1987 in spaceflight

1987 in spaceflight
	The Atlas H launches on its final flight
Orbital launches
First	5 January
Last	29 December
Total	115
Catalogued	110
National firsts
Space traveller	Syria
Rockets
Maiden flights	ASLV; Energia
Retirements	Atlas H; N-II; Titan III(34)B
Crewed flights
Orbital	3
Total travellers	8
	v; t; e;

The following is an outline of 1987 in spaceflight.

Launches

← Jan
Feb
Mar
Apr
May
Jun
Jul
Aug
Sep
Oct
Nov
Dec →


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
24 August 16:30	Skylark 7			Woomera Test Range LA2 D		MORABA

		Supernova (W-GR-147)	DFVLR	Suborbital	X-ray astronomy	24 August	Successful
		Apogee: ~270 km
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 apogee.^[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

There were no deep-space rendezvous in 1987.

References

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

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

[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.

[1]

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Future

v t e Timeline of spaceflight
Spaceflight before 1951
1950s	1950 1951 1952 1953 1954 1955 1956 1957 1958 1959
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1980s	1980 1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989
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2020s	2020 2021 (H1, H2) 2022 (H2, H2) 2023 (H1, H2) 2024 (H1, H2) 2025 2026 2027 2028 2029
Future

v t e ← 1986 Orbital launches in 1987 1988 →
January	Meteor-2 No.17 Kosmos 1811 Kosmos 1812 Kosmos 1813 Progress 27 Kosmos 1814 Kosmos 1815 Molniya-3 No.42 Kosmos 1816 Kosmos 1817
February	Kosmos 1818 Ginga Soyuz TM-2 Kosmos 1819 USA-21 Kosmos 1820 Kosmos 1821 Momo 1 Kosmos 1822 Kosmos 1823 Kosmos 1824 GOES 7
March	Progress 28 Kosmos 1825 Kosmos 1826 Kosmos 1827, Kosmos 1828, Kosmos 1829, Kosmos 1830, Kosmos 1831, Kosmos 1832 Kosmos 1833 Gran' No.31L Palapa B2P SROSS-A FLTSATCOM-6 Kvant-1
April	Kosmos 1834 Kosmos 1835 Kosmos 1836 Progress 29 Kosmos 1837 Kosmos 1838, Kosmos 1839, Kosmos 1840 Kosmos 1841 Kosmos 1842
May	Kosmos 1843 Gorizont No.23L Kosmos 1844 Kosmos 1845 USA-22, LIPS-3, USA-23, USA-24, USA-25 Polyus Progress 30 Kosmos 1846 Kosmos 1847 Kosmos 1848
June	Kosmos 1849 Kosmos 1850 Kosmos 1851 Kosmos 1852, Kosmos 1853, Kosmos 1854, Kosmos 1855, Kosmos 1856, Kosmos 1857, Kosmos 1858, Kosmos 1859 Resurs-F1 No.105 Kosmos 1860 USA-26 Kosmos 1861
July	Kosmos 1862 Kosmos 1863 Kosmos 1864 Kosmos 1865 Kosmos 1866 Kosmos 1867 Kosmos 1868 Kosmos 1869 Soyuz TM-3 Kosmos 1870
August	Kosmos 1871 Progress 31 Fanhui Shi Weixing 10 Meteor-2 No.21 Kosmos 1872 Kiku No.5 Kosmos 1873
September	Kosmos 1874 Ekran No.29L Kosmos 1875, Kosmos 1876, Kosmos 1877, Kosmos 1878, Kosmos 1879, Kosmos 1880 Fanhui Shi Weixing I-01 Kosmos 1881 Kosmos 1882 Aussat A3, ECS-4 Kosmos 1883, Kosmos 1884, Kosmos 1885 Transit-O 27, Transit-O 29 Kosmos 1886 Progress 32 Kosmos 1887
October	Kosmos 1888 Kosmos 1889 Kosmos 1890 Kosmos 1891 Kosmos 1892 Kosmos 1893 USA-27 Kosmos 1894
November	Kosmos 1895 Kosmos 1896 Progress 33 TV-SAT 1 Kosmos 1897 USA-28
December	Kosmos 1898 Kosmos 1899 Gran' No.32L Kosmos 1900 Kosmos 1901 Kosmos 1902 Soyuz TM-4 Kosmos 1903 Kosmos 1904 Kosmos 1905 Kosmos 1906 Ekran-M No.13L Kosmos 1907
Launches are separated by dots ( • ), payloads by commas ( , ), multiple names for the same satellite by slashes ( / ). Crewed flights are underlined. Launch failures are marked with the † sign. Payloads deployed from other spacecraft are (enclosed in parentheses).