Valeri Rozhdestvensky, born February 13, 1939 Leningrad, Soviet Union, went into space aboard Soyuz 23. It was his only trip into space, but considering the problems he and Commander Vyacheslav Zudov encountered during their disastrous trip, one cannot blame him. Fortunately, he and Zudov survived their ordeal.
Soyuz 24, launched February 7, 1977, was the third and final mission to Salyut 5 space station. Its crew, Commander Viktor Gorbatko and Flight Engineer Yuri Glazkov, reactivated the station after toxic fumes ended the previous mission, Soyuz 21. The Soyuz 23 flight attempted to dock with the station a few months earlier but was unable to complete the mission.
Soyuz 24 successfully docked with Salyut 5 the day after launch, but they did not enter the space station until the next day, probably dealing with the toxic fume problem.
On February 23, they started up Soyuz 24 and deactivated the space station and returned to Earth February 25.
Vyacheslav Zudov, born January 8, 1942 in the former Soviet Union, is a cosmonaut, whose only flight into space was aboard Soyuz 23 to Salyut 5, in October 1976. With fellow cosmonaut Valeri Rozhdestvensky, they reached the space station but there was a problem with the docking mechanism and they had to abort the mission. They landed on Lake Tengiz, a partially frozen lake in Kazakhstan. Although unintentional, it was the first splashdown of the Soviet Space Program.
When Commander Vyacheslav Zudov and Flight Engineer Valeri
Rozhdestvensky blasted off October 14, 1976, they did not expect to be back on
Earth in just two days. The expectation
was for them to link with Salyut 5 and break an in-space endurance record,
which was 84 days at the time. But from the
get-go, nothing went right.
The morning of the launch, the bus carrying the astronauts
to the launch pad broke down.
High-altitude winds forced the rocket off-course and the cosmonauts
almost had to abort the mission then.
They managed to achieve orbit somewhat lower than planned, but finally
settled in orbit 168 miles.
They planned to dock with Salyut 5 on evening of October 15
but as the cosmonauts came within 4 miles of the station, Commander Zudov
reported “strong lateral fluctuations” in the craft. At 500m, both men realized they would not be
able to dock.
Zudov wanted to make a second attempt but were told they had
used too much fuel settling into a lower altitude orbit and stabilizing the
craft. They needed to reserve what fuel
they had remaining for the return home.
Not what they wanted to hear.
High winds and
blizzard conditions carried them about 75 miles from the scheduled landing
point. They braced themselves for a “splatdown”
and were shocked when the landing terminated with a loud splash, in Lake Tengiz
about 5 miles from shore. At night. Lake Tengiz is a large salt lake in
Kazakhstan. The capsule lay on its side,
which kept them from opening the hatch.
Not that they wanted to since outside the temperature was -22° C.
A thick fog blocked the capsule’s beacon so rescue
helicopters could not locate them. The
salt water corrosion activated the explosive charges on the reserve chute,
deploying it and allowing it to fill with water.
A helicopter finally spotted them but the blizzard moving in
would not allow the pilot to hold a stable position. A second attempt also failed. Amphibious vehicles could not be used because
they could not traverse the bogs and marshes.
Blocks of ice and sludge on Lake Tengiz prevented the use of life rafts.
When dawn came, a helicopter managed to tow the capsule to
shore, but was nearly dragged down by the water-filled reserve chute. It took 45 minutes to bring the cosmonauts to
dry land, but they were alive!
