Soyuz 17

Infobox Space mission
mission_name = Soyuz 17
sign = Зенит (Zenit - "Zenith")
crew_members = 2
launch = January 11, 1975
21:43:37 UTC
Gagarin's Start
landing = February 9, 1975
11:03:22 UTC
110km NE of Tselinograd
duration = 29d/13:19:45
orbits = 479
next = Soyuz 18a
previous = Soyuz 16 |

Crew

Number in parentheses indicates number of spaceflights by each individual prior to and including this mission.
*Aleksei Gubarev (1) - Commander
*Georgi Grechko (1) - Flight Engineer

Backup crew

*Vasili Lazarev - Commander
*Oleg Makarov - Flight Engineer

Reserve crew

*Pyotr Klimuk - Commander
*Vitali Sevastyanov - Flight Engineer

Mission parameters

*Mass: 6800 kg
*Perigee: 185 km
*Apogee: 249 km
*Inclination: 51.6°
*Period: 88.8 min

Mission highlights

Soyuz 17 carried cosmonauts Georgi Grechko and Aleksei Gubarev to the Salyut 4 space station for a month-long stay. Upon entering the new station, they found a humorous note from its builders, telling them to "Wipe your feet!"

When Soyuz 17 docked, Salyut 4 was in an unusually high circular orbit at 350 km. Astrophysics was a major component of their mission (hence the high altitude). The crew discovered that the main mirror of the solar telescope had been ruined by direct exposure to sunlight when the pointing system failed. They resurfaced the mirror and worked out a way of pointing the telescopeusing a stethoscope, stopwatch, and the noises the moving mirror made in its casing.

Experiments carried out on board the station were mostly of an astronomical nature, with observations of the Sun, the Earth, and the planets.