Launches
ON RECORD23MISSIONS
20 of them succeeded. The earliest was in 1958 and the latest in 2026.
ARCHIVE // DAY OF YEAR
August 17 in spaceflight
23 launches flew on August 17, the earliest of them in 1958, and 20 of them succeeded. Wikipedia lists 2 spaceflight and astronomy events on August 17. Pick another date to see what happened on it.
Recorded events
IN THE RECORD2ENTRIES
Spaceflight and astronomy entries from Wikipedia for this date, oldest first, starting in 1958.
Pictures from this date
NONE0IMAGES
There's no Astronomy Picture of the Day we can show for this date.
What happened on August 17
1958
Pioneer 0, America's first attempt at lunar orbit, is launched using the first Thor-Able rocket and fails. Notable as one of the first attempted launches beyond Earth orbit by any country.
Pioneer 0 ↗1970
Soviet Union Venera program: Venera 7 launched. It will become the first spacecraft to successfully transmit data from the surface of another planet (Venus).
Venera program ↗
Launches on August 17Archive read 2026-11-05. Anything after that isn't listed here.
23 launches
ONLINE
- 2026Long March 2C | Satellite for Earth Observation (SEO)CASCSUCCESS
- 2025Long March 6A | SatNet LEO Group 09CASCSUCCESS
- 2025Long March 4C | Shiyan 28 B-02CASCSUCCESS
- 2023Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 6-10SpXSUCCESS
- 2021Vega | Pléiades Neo 4ASASUCCESS
- 2019Smart Dragon 1 | Maiden FlightCHNRSUCCESS
- 2011Proton-M / Briz-M Enhanced | Ekspress AM-4KhSCFAILURE
- 2011Dnepr 1 | Sich-2ISCKSUCCESS
- 2009Delta II 7925 | GPS IIR-M-8 (USA-206)ULASUCCESS
- 2000Titan 403B | NROL-11USAFSUCCESS
- 2000Ariane 44LP | Brasilsat B4 & Nilesat 102ASASUCCESS
- 1999Delta 7420-10C | Globalstar 24,27,53,54USAFSUCCESS
- 1996Soyuz-U | Soyuz TM-24RFSASUCCESS
- 1996H-II | MidoriJAXASUCCESS
- 1983Soyuz U | Progress 17CCCPSUCCESS
- 1979Soyuz U | Zenit-2M/NKh 5CCCPSUCCESS
- 1978Proton-K/DM | EkranCCCPFAILURE
- 1973Thor Burner 2A | DMSP-5B F4USAFSUCCESS
- 1970Molniya-M | Venera-7CCCPSUCCESS
- 1966Thor Delta E1 | Pioneer 7USAFSUCCESS
- 1965Thor SLV-2A Agena D | KH-4A 23USAFSUCCESS
- 1961Blue Scout Jr | O-1USAFSUCCESS
- 1958Thor Able I | Able I (Pioneer)ABMAFAILURE
FIELD KIT / LIBRARY
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- VIEW
LISTING
Cosmos, by Carl Sagan
Sagan's tour of the universe and how we came to understand it. It keeps the science in.
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LISTING
Pale Blue Dot, by Carl Sagan
Sagan's case for people leaving Earth one day, and an honest look at how hard that would be.
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LISTING
Project Hail Mary, by Andy Weir
A science-fiction novel from the author of The Martian, built around solving one engineering problem after another.
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Sources and licences
Event text and thumbnails come from Wikipedia and are used under CC BY-SA 4.0. Images come only from Wikimedia Commons, which doesn't accept non-free content. Each thumbnail links to its file page, which lists its licence and author.
Launch records are from The Space Devs’ Launch Library 2. Pictures are NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day. Many of them belong to the photographer or a partner agency, so we only show the ones credited to NASA alone.