to Paul Scully Powers, the first Aussie to launch into space, but as an oceanographer flying as a payload specialist on a U.S. space shuttle.
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