Skip to content
DELTA-V

ARCHIVE // DAY OF YEAR

June 17 in spaceflight

19 orbital launches flew on June 17, the earliest of them in 1962, and 18 reached orbit. Wikipedia records 2 spaceflight and astronomy events on June 17. Below are the pictures NASA published on June 17 in 6 different years — each one taken or released on this exact date.

DATE

Launches

ON RECORD

19MISSIONS

18 of them reached orbit. The earliest was 1962, the most recent 2026.

Recorded events

IN THE RECORD

2ENTRIES

Spaceflight and astronomy entries from Wikipedia's record of this date, oldest first — from 1922 onward.

Pictures from this date

PUBLISHED

6IMAGES

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

Published on June 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.

NASA · public domain

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.

NASA · public domain

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.

© Elke Schulz — used with the credit NASA publishes

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.

© Joe Navara — used with the credit NASA publishes

What happened on June 17

  1. 1922

    Portuguese naval aviators Gago Coutinho and Sacadura Cabral complete the first aerial crossing of the South Atlantic.

    Portuguese Naval Aviation ↗

  2. 1985

    Space Shuttle program: STS-51-G mission: Space Shuttle Discovery launches carrying Sultan bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, the first Arab and first Muslim in space, as a payload specialist.

    Space Shuttle program ↗

Every launch on June 17

19 launches

ONLINE
  1. 2026Ariane 64 Block 2 | Amazon Leo (LE-03)ASASUCCESS
  2. 2026Falcon 9 Block 5 | BlueBird 8-10 (Block 2 #3-5)SpXSUCCESS
  3. 2026Kuaizhou 11 | CentiSpace-1 Group 05EPSUCCESS
  4. 2026Long March 12 | SatNet LEO Group 22CASCSUCCESS
  5. 2025Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 15-9SpXSUCCESS
  6. 2022Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 4-19SpXSUCCESS
  7. 2021Falcon 9 Block 5 | GPS III SV05SpXSUCCESS
  8. 2021Long March 2F/G | Shenzhou 12CASCSUCCESS
  9. 2020Long March 2D | Gaofen-9-03CASCSUCCESS
  10. 2006Proton-K/DM-2M | KazsatKhSCSUCCESS
  11. 1994Ariane 44LP | INTELSAT 702ASASUCCESS
  12. 1985Space Shuttle Discovery / OV-103 | STS-51-GLSOCSUCCESS
  13. 1981Soyuz U | Zenit-6U 40CCCPSUCCESS
  14. 1977Tsiklon-2 | IS-A 6CCCPSUCCESS
  15. 1977Kosmos-3M | Signe 3CCCPSUCCESS
  16. 1970Voskhod | Zenit-4 73CCCPSUCCESS
  17. 1967Molniya-M | Venera-5aCCCPFAILURE
  18. 1966Voskhod | Zenit-4 19CCCPSUCCESS
  19. 1962Atlas Agena B | Samos-E6 2USAFSUCCESS

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.