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April 17 in spaceflight

17 orbital launches flew on April 17, the earliest of them in 1965, and 17 reached orbit. Wikipedia records 6 spaceflight and astronomy events on April 17. Below are the pictures NASA published on April 17 in 6 different years — each one taken or released on this exact date.

DATE

Launches

ON RECORD

17MISSIONS

17 of them reached orbit. The earliest was 1965, the most recent 2026.

Recorded events

IN THE RECORD

6ENTRIES

Spaceflight and astronomy entries from Wikipedia's record of this date, oldest first — from 1964 onward.

Pictures from this date

PUBLISHED

6IMAGES

NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day for April 17, one per year. Some are public domain and some belong to the photographer — each says which.

Published on April 17

NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day, for this calendar date in each of the last several years.

NASA Science

2026

NASA Science

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

© Robert Nemiroff — used with the credit NASA publishes

NASA Science

2025

NASA Science

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

© Daniel Adibi — used with the credit NASA publishes

NASA Science

2024

NASA Science

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

NASA · public domain

NASA Science

2023

NASA Science

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

NASA · public domain

NASA Science

2022

NASA Science

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

NASA · public domain

NASA Science

2021

NASA Science

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

NASA · public domain

What happened on April 17

  1. 1964

    Jerrie Mock completes the first around-the-world airplane flight by a woman. Her solo flight in the Spirit of Columbus, which took 29+1⁄2 days, took off and landed at the Port Columbus International Airport in Ohio.

    Jerrie Mock ↗

  2. 1970

    Apollo program: The damaged Apollo 13 spacecraft returns to Earth safely.

    Apollo program ↗

  3. 1978

    Mir Akbar Khyber is assassinated, provoking the Saur Revolution in Afghanistan.

    Mir Akbar Khyber ↗

  5. 2014

    NASA announced the discovery of Kepler-186f, the first exoplanet with a radius similar to Earth's discovered in the habitable zone of another star.

    NASA ↗

  6. 2014

    NASA's Kepler space telescope confirms the discovery of the first Earth-size planet in the habitable zone of another star.

    NASA ↗

Every launch on April 17

17 launches

ONLINE
  1. 2026Long March 4C | Daqi-2 (AEMS)CASCSUCCESS
  2. 2024Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 6-51SpXSUCCESS
  3. 2022Falcon 9 Block 5 | NROL-85SpXSUCCESS
  4. 2019Antares 230 | Cygnus CRS NG-11 (S.S. Roger Chaffee)NGSSSUCCESS
  5. 2007Dnepr | EgyptSat 1 & Saudisat 3ISCKSUCCESS
  6. 2000Proton-K/DM-2M | SesatKhSCSUCCESS
  7. 1998Space Shuttle Columbia / OV-102 | STS-90USASUCCESS
  8. 1997Kosmos-3M | Parus 88NPSUCCESS
  9. 1990Soyuz U | Zenit-8 91CCCPSUCCESS
  10. 1986Kosmos-3M | Strela-2M 38CCCPSUCCESS
  11. 1984Titan 24B | KH-8 54USAFSUCCESS
  12. 1983SLV-3 | Rohini RS-D-2ISROSUCCESS
  13. 1980Soyuz U | Zenit-4MKM 38CCCPSUCCESS
  14. 1971Vostok 8A92M | Meteor-1 8 (21L)CCCPSUCCESS
  15. 1968Titan IIIB | KH-8 13USAFSUCCESS
  16. 1967Atlas Centaur D | Surveyor 3USAFSUCCESS
  17. 1965Voskhod | Zenit-4 6CCCPSUCCESS

FIELD KIT / LIBRARY

SPONSORED

General-audience astronomy and spaceflight — none of it a textbook.

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Links here cost you nothing extra.

  • LISTING

    Cosmos — Carl Sagan

    Still the best single argument for why any of this matters, and it leaves the arithmetic in. For a reader who wants the science, not just the awe.

    VIEW

  • LISTING

    Pale Blue Dot — Carl Sagan

    The case for leaving Earth, written by someone unsentimental about how hard that is. Suits readers who want the argument rather than the poster.

    VIEW

  • LISTING

    Project Hail Mary — Andy Weir

    Hard-SF problem solving in The Martian's key — for anyone who liked the engineering more than the peril. The only novel on this list.

    VIEW

BROWSE opens an Amazon search, not a specific recommendation.

LINKS AMAZON.COM

Sources and licences

Event text and thumbnails come from Wikipedia and are used under CC BY-SA 4.0. Images are drawn only from Wikimedia Commons, which does not accept non-free content — each thumbnail links to its file page, where its licence and author are recorded.

Launch records are from The Space Devs’ Launch Library 2. Pictures are NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day; NASA imagery is generally not subject to copyright, but individual APOD entries are frequently the property of the photographer, and each caption says which applies.