science

List of Soyuz missions

List of Soyuz missions is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand List of Soyuz missions rather than just read about it. In short: This is a list of crewed and uncrewed flights of Soyuz series spacecraft. The Soyuz programme is an ongoing human spaceflight programme which 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.

Key takeaways

List of Soyuz missions belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect List of Soyuz missions to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of List of Soyuz missions from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

This is a list of crewed and uncrewed flights of Soyuz series spacecraft. The Soyuz programme is an ongoing human spaceflight programme which 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. It is the third Soviet human spaceflight programme after the Vostok and Voskhod programmes. Since the 1990s, as the successor state to the Soviet Union, Russia has continued and expanded the programme, which became part of a multinational collaboration to ensure a permanent human presence in low Earth orbit on the ISS (ISS). Soyuz spacecraft previously visited the Salyut and Mir space stations. Between the retirement of the Space Shuttle in 2011 and the first orbital flight of SpaceX's Crew Dragon in 2019, Soyuz were the only human-rated orbital spacecraft in operation, and the only way to transport crews to the ISS. Russia plans to succeed Soyuz in the 2020s with the Federatsiya/Orel programme, using new reusable capsules launching on Angara rockets, to transport cosmonauts to orbit.

Crewed mission numbers and spacecraft generations Beginning in 1966, the Soyuz programme has sent humans into space on a regular basis for over fifty years. Due to its length, the program has a complex history, which may lead to confusion about its mission numbers. The mission numbering scheme for crewed Soyuz flights is closely related to the generations of spacecraft. Understanding the former is made significantly easier by understanding the latter. The first era of the Soyuz programme's crewed missions (Soyuz 1-40) used the 7K series of Soyuz craft, which included the first-generation (1.0) Soyuz 7K-OK, a variant (1.5) Soyuz 7K-OKS, the second-generation (2.0) Soyuz 7K-T, and the (2.5) Soyuz 7K-TM variant. Following this first era, successive eras of crewed missions have had mission numbers which were directly tied to the names of craft used:

The second era of Soyuz T flights used the third-generation (3.0) craft of the same name. Mission numbers were of the form: "Soyuz T-#". The third era of Soyuz TM flights used the fourth-generation (4.0) craft of the same name. Mission numbers were of the form: "Soyuz TM-#". The fourth era of Soyuz TMA flights used the fifth-generation (5.0) craft of the same name. Mission numbers were of the form: "Soyuz TMA-#". The fifth era of Soyuz TMA-M flights used the fifth-generation variant (5.5) craft of the same name. Mission numbers were of the form "Soyuz TMA-##M". The sixth and current era of Soyuz MS flights uses the sixth-generation (6.0) craft of the same name. Mission numbers are of the form: "Soyuz MS-##". Within each given era, a mission number generally reflects the mission's chronological launch order, e.g. Soyuz TMA-12M was the twelfth mission of the TMA-M era, immediately preceded by Soyuz TMA-11M and immediately followed by Soyuz TMA-13M. Although there are exceptions to this (detailed below in the first table), the mission numbering scheme is usually consistent with chronological launch orders. This is in contrast with the mission numbers of the Space Shuttle program, which were tied to specific mission objectives and did not reflect chronological launch orders, e.g. STS-50, the forty-eighth Shuttle mission, was immediately followed by STS-46, the forty-ninth Shuttle mission.

Soyuz 7K (1966–1981) The first Soyuz series was the 7K series.

Soyuz 7K-L1

Spacecraft designed for Soviet human circumlunar missions. Missions are included under the Zond programme.

Soyuz 7K-LOK

Spacecraft designed for Soviet human lunar orbital and landing missions.

Soyuz T (1979–1986)

Soyuz TM (1987–2002)

Soyuz TMA (2002–2012)

Soyuz TMA-M (2010–2016)

Soyuz MS (2016–)

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with List of Soyuz missions

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what List of Soyuz missions claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to List of Soyuz missions before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about List of Soyuz missions ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of List of Soyuz missions

In research: List of Soyuz missions appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses List of Soyuz missions in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: List of Soyuz missions is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics International Space Station, Lists of rocket launches, Lists of space missions, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for List of Soyuz missions outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study List of Soyuz missions in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what List of Soyuz missions means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain List of Soyuz missions out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is List of Soyuz missions in simple terms?

Why does List of Soyuz missions matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study List of Soyuz missions?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on List of Soyuz missions.