Thursday, April 19, 2018

Salyut 1, first space station launched 1971


Salyut 1, the first space station ever, was launched by the Soviet Union April 19, 1971. After Apollo 11 landed on the moon in July 1969, the Soviets shifted the emphasis of their space program to orbiting stations, with a possible moon landing later in the 1970s.

They began construction of Salyut 1 in early 1970 and planned to launch on April 12 to coincide with Yuri Gagarin’s history flight on Vostok 1 technical problems postponed the launch until April 19.

The first crew to arrive was aboard Soyuz 10, launched April 22 with Vladimir Shatalov, Aleksei Yeliseyev and Nikolai Rikavishnikov.  They managed to ‘soft-dock’ with Salyut 1 but hard-docking had to be aborted due to technical malfunctions.  However, after undocking, toxic fumes began to fill the capsule during re-entry and Rukavishnikov lost consciousness, but all crew members were recovered successfully.

The second crew, Georgy Dobrovolsky, Vladislav Volkov and Viktor Patsayev, launched in Soyuz 11 June 6, 1971 and docked with Salyut 1 and transferred to the space station.  They were able to carry out some of their tasks but after 23 days, their mission was cut short due to problems aboard the station.  They transferred back to Soyuz 11 and re-entered Earth’s atmosphere.  A pressure relief valve malfunctioned during the descent, depressurizing the capsule, suffocating the crew.

The Soviets then moved Salyut 1 to a higher orbit to be sure it would not be destroyed too early through orbital decay.  While this maneuver was being fulfilled, the Soviets worked on an effort to redesign the capsules so pressure suits could be worn during launch, docking, re-entry, etc. 


Their efforts took too much time and in September, Salyut 1 was running low on attitude control gas.  On October 11, 1971, the Soviets fired the main engines for a deorbit maneuver and the space station burned up over the Pacific Ocean.


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