Galileo launch on a Soyuz rocket, 21 Oct 2011

A deeply modernized version of the R-7 is still used as the launch vehicle for the Soviet / Russian Soyuz spacecraft, marking more than 50 years of operational history of the original Sergei Korolyov's rocket design.

** The Soviet manned space mission Soyuz 18a ends in failure during its ascent into orbit when a critical malfunction occurs in the second and third stages of the booster rocket during staging, resulting with the cosmonauts and their Soyuz spacecraft having to be ripped free from the vehicle.

Since 1995 Khrunichev's Proton rocket is marketed through International Launch Services while the Soyuz rocket is marketed via Starsem.

Energia builds the Soyuz rocket and owns part of the Sea Launch project which flies the Ukrainian Zenit rocket.

The programme consists of the Soyuz spacecraft and the Soyuz rocket and is now the responsibility of the Russian Federal Space Agency.

Soyuz rocket on launch pad.

Its earliest form was intended to travel to the moon without employing a huge booster like the Saturn V or the Soviet N-1 by repeatedly docking with upper stages that had been put in orbit using the same rocket as the Soyuz.

In the end it turned out that the Soviet N1 " Moon Shot " rocket never flew successfully, so OKB-1's decisions to abandon the ill fated Soviet maned lunar program, and to derive a DOS space station from existing Soyuz subsystems and an Almaz-OPS hull proved to be right: The actual time to the launch of the first DOS-based Salyut 1 space station from the get-go was an impressive 16 months – the world's first space station was launched by the Soviet Union, two years before Skylab or the first Almaz-OPS station flew.

Soyuz 1 was the first manned flight of the first-generation Soyuz 7K-OK spacecraft and Soyuz rocket, designed as part of the Soviet lunar program.

In an experiment led by Leopoldo Sancho from the Complutense University of Madrid, two species of lichen — Rhizocarpon geographicum and Xanthoria elegans — were sealed in a capsule and launched on a Russian Soyuz rocket on 31 May 2005.

Heavy variants of Angara will be simpler and cheaper than Proton ( and like the new Atlas V rocket, will not use hypergolics ; instead, it will use the same RP-1 fuel as that used on the Soyuz rocket ).

: For the launch vehicle of the same name see Soyuz ( rocket family )

The Soyuz spacecraft is launched by the Soyuz rocket, the most frequently used and most reliable Russian launch vehicle to date.

OKB-1 was among others responsible for the development of the manned Soyuz spacecraft and its Soyuz rocket, the N1 " Moon Shot " rocket, large parts of the Salyut space station program, the unmanned Progress resupply craft and designed the Energia rocket for the Buran space shuttle program.

The basic Soyuz spacecraft design was the basis for many projects, many of which never came to light.

The following month Komarov clashed with other engineers over ongoing design problems in which zero-G tests showed that the Soyuz module hatch was too small to allow the exit of a fully suited cosmonaut safely.

In an effort by OKB-1 to catch up with OKB-52, they took Chelomei's Almaz-OPS hull design and mated it with subsystems derived from their own Soyuz.

Prior to launch, Soyuz 1 engineers are said to have reported 203 design faults to party leaders, but their concerns " were overruled by political pressures for a series of space feats to mark the anniversary of Lenin's birthday.

Yuri Gagarin was the backup pilot for Soyuz 1, and was aware of the design problems and the pressures from the Politburo to proceed with the flight.

Konstantin Feoktistov, who had been a design engineer for the Vostok, Voskhod, and Soyuz programs, was selected for this flight, becoming the only Soviet outer space designer to make a spaceflight.

He joined Mikhail Tikhonravov's OKB ( design bureau ), and in 1955, Feoktistov formed part of the team that went on to design the Sputnik satellites, the Vostok space capsule, the Voskhod space capsule, and the Soyuz space capsule under the leadership of the Soviet Chief Designer Sergey Korolev.

He continued leading technical detachments in the flying, design, testing and control of the spaceship Soyuz and Soyuz T, and the orbiting space stations Salyut 4, Salyut 5, and Salyut 6.

In October 1965 the Soviet government ordered a compromise ; the circumlunar mission would be launched on Chelomei's UR-500 using Korolev's Soyuz spacecraft in place of their own Zond design, aiming for a launch in 1967, the 50th anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution.

Until the design was corrected and a new vehicle launched, the crew was safe on Salyut with the Soyuz usable in an emergency.

The Soyuz 33 engine failure did not affect the supply tanker as it differed in its design.

* Soyuz 7K-L3, a manned lunar lander design type in Russia's Soyuz space program

The drawing shows Soyuz 7K ( right ), Soyuz 9K booster, and Soyuz 11K tanker with twin whip antennas ( left ) In its preliminary Moon plans, Korolyov's design bureau initially promoted the Soyuz A-B-C circumlunar complex concept under which a two-man spacecraft would rendezvous with other components in Earth orbit to assemble a lunar flyby excursion vehicle.

Few details are known about the Shenzhou reentry capsule, except that it uses some technology from the Soyuz TM design.

The use of the Soyuz spacecraft makes sense in many ways ; the original Soyuz design of 1962 was specifically intended for circumlunar travel.

* 1967 – Soviet space program: Soyuz 1 ( Russian: Союз 1, Union 1 ) is a manned spaceflight, Launched into orbit carrying cosmonaut Colonel Vladimir Komarov.

* 1973 – Soviet Soyuz Programme: Soyuz 13, crewed by cosmonauts Valentin Lebedev and Pyotr Klimuk, is launched from Baikonur in the Soviet Union.

* 1978 – Czech Vladimír Remek becomes the first non-Russian or non-American to go into space, when he is launched aboard Soyuz 28.

South Korea is currently selecting its first astronaut, scheduled to board a Soyuz flight to the International Space Station in April 2008.

* October 30 – This is the final date during which there is no human presence in space ; on October 31, Soyuz TM-31 launches, carrying the first resident crew to the International Space Station.

* April 2 – Indian Squadron Leader Rakesh Sharma is launched into space, aboard the Soyuz T-11.

* June 1 – Soyuz 9, a two man spacecraft, is launched in the Soviet Union.

** Soyuz program: Soyuz 11 ( Vladislav Volkov, Georgi Dobrovolski, Viktor Patsayev ) is launched.

* March 2 – Soyuz 28 ( Aleksei Gubarev, Vladimir Remek ) is launched on a rendezvous with Salyut 6, with the first cosmonaut from a third country ( besides the Soviet Union and United States ) – Czechoslovak citizen Vladimír Remek.

The Soyuz programme (,, meaning " Union ") is a human spaceflight programme that was initiated by the Soviet Union in the early 1960s, originally part of a Moon landing project intended to put a Soviet cosmonaut on the Moon.

Kourou's economy is largely dominated by the CSG, from which the European Ariane rockets are launched, as well as the Russian Soyuz and the Italian Vega rockets.

It is also possible for the Russian Soyuz spacecraft and Chinese Shenzhou spacecraft to land in water, though this is only a contingency.

The only example of an ( unintentional ) manned splashdown in Soviet history is the Soyuz 23 landing.

The Soyuz 1 crash site coordinates are, which is west of Karabutak, Province of Orenburg in the Russian Federation.

Hypersonic flight is achieved by reentering spacecraft such as the Space Shuttle and Soyuz.

The Soyuz is shown off-centre throughout the video just days before astronauts Mike Fossum, Satoshi Furukawa, and Sergey Alexandrovich Volkov | Sergey Volkov board this vehicle to come back to Earth.