1987 in spaceflight

Summary

The following is an outline of 1987 in spaceflight.

1987 in spaceflight
The Atlas H launches on its final flight
Orbital launches
First5 January
Last29 December
Total115
Catalogued110
National firsts
Space traveller Syria
Rockets
Maiden flightsASLV
Energia
RetirementsAtlas H
N-II
Titan III(34)B
Crewed flights
Orbital3
Total travellers8

Launches edit

Date and time (UTC) Rocket Flight number Launch site LSP
Payload
(⚀ = CubeSat)
Operator Orbit Function Decay (UTC) Outcome
Remarks
5 February
21:38:16
 Soyuz-U2  Baikonur Site 1/5  
 Soyuz TM-2 Low Earth (Mir) Mir EO-2 30 July
01:04:12
Successful
Crewed flight launching two cosmonauts and landing three, first crewed flight of Soyuz-TM
12 February
06:40
 Titan 34B/Agena-D  Vandenberg SLC-4W  U.S. Air Force
 SDS-1 F-6[1] U.S. Air Force Molniya Communications In orbit Successful
Final flight of the Titan IIIB rocket. Final use of the RM-81 Agena upper stage in any rocket.
26 February
23:05
 Delta 3914  Cape Canaveral LC-17A  
 GOES 7 NOAA Geostationary Weather In orbit Operational
20 March
23:05
 Delta-3920  Cape Canaveral LC-17  
 Palapa B2-P PT Pasifik Satelit Nusantara ? Communications In orbit Successful
31 March
00:16:16
 Proton-K  Baikonur Site 200/39  
 Kvant-1 1991–2001: Roskosmos Low Earth (Mir) Mir module 23 March 2001
05:59:36
Successful
 Kvant FSB Low Earth (Kvant-1) Space tug 25 August 1988 Successful
15 May
17:30:01
 Energia  Baikonur Site 250  
 Polyus Intended: Low Earth Weapons tests
Technology
15 May Launch failure
Maiden flight of Energia, computer error resulted in spacecraft attempting to perform circularisation burn in a retrograde orientation, failed to orbit
8 June   RH-300 Mk II   Sriharikota   ISRO
  ISRO Suborbital Engineering test 8 June Successful
First flight of the RH-300 Mk II, reached an altitude of 130 km (80 miles)
22 July
01:59:17
 Soyuz-U2  Baikonur Site 1/5  
 Soyuz TM-3 Low Earth (Mir) Mir EP-1 29 December
09:16:15
Successful
Crewed flight with three cosmonauts, first Syrian in space, carried replacement for ill EO-2 crewmember
8 October   Sonda IV   Barreira do Inferno Launch Center   IAE
  IAE Suborbital Engineering test 8 October Successful
"Operation Petrópolis". R&D launch for the VLS program. 510 kg payload. 570 km perigee.[2]
21 November
02:19:00
 Ariane 2  Kourou ELA-2  Arianespace
 TV-SAT 1 Deutsche Bundespost Current: Graveyard
Operational: Geosynchronous
Communications In orbit Spacecraft failure
Immediately after launch, one of its solar panels failed to deploy, and as a result of this the main uplink antenna, which was located behind the solar panel, could not deploy either. Briefly used to verify the systems of the Spacebus 300 satellite bus before being retired to a graveyard orbit.
21 December
11:18:03
 Soyuz-U2  Baikonur Site 1/5  
 Soyuz TM-4 Low Earth (Mir) Mir EO-3 17 June 1988
10:12:32
Successful
Crewed flight with three cosmonauts

Deep-space rendezvous edit

There were no deep-space rendezvous in 1987.

References edit

  • Bergin, Chris. "NASASpaceFlight.com".
  • Clark, Stephen. "Spaceflight Now".
  • Kelso, T.S. "Satellite Catalog (SATCAT)". CelesTrak.[dead link]
  • Krebs, Gunter. "Chronology of Space Launches".
  • Kyle, Ed. "Space Launch Report". Archived from the original on 5 October 2009. Retrieved 13 August 2022.
  • McDowell, Jonathan. "GCAT Orbital Launch Log".
  • Pietrobon, Steven. "Steven Pietrobon's Space Archive".
  • Wade, Mark. "Encyclopedia Astronautica".
  • Webb, Brian. "Southwest Space Archive".
  • Zak, Anatoly. "Russian Space Web".
  • "ISS Calendar". Spaceflight 101.
  • "NSSDCA Master Catalog". NASA Space Science Data Coordinated Archive. NASA Goddard Space Flight Center.
  • "Space Calendar". NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory.[dead link]
  • "Space Information Center". JAXA.[dead link]
  • "Хроника освоения космоса" [Chronicle of space exploration]. CosmoWorld (in Russian).
Generic references:
  Spaceflight portal

Footnotes edit

  1. ^ "NASA Space Science Data Coordinated Archive". Archived from the original on 29 September 2020. Retrieved 21 August 2019.
  2. ^ "Lançamento do foguete Sonda IV foi um sucesso". O Pioneiro (in Brazilian Portuguese). No. 528. 9 October 1987. p. 5. Retrieved 18 February 2024.