Soyuz MS-17 was aSoyuz spaceflight that was launched on 14 October 2020.[4][11] It transported three crew members of theExpedition 63/64 crew to theInternational Space Station. Soyuz MS-17 was the 145th crewed flight of a Soyuz spacecraft. The crew consisted of a Russian commander and a Russian and American flight engineer.[12][13][14]
The mission marked the first use of a new "ultrafast" two-orbitrendezvous flight plan with the Soyuz, which saw Soyuz MS-17 arrive at the ISS within approximately three hours after the launch.[3][15][16][8]
On 19 March 2021, the crew of Soyuz MS-17 boarded their spacecraft to relocate it fromRassvet toPoisk to make way for the arrival and docking of theSoyuz MS-18 spacecraft,[9] which launched on 9 April 2021 carrying cosmonautsOleg Novitsky,Pyotr Dubrov andNASA astronaut,Mark T. Vande Hei to the ISS ahead of a six-month stay. The two spacecraft had a nine-day handover period before Soyuz MS-17 departed. This is necessary to avoid de-crewing theRussian Orbital Segment (ROS) of the ISS since no Russian cosmonaut was present aboardSpaceX Crew-1.[11]
Early planning had listed Russian cosmonautNikolai Chub as the mission's Flight engineer, pending aNASA decision on whether they would purchase more seats on the Soyuz. In May 2020, NASA purchased a Soyuz seat and assigned NASA astronautKathleen Rubins to the Flight engineer position, backed up by astronautMark T. Vande Hei.[17][20]
Originally Russian cosmonautsAnatoli Ivanishin andIvan Vagner were set to fly as Commander and Flight engineer respectively. In February 2020, however, the two cosmonauts were moved to theSoyuz MS-16 flight due to medical issues with the commander ofSoyuz MS-16,Nikolai Tikhonov. Ivanishin and Vagner were replaced by Ryzhikov and Kud-Sverchkov. Babkin remains an active cosmonaut, but has not yet been to space, while Tikhonov has retired fromRoscosmos' astronaut corps.
Reacting to theCOVID-19 pandemic,Roscosmos implemented a two-cosmonaut reserve crew to ensure the flight could go on with no delays, in the unlikely event both the prime and backup crews fall ill. It was not confirmed whether NASA planned to add an astronaut of their own to the reserve crew.[21]
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).