On June 30, 1971, the first crew of the Salyut orbital space station in the history of astronautics, consisting of Georgy Dobrovolsky, Vladislav Volkov and Viktor Patsayev, died while returning to Earth. This tragic incident became the largest in the history of Russian cosmonautics - the entire crew died.
The Soviet and American space programs operated in conditions of extremely fierce competition. Each side strived at all costs to get ahead of the competitor and become the first. At first, the palm belonged to the USSR: the first launch of an artificial Earth satellite, the first launch of a man into space, the first man in outer space, the first flight of a female cosmonaut remained with the Soviet Union.
The Americans focused on the lunar race and won. Although the USSR had the theoretical opportunity to be the first, the program was too unreliable and the likelihood of disaster was too high, so the Soviet leadership did not dare to risk the lives of its cosmonauts. The Soviet lunar cosmonaut corps was transferred to training under the Docking program for the first flight to the orbital station.
Having safely landed on the Moon, the Americans proved to themselves that they could also do something, after which they became overly interested in the Earth’s satellite. The USSR at that time was already developing a project for a manned orbital station and won another victory in this area, launching its orbital station two years earlier than the United States did.
The Salyut station was planned to be launched into orbit by the beginning of the 24th Congress of the CPSU, but they were a little late. The station was launched into orbit only on April 19, 1971, ten days after the closing of the congress.
Almost immediately the first crew was sent to the orbital station. On April 24, five days after the station entered orbit, the Soyuz-10 spacecraft launched from Baikonur. On board were the ship's commander Vladimir Shatalov, flight engineer Alexey Eliseev and test engineer Nikolai Rukavishnikov.
This was a very experienced crew. Shatalov and Eliseev had already made two flights on Soyuz spacecraft; only Rukavishnikov was new to space. It was planned that Soyuz-10 would successfully dock with the orbital station, after which the cosmonauts would stay there for three weeks.
But everything didn't go as planned. The ship arrived safely at the station and began docking, but then problems began. The docking hub pin engaged with the station, but the automation failed and the correction engines started working, causing the Soyuz to sway and the docking hub to break.
There could no longer be any question of docking. Moreover, the entire Salyut station program was in jeopardy, since the cosmonauts did not know how to get rid of the docking pin. It could have been “shot”, but this would have made it impossible for any other ship to dock with the Salyut and would have meant the collapse of the entire program. Design engineers on Earth got involved and advised installing a jumper and using it to open the lock and remove the Soyuz pin. After several hours, this was finally done - and the astronauts went home.
Crew change
Preparations for the Soyuz-11 flight have begun. This crew was slightly less experienced than the previous one. None of the astronauts have been in space more than once. But the crew commander was Alexey Leonov, the first person to perform a spacewalk. In addition to him, the crew included flight engineer Valery Kubasov and engineer Pyotr Kolodin.
For several months they trained in docking both manually and automatically, because it was impossible to lose face for the second time in a row and return from the flight without docking.
At the beginning of June, the departure date was determined. At a meeting of the Politburo, the date was approved, as was the composition of the crew, which everyone unequivocally certified as the most skillful. But the unimaginable happened. Two days before the launch from Baikonur, sensational news came: during a standard pre-flight medical examination, doctors took an X-ray of Kubasov and discovered a slight darkening in one of the lungs. Everything pointed to an acute tuberculosis process. True, it remained unclear how it could be viewed, because such a process does not develop in one day, and the astronauts underwent thorough and regular medical examinations. One way or another, Kubasov was not allowed to fly into space.
But both the State Commission and the Politburo have already approved the composition of the crew. What to do? After all, in the Soviet program, cosmonauts prepared for flights in groups of threes, and if one dropped out, then it was necessary to change the entire team, since it was believed that the teams had already worked together, and replacing one crew member would lead to a violation of consistency.
But, on the other hand, no one before in the history of astronautics has changed the crew less than two days before departure. How to choose the right solution in such a situation? There was a heated argument between the curators of the space program. Assistant to the Air Force Commander-in-Chief for Space Nikolai Kamanin insisted that Leonov’s crew was experienced and if you replace the retired Kubasov with Volkov, who also had experience in space flights, then nothing terrible would happen and the coordination of actions would not be disrupted.
However, designer Mishin, one of the developers of Salyut and Soyuz, advocated a complete change of the troika. He believed that the backup crew would be much better prepared and worked together than the main crew, but which had undergone a change in crew on the eve of the flight. In the end, Mishin’s point of view won. Leonov's crew was removed and replaced with a backup crew consisting of commander Georgy Dobrovolsky, flight engineer Vladislav Volkov and research engineer Viktor Patsaev. None of them had been in space, with the exception of Volkov, who had already flown on one of the Soyuz.
Leonov's crew took the removal from the flight very painfully. Boris Chertok later recalled the words of designer Mishin: “Oh, what a difficult conversation I had with Leonov and Kolodin!” he told us. “Leonov accused me of allegedly deliberately not wanting to replace Kubasov with Volynov in order to drag him into Volkov's space. Kolodin said that he felt this way until the last day that he would not be allowed into space under any pretext. Kolodin says: “I am a black sheep for them. They are all pilots, and I am a rocket scientist."
None of the angry cosmonauts could have imagined that an erroneous x-ray (Kubasov did not have any tuberculosis and later he successfully flew into space) saved their lives. But then the situation escalated to the limit. Chertok personally observed this picture: “At the State Commission, I found myself next to Kolodin. He sat with his head bowed low, nervously clenching and unclenching his fingers, nodules playing on his face. He was not the only one nervous. Both crews felt unwell. The first was shocked by the removal from the flight, the second - a sudden change in fate. After the flight, the second crew had to climb the marble stairs of the Kremlin Palace to fanfare, Glinka’s music, and receive the stars of the heroes. But there was no joy on their faces.
The Soyuz-11 spacecraft launched from Baikonur on June 6, 1971. The astronauts were worried not only because two of them had never been in space before, but also because of the magnificent farewell: the day before departure, the mourners staged a real meeting at which they gave speeches.
Nevertheless, the launch of the ship took place as usual and without any failures. The astronauts successfully and without problems docked with the orbital station. It was an exciting moment, because they were to become the first earthlings on board the space station.
The astronauts were safely accommodated in the orbital station, which, although small, seemed huge to them after the incredibly cramped Soyuz. The first week they got used to the new environment. Among other things, the cosmonauts on the Salyut had a television connection with the Earth.
On June 16, an emergency occurred at the station. The astronauts smelled a strong burning smell. Volkov contacted Earth and reported the fire. The issue of urgent evacuation from the station was being considered, but Dobrovolsky decided to take his time and turn off some devices, after which the burning smell went away.
In total, the astronauts spent 23 days in orbit. They had a fairly rich program of research and experiments. In addition, they had to mothball the station for the next crews.
Catastrophe
In general, the flight went well - no one expected any emergencies. The crew made contact and conducted an orientation. As it turned out, this was the last communication session with the crew. As expected, at 1:35 the braking propulsion system was activated. At 1:47, the descent module separated from the instrument and service compartments. At 1:49 the crew was supposed to get in touch and report the successful separation of the descent module. The descent vehicle did not have a telemetry system and no one on Earth knew what was happening to the astronauts. It was planned that immediately after the separation Dobrovolsky would get in touch. The silence on the radio greatly surprised the experts, because the crew was very talkative and sometimes spoke to the Earth much more than the situation required.
The return to Earth took place as planned, without incidents, so at first there was no reason to believe that anything had happened to the crew. The most likely version was a malfunction of the radio equipment.
At 1:54 a.m., air defense systems detected the descent module. At an altitude of 7 thousand meters, the main parachute of the descent vehicle, which was equipped with an antenna, opened. The astronauts were required to contact either HF or VHF channels and report the situation. But they were silent, not responding to requests from Earth. This was already alarming; none of the safely returned Soyuz had problems with communication at this stage.
At about 2:05, the helicopters meeting the descent vehicle discovered it and reported it to the Mission Control Center. Ten minutes later the device landed safely. Externally, the device did not have any damage, but the crew still did not make contact and showed no signs of life. It was already clear that some kind of emergency had occurred, but there was still hope that the astronauts might have lost consciousness, but were still alive.
Immediately after landing, a meeting helicopter landed next to the device, and two minutes later the rescuers were already opening the hatch of the device. Chertok recalled: “The descent vehicle was lying on its side. There was no external damage. They knocked on the wall - no one responded. They quickly opened the hatch. All three were sitting in chairs in calm poses. There were blue spots on their faces. Streaks of blood from the nose and ears. They pulled out them from the SA. Dobrovolsky was still warm. Doctors continue artificial respiration."
Attempts by doctors to resuscitate the crew through artificial respiration and cardiac massage were unsuccessful. An autopsy showed that the crew died from decompression sickness caused by a sharp drop in pressure in the descent module.
Investigation
The circumstances of the death clearly indicated that the ship was depressurized. The very next day, studies of the descent module began, but all attempts to detect a leak failed. Kamanin recalled: “They closed the hatch and all other standard openings in the ship’s hull, created a pressure in the cabin that exceeded atmospheric pressure by 100 millimeters, and... did not find the slightest sign of leakage. They increased the excess pressure to 150, and then to 200 millimeters. Withstood the ship under such pressure for an hour and a half, we were finally convinced that the cabin was completely sealed."
But, if the device was completely sealed, then how could depressurization occur? There was only one option left. The leak may have occurred through one of the vent valves. But this valve opened only after the parachute opened to equalize the pressure, how could it open during the separation of the descent module?
The only theoretical option: the shock wave and explosions of the squibs during separation of the descent vehicle forced the valve opening squib to fire prematurely. But the Soyuz never had such problems (and in general there was not a single case of depressurization on both manned and unmanned ships). Moreover, after the disaster, experiments simulating this situation were carried out many times, but the valve never opened abnormally due to a shock wave or the detonation of squibs. No experiment has ever reproduced this situation. But, since there were no other explanations, this version was accepted as the official one. It was stipulated that this event was classified as extremely unlikely, since it could not be reproduced under experimental conditions.
The commission was able to approximately reconstruct the events that took place inside the descent module. After the normal separation of the apparatus, the cosmonauts discovered depressurization, as the pressure was rapidly dropping. They had less than a minute to find and eliminate her. Crew commander Dobrovolsky checks the hatch, but it is sealed. Trying to detect a leak by sound, the astronauts turn off radio transmitters and equipment. Most likely, they managed to detect the leak, but were no longer strong enough to close the valve. The drop in pressure was too strong, and within a minute the astronauts lost consciousness, and after about two minutes they were dead.
Everything would have been different if the crew had spacesuits. But the Soviet cosmonauts returned in the descent module without them. Both Korolev and Mishin opposed this. The suits were very bulky, as was the life support equipment they required, and the ships were already too cramped. Therefore, we had to choose: either an additional crew member, or spacesuits, or a radical reconstruction of the ship and the descent module.
The dead cosmonauts were buried in the Kremlin wall. At that time, it was the largest disaster in space in terms of the number of victims. For the first time, the entire crew died. The Soyuz-11 tragedy led to the fact that flights under this program were frozen for more than two years.
During this time, the program itself was radically revised. Since then, astronauts have been required to return back in protective suits. In order to gain more space in the lander, it was decided to abandon the third crew member. The layout of the controls was changed so that the astronaut could reach all the most important buttons and levers without getting up.
After modifications were made, the Soyuz program established itself as one of the most reliable and is still operating successfully.
In the mid-1980s, the American space program was at the height of its power. After winning the “lunar race,” the United States established its opinion of its unconditional leadership in space.
Another proof of this was the space exploration program using the Space Shuttle. Space shuttles, whose operation began in 1981, made it possible to launch a large amount of payload into orbit, return failed vehicles from orbit, and also make flights with a crew of up to 7 people. No other country in the world had similar technologies at that time.
Unlike the USSR, the US manned program did not experience accidents with human casualties during flights. More than 50 expeditions in a row ended successfully. Both the country's leadership and ordinary people have the opinion that the reliability of American space technology serves as an absolute guarantee of safety.
The idea arose that in the new conditions, anyone who had normal health and had completed a not too difficult and long course of training could fly into space.
"Teacher in Space"
U US President Ronald Reagan The idea arose to send an ordinary school teacher into space. The teacher was supposed to teach several lessons from orbit to increase children's interest in mathematics, physics, geography, as well as science and space exploration.
The “Teacher in Space” competition was announced in the USA, which received 11 thousand applications. There were 118 candidates in the second round, two from each state and dependent areas.
The final results of the competition were announced solemnly in the White House. US Vice President George W. Bush July 19, 1985 announced: the winner was 37-year-old Sharon Christa McAuliffe, second place was taken by the 34-year-old Barbara Morgan. Krista became the main candidate for the flight, Barbara became her backup.
Christa McAuliffe, a mother of two who taught high school history, English and biology, cried tears of joy as the competition results were announced. Her dream came true.
To those close to her, whose pride in Krista alternated with anxiety, she explained: “This is NASA, even if something goes wrong, they will be able to fix everything at the last moment.”
After completing a three-month training program, Christa McAuliffe was included in the crew of the Challenger spacecraft, which was scheduled to go into orbit in January 1986.
Anniversary start
The Challenger flight was supposed to be the anniversary, the 25th launch within the Space Shuttle program. Experts sought to increase the number of expeditions into orbit - after all, fabulous money was allocated for the project with the expectation that over time the shuttles would pay off and begin to make a profit. In order to achieve this, it was planned to reach a rate of 24 flights per year by 1990. That is why the program managers were extremely irritated by the words of specialists about serious shortcomings in the design of the ships. Minor faults had to be eliminated almost before every start, and fears arose that sooner or later everything could end in big trouble.
In addition to Christa McAuliffe, the STS-51L crew included Commander Francis Scobie, first pilot Michael Smith as well as astronauts Allison Onizuka, Judith Resnick, Ronald McNair And Gregory Jarvis.
Challenger crew. Photo: www.globallookpress.com
In addition to school lessons from orbit, the mission program included launching satellites into orbit and observing Halley's Comet.
Initially, the launch from the Cape Canaveral Space Center was scheduled for January 22, but was then postponed several times until January 28 became the new date.
That morning there was also a suspicion that the flight would have to be rescheduled - it was very cold in Florida, the temperature dropped below zero, and icing appeared at the launch site. The management decided not to cancel the start, but simply postpone it by a couple of hours. Upon a new inspection, it turned out that the ice had begun to melt, and the go-ahead was given for the start.
"Critical Situation"
The final launch was scheduled for 11:38 local time on January 28, 1986. Relatives and friends of the astronauts, colleagues and students of Christa McAuliffe gathered at the cosmodrome, waiting for the moment when the first teacher would go on a space journey.
At 11:38 a.m., Challenger lifted off from Cape Canaveral. In the stands where the audience was, rejoicing began. The television camera showed a close-up of the faces of Christa McAuliffe's parents as they saw off their daughter on the flight - they smiled, happy that their girl's dream had become a reality.
The announcer commented on everything that happened at the cosmodrome.
52 seconds after launch, the Challenger began its maximum acceleration. The ship's commander, Francis Scobie, confirmed the start of acceleration. These were the last words heard from the shuttle.
At the 73rd second of the flight, spectators watching the launch saw the Challenger disappear in a white cloud of explosion.
At first the spectators did not understand what had happened. Someone was scared, someone applauded in admiration, believing that everything was happening according to the flight program.
The announcer also seemed to think everything was fine. “1 minute 15 seconds. The ship's speed is 2900 feet per second. Flew a distance of nine nautical miles. The height above the ground is seven nautical miles,” the presenter continues to say.
As it turned out later, the announcer was not looking at the monitor screen, but was reading a previously drawn up launch script. A couple of minutes later, he announced a “critical situation,” and then said the terrible words: “The Challenger exploded.”
No chance of salvation
But by this moment, the audience had already understood everything - debris from what had recently been the most modern spacecraft in the world was falling from the sky into the Atlantic Ocean.
A search and rescue operation was launched, although it was initially called a rescue operation only formally. The ships of the Space Shuttle project, unlike the Soviet Soyuz, were not equipped with emergency rescue systems that could save the lives of astronauts during launch. The crew was doomed.
The operation to recover debris that fell into the Atlantic Ocean continued until May 1, 1986. In total, about 14 tons of debris were recovered. About 55% of the shuttle, 5% of the cabin and 65% of the payload remained on the ocean floor.
The cabin with the astronauts was raised on March 7. It turned out that after the destruction of the ship's structures, the stronger cabin survived and continued to rise upward for several seconds, after which it began to fall from a great height.
It was not possible to determine the exact moment of death of the astronauts, but it is known that at least two - Allison Onizuka and Judith Resnik - survived the moment of the disaster. Experts discovered that they had turned on personal air supply devices. What happened next depends on whether the cabin was depressurized after the destruction of the shuttle. Since personal devices do not supply air under pressure, the crew soon lost consciousness when depressurized.
If the cabin remained sealed, then the astronauts died when they hit the surface of the water at a speed of 333 km/h.
American "maybe"
America experienced the deepest shock. Flights under the Space Shuttle program were suspended indefinitely. To investigate the crash, US President Ronald Reagan appointed a special commission led by Secretary of State William Rogers.
The conclusions of the Rogers Commission were no less a blow to NASA's prestige than the disaster itself. Shortcomings in corporate culture and decision-making procedures were identified as the decisive factor leading to the tragedy.The destruction of the aircraft was caused by damage to the o-ring of the right solid fuel booster during take-off. Damage to the ring caused a hole to burn out in the side of the accelerator, from which a jet stream shot towards the external fuel tank. This led to the destruction of the tail mount of the right solid rocket booster and the supporting structures of the external fuel tank. Elements of the complex began to shift relative to each other, which led to its destruction as a result of abnormal aerodynamic loads.
As an investigation showed, NASA had known about defects in the o-rings since 1977, long before the first flight of the Space Shuttle program. But instead of making the necessary changes, NASA treated the problem as an acceptable risk of equipment failure. That is, to put it simply, the department’s specialists, hypnotized by past successes, hoped for an American “maybe.” This approach cost the lives of 7 astronauts, not to mention billions of dollars in financial losses.
21 years later
The Space Shuttle program was resumed after 32 months, but the previous confidence in it was no longer there. There was no longer any talk about payback and profit. The year 1985 remained a record year for the program, when 9 flights were made, and after the death of the Challenger, plans to increase the number of launches to 25-30 per year were no longer remembered.
After the disaster on January 28, 1986, NASA closed the Teacher in Space program and Christa McAuliffe's understudy, Barbara Morgan, returned to teaching school. However, everything she experienced made the teacher dream of finishing the job she started. In 1998, she re-enlisted as an astronaut and in 2002 was assigned as a flight specialist on the shuttle STS-118, which was scheduled to fly to the ISS in November 2003.
However, on February 1, 2003, the second shuttle disaster occurred - the Columbia spacecraft with 7 astronauts on board died during descent from orbit. Barbara Morgan's flight was postponed.
And yet she went into space. On August 8, 2007, 21 years after the loss of Challenger, teacher Barbara Morgan reached orbit on the USS Endeavor. During her flight, she conducted several communications with school classes, including the McCall-Donnelly School, where she taught for a long time. Thus, she completed a project that was not destined to be realized in 1986.
The largest space disasters in history October 16th, 2013
In the recently released space thriller "Gravity", viewers have the opportunity to watch a terrifying situation when the astronauts played Sandra Bullock And George Clooney, takes you far into space. The disaster occurs due to the fact that space debris disables the space shuttle. Although this situation is fictitious, the possibility of death and destruction is very real. Here are the biggest disasters that have occurred in the history of space flight.
1. Soyuz 1 and the death of cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov in 1967
The first fatal accident in the history of space flight occurred in 1967 with a Soviet cosmonaut. Vladimir Komarov, who was on board Soyuz 1, who died on landing when the spacecraft's descent module crashed into the ground. According to various sources, the cause of the tragedy was a failure of the parachute system. One can only guess what happened during the last minutes.
When it hit the ground, the on-board tape recorder melted, and the astronaut most likely died instantly from the incredible overloads. All that was left of the body were a few charred remains.
2. Soyuz-11: death in space
Another tragic ending to the Soviet space program occurred on June 30, 1971, when the cosmonauts Georgy Dobrovolsky, Vladislav Volkov And Victor Patsaev died while returning to Earth from the Salyut 1 space station.
The investigation showed that during the descent of Soyuz 11, the ventilation valve, which usually opens before landing, operated early, causing asphyxia among the astronauts. The pressure drop in the descent module exposed the crew to outer space. The astronauts were without spacesuits, since the descent module was not designed for three people.
Just 22 seconds after depressurization at an altitude of approximately 150 km, they began to lose consciousness, and after 42 seconds their heart stopped. They were found sitting in a chair, they had a hemorrhage, their eardrums were damaged, and the nitrogen in their blood clogged their blood vessels.
3. Challenger disaster
On January 28, 1986, NASA's space shuttle Challenger exploded on live television shortly after liftoff. The launch attracted widespread attention as it sent a teacher into orbit for the first time. Christa McAuliffe, which hoped to deliver lessons from space, attracting an audience of millions of schoolchildren.
The disaster dealt a serious blow to the reputation of the United States, and everyone could see it. An investigation revealed that cold temperatures on launch day caused problems with the O-ring, which destroyed the mount. All seven crew members died as a result of the disaster, and the shuttle program was closed until 1988.
4. Columbia Disaster
Seventeen years after the Challenger tragedy, the shuttle program suffered another loss when the space shuttle Columbia disintegrated upon re-entry on February 1, 2003, towards the end of mission STS-107. The investigation showed that the cause of death was foam debris that damaged the shuttle's thermal insulation coating, creating a hole with a diameter of about 20 cm.
Found shipwreck
All seven crew members were able to escape, but quickly lost consciousness and died as the shuttle continued to fall apart.
5. Apollo Mission: Apollo 1 Fire
Although no astronauts died during the Apollo missions, two fatal accidents did occur during related activities. Three astronauts: Gus Grissom, Edward White And Roger Chaffee died during a ground test of the command module that occurred on January 27, 1967. During preparation, a fire broke out in the cabin, causing the astronauts to suffocate and their bodies to burn.
The investigation found several errors, including the use of pure oxygen in the cabin, highly flammable Velcro fasteners and an inward-opening hatch that prevented the crew from quickly escaping. Before the test, the three astronauts were nervous about their upcoming training and posed for photos in front of a model of the spacecraft.
The accident led to many changes and improvements to future missions that later led to the first lunar landing.
6. Apollo 13: "Houston, we have a problem."
The Apollo 13 mission vividly demonstrated the dangers that await humans in space.
The launch of the spacecraft took place on April 11, 1970 at 13:13. During the flight, an oxygen tank exploded, damaging the service module, which disrupted plans to land on the Moon.
Damaged Apollo 13 service module
To return to Earth, the astronauts had to fly around the Moon, taking advantage of its gravity. During the explosion, the astronaut Jack Swigert over the radio he said the phrase: “Houston, we had a problem.” Subsequently, in the famous Hollywood film "Apollo 13" it was changed to the now famous quote: "Houston, we have a problem."
7. Lightning strikes and taiga: Apollo 12 and Voskhod 2
There were some pretty interesting, though not catastrophic, things that happened in both the Soviet space program and NASA. In 1969, during the launch of Apollo 12, lightning struck the spacecraft twice at 36 and 52 seconds after liftoff. Despite this, the mission was a success.
Voskhod 2 became famous due to the fact that in 1965, during the flight, the world's first spacewalk by an astronaut was made.
But there was a minor incident during landing due to a delay caused by the extra orbit around the Earth. At the same time, the place of return to the atmosphere was shifted. Alexey Leonov And Pavel Belyaev on board the ship landed in the remote taiga about 30 km from the city of Bereznyaki, Perm Region. The astronauts spent two days in the taiga, after which they were discovered by rescuers.
Source www.space.com
There are only about 20 people who gave their lives for the benefit of world progress in the field of space exploration, and today we will tell about them.
Their names are immortalized in the ashes of cosmic chronos, burned into the atmospheric memory of the universe forever, many of us would dream of remaining heroes for humanity, however, few would want to accept such a death as our cosmonaut heroes.
The 20th century was a breakthrough in mastering the path to the vastness of the Universe; in the second half of the 20th century, after much preparation, man was finally able to fly into space. However, there was a downside to such rapid progress - death of astronauts.
People died during pre-flight preparations, during the takeoff of the spacecraft, and during landing. Total during space launches, preparations for flights, including cosmonauts and technical personnel who died in the atmosphere More than 350 people died, about 170 astronauts alone.
Let us list the names of the cosmonauts who died during the operation of spacecraft (the USSR and the whole world, in particular America), and then we will briefly tell the story of their death.
Not a single cosmonaut died directly in Space; most of them all died in the Earth’s atmosphere, during the destruction or fire of the ship (the Apollo 1 astronauts died while preparing for the first manned flight).
Volkov, Vladislav Nikolaevich (“Soyuz-11”)
Dobrovolsky, Georgy Timofeevich (“Soyuz-11”)
Komarov, Vladimir Mikhailovich (“Soyuz-1”)
Patsaev, Viktor Ivanovich (“Soyuz-11”)
Anderson, Michael Phillip ("Columbia")
Brown, David McDowell (Columbia)
Grissom, Virgil Ivan (Apollo 1)
Jarvis, Gregory Bruce (Challenger)
Clark, Laurel Blair Salton ("Columbia")
McCool, William Cameron ("Columbia")
McNair, Ronald Erwin (Challenger)
McAuliffe, Christa ("Challenger")
Onizuka, Allison (Challenger)
Ramon, Ilan ("Columbia")
Resnick, Judith Arlen (Challenger)
Scobie, Francis Richard ("Challenger")
Smith, Michael John ("Challenger")
White, Edward Higgins (Apollo 1)
Husband, Rick Douglas ("Columbia")
Chawla, Kalpana (Columbia)
Chaffee, Roger (Apollo 1)
It is worth considering that we will never know the stories of the death of some astronauts, because this information is secret.
Soyuz-1 disaster
“Soyuz-1 is the first Soviet manned spacecraft (KK) of the Soyuz series. Launched into orbit on April 23, 1967. There was one cosmonaut on board Soyuz-1 - Hero of the Soviet Union, engineer-colonel V. M. Komarov, who died during the landing of the descent module. Komarov’s backup in preparation for this flight was Yu. A. Gagarin.”
Soyuz-1 was supposed to dock with Soyuz-2 to return the crew of the first ship, but due to problems, the launch of Soyuz-2 was canceled.
After entering orbit, problems began with the operation of the solar battery; after unsuccessful attempts to launch it, it was decided to lower the ship to Earth.
But during the descent, 7 km from the ground, the parachute system failed, the ship hit the ground at a speed of 50 km per hour, tanks with hydrogen peroxide exploded, the cosmonaut died instantly, Soyuz-1 almost completely burned out, the remains of the cosmonaut were severely burned so that it was impossible to identify even fragments of the body.
“This disaster was the first time a person died in flight in the history of manned astronautics.”
The causes of the tragedy have never been fully established.
Soyuz-11 disaster
Soyuz 11 is a spacecraft whose crew of three cosmonauts died in 1971. The cause of death was the depressurization of the descent module during the landing of the ship.
Just a couple of years after the death of Yu. A. Gagarin (the famous cosmonaut himself died in a plane crash in 1968), having already followed the seemingly well-trodden path of conquest of outer space, several more cosmonauts passed away.
Soyuz-11 was supposed to deliver the crew to the Salyut-1 orbital station, but the ship was unable to dock due to damage to the docking unit.
Crew composition:
Commander: Lieutenant Colonel Georgy Dobrovolsky
Flight engineer: Vladislav Volkov
Research engineer: Viktor Patsayev
They were between 35 and 43 years old. All of them were posthumously awarded awards, certificates, and orders.
It was never possible to establish what happened, why the spacecraft was depressurized, but most likely this information will not be given to us. But it’s a pity that at that time our cosmonauts were “guinea pigs” who were released into space without much security or security after the dogs. However, probably many of those who dreamed of becoming astronauts understood what a dangerous profession they were choosing.
Docking occurred on June 7, undocking on June 29, 1971. There was an unsuccessful attempt to dock with the Salyut-1 orbital station, the crew was able to board the Salyut-1, even stayed at the orbital station for several days, a TV connection was established, but already during the first approach to the station the cosmonauts stopped filming for some smoke. On the 11th day, a fire started, the crew decided to descend on the ground, but problems emerged that disrupted the undocking process. Spacesuits were not provided for the crew.
On June 29 at 21.25 the ship separated from the station, but a little more than 4 hours later contact with the crew was lost. The main parachute was deployed, the ship landed in a given area, and the soft landing engines fired. But the search team discovered at 02.16 (June 30, 1971) the lifeless bodies of the crew; resuscitation efforts were unsuccessful.
During the investigation, it was found that the cosmonauts tried to eliminate the leak until the last minute, but they mixed up the valves, fought for the wrong one, and meanwhile missed the opportunity for salvation. They died from decompression sickness - air bubbles were found during autopsy even in the heart valves.
The exact reasons for the depressurization of the ship have not been named, or rather, they have not been announced to the general public.
Subsequently, engineers and creators of spacecraft, crew commanders took into account many of the tragic mistakes of previous unsuccessful flights into space.
Challenger shuttle disaster
“The Challenger disaster occurred on January 28, 1986, when the space shuttle Challenger, at the very beginning of mission STS-51L, was destroyed by an explosion of its external fuel tank 73 seconds into flight, resulting in the death of all 7 crew members. The crash occurred at 11:39 EST (16:39 UTC) over the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of central Florida, USA."
In the photo, the ship's crew - from left to right: McAuliffe, Jarvis, Resnik, Scobie, McNair, Smith, Onizuka
All of America was waiting for this launch, millions of eyewitnesses and viewers watched the launch of the ship on TV, it was the culmination of the Western conquest of space. And so, when the grand launch of the ship took place, seconds later, a fire began, later an explosion, the shuttle cabin separated from the destroyed ship and fell at a speed of 330 km per hour on the surface of the water, seven days later the astronauts would be found in the broken cabin at the bottom of the ocean. Until the last moment, before hitting the water, some crew members were alive and tried to supply air to the cabin.
In the video below the article there is an excerpt of a live broadcast of the launch and death of the shuttle.
“The Challenger shuttle crew consisted of seven people. Its composition was as follows:
The crew commander is 46-year-old Francis “Dick” R. Scobee. US military pilot, US Air Force Lieutenant Colonel, NASA astronaut.
The co-pilot is 40-year-old Michael J. Smith. Test pilot, US Navy captain, NASA astronaut.
The scientific specialist is 39-year-old Ellison S. Onizuka. Test pilot, Lieutenant Colonel of the US Air Force, NASA astronaut.
The scientific specialist is 36-year-old Judith A. Resnick. Engineer and NASA astronaut. Spent 6 days 00 hours 56 minutes in space.
The scientific specialist is 35-year-old Ronald E. McNair. Physicist, NASA astronaut.
The payload specialist is 41-year-old Gregory B. Jarvis. Engineer and NASA astronaut.
The payload specialist is 37-year-old Sharon Christa Corrigan McAuliffe. A teacher from Boston who won the competition. This was her first flight into space as the first participant in the Teacher in Space project.”
Last photo of the crew
To establish the causes of the tragedy, various commissions were created, but most of the information was classified; according to assumptions, the reasons for the ship’s crash were poor interaction between organizational services, irregularities in the operation of the fuel system that were not detected in time (the explosion occurred at launch due to the burnout of the wall of the solid fuel accelerator), and even. .terrorist attack. Some said that the shuttle explosion was staged to harm America's prospects.
Space Shuttle Columbia disaster
“The Columbia disaster occurred on February 1, 2003, shortly before the end of its 28th flight (mission STS-107). The final flight of the space shuttle Columbia began on January 16, 2003. On the morning of February 1, 2003, after a 16-day flight, the shuttle was returning to Earth.
NASA lost contact with the craft at approximately 14:00 GMT (09:00 EST), 16 minutes before its intended landing on Runway 33 at the John F. Kennedy Space Center in Florida, which was scheduled to take place at 14:16 GMT. Eyewitnesses filmed burning debris from the shuttle flying at an altitude of about 63 kilometers at a speed of 5.6 km/s. All 7 crew members were killed."
Crew pictured - From top to bottom: Chawla, Husband, Anderson, Clark, Ramon, McCool, Brown
The Columbia shuttle was making its next 16-day flight, which was supposed to end with a landing on Earth, however, as the main version of the investigation says, the shuttle was damaged during the launch - a piece of torn off thermal insulating foam (the coating was intended to protect tanks with oxygen and hydrogen) as a result of the impact, damaged the wing coating, as a result of which, during the descent of the apparatus, when the heaviest loads on the body occur, the apparatus began to overheat and, subsequently, destruction.
Even during the shuttle mission, engineers more than once turned to NASA management to assess the damage and visually inspect the shuttle body using orbital satellites, but NASA experts assured that there were no fears or risks and the shuttle would descend safely to Earth.
“The crew of the shuttle Columbia consisted of seven people. Its composition was as follows:
The crew commander is 45-year-old Richard “Rick” D. Husband. US military pilot, US Air Force colonel, NASA astronaut. Spent 25 days 17 hours 33 minutes in space. Before Columbia, he was commander of the shuttle STS-96 Discovery.
The co-pilot is 41-year-old William "Willie" C. McCool. Test pilot, NASA astronaut. Spent 15 days 22 hours 20 minutes in space.
The flight engineer is 40-year-old Kalpana Chawla. Scientist, first female NASA astronaut of Indian origin. Spent 31 days, 14 hours and 54 minutes in space.
The payload specialist is 43-year-old Michael P. Anderson. Scientist, NASA astronaut. Spent 24 days 18 hours 8 minutes in space.
Zoology specialist - 41-year-old Laurel B. S. Clark. US Navy captain, NASA astronaut. Spent 15 days 22 hours 20 minutes in space.
Scientific specialist (doctor) - 46-year-old David McDowell Brown. Test pilot, NASA astronaut. Spent 15 days 22 hours 20 minutes in space.
The scientific specialist is 48-year-old Ilan Ramon (English Ilan Ramon, Hebrew.אילן רמון). NASA's first Israeli astronaut. Spent 15 days 22 hours 20 minutes in space.”
The shuttle's descent took place on February 1, 2003, and within an hour it was supposed to land on Earth.
“On February 1, 2003, at 08:15:30 (EST), the space shuttle Columbia began its descent to Earth. At 08:44 the shuttle began to enter the dense layers of the atmosphere." However, due to damage, the leading edge of the left wing began to overheat. From 08:50, the ship's hull suffered severe thermal loads; at 08:53, debris began to fall off the wing, but the crew was alive and there was still communication.
At 08:59:32 the commander sent the last message, which was interrupted mid-sentence. At 09:00, eyewitnesses had already filmed the explosion of the shuttle, the ship collapsed into many fragments. that is, the fate of the crew was predetermined due to NASA’s inaction, but the destruction itself and the loss of life occurred in a matter of seconds.
It is worth noting that the Columbia shuttle was used many times, at the time of its death the ship was 34 years old (in operation by NASA since 1979, the first manned flight in 1981), it flew into space 28 times, but this flight turned out to be fatal.
No one died in space itself; about 18 people died in the dense layers of the atmosphere and in spaceships.
In addition to the disasters of 4 ships (two Russian - "Soyuz-1" and "Soyuz-11" and American - "Columbia" and "Challenger"), in which 18 people died, there were several more disasters due to an explosion, fire during pre-flight preparation , one of the most famous tragedies is a fire in an atmosphere of pure oxygen during preparation for the Apollo 1 flight, then three American astronauts died, and in a similar situation, a very young USSR cosmonaut, Valentin Bondarenko, died. The astronauts simply burned alive.
Another NASA astronaut, Michael Adams, died while testing the X-15 rocket plane.
Yuri Alekseevich Gagarin died in an unsuccessful flight on an airplane during a routine training session.
Probably, the goal of the people who stepped into space was grandiose, and it is not a fact that even knowing their fate, many would have renounced astronautics, but still we always need to remember at what cost the path to the stars was paved for us...
In the photo there is a monument to the fallen astronauts on the Moon
In the USSR, they preferred to remain silent about the victims of the space race.
Challenger disaster © wikipedia.com
The history of space exploration by two superpowers - the USA and the USSR - was written in blood. During this time, dozens of astronauts died.
website recalls the high-profile disasters of the American shuttles and the lesser-known cases of the death of Soviet cosmonauts.
AccidentApolloA-13
After American astronauts successfully landed on the Moon twice using Apollo spacecraft, in 1970 the United States sent Apollo 13 into space, the third expedition whose goal was to land on the lunar surface.
For the first two days, John Swigert, Fred Hayes and commander James Lovell flew to the moon without incident. But on the third day, April 13, 1970, an oxygen tank exploded on Apollo 13. The main engine was damaged. The crew saw a stream of oxygen flowing from the ship into outer space. “Houston, we have a problem,” the astronauts gloomily reported to the command center.
There was no longer any talk of landing on the moon. However, Apollo 13 had to fly around the satellite, performing a gravity maneuver, and only then turn back to Earth.
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To save energy, the astronauts moved from the main cabin to the lunar module and turned off almost all systems, including heating, computers and lights.
On the fourth day after the accident, the level of carbon dioxide in the cabin began to increase. The temperature dropped to +11 degrees, but since the astronauts did not move, it seemed to them that the cabin was barely above freezing. The lunar module's engine had to be turned on four times to adjust its course to Earth, at the risk of losing all energy.
But, despite all the difficulties, on April 17, Apollo 13 entered the earth's atmosphere and successfully splashed down in the Pacific Ocean. The crew was picked up by an American ship and taken to Hawaii. In 1995, Hollywood made a film based on this story.
Rescue of the Apollo 13 crew: astronaut Fred Hayes is picked up by a lifeboat
Soyuz-1 disaster: one victim
In 1967, the USSR lagged behind the United States in the space race. For two years before this, the States had conducted manned space flights one after another, but the Union had not conducted a single one.
Despite the fact that previously unmanned Soyuz launches had ended in accidents, politicians were in a hurry to launch the Soyuz-1 spacecraft into orbit with an astronaut on board at any cost. This astronaut was 40-year-old Vladimir Komarov. He knew the ship he was ordered to fly on well and was aware of the extent of its unpreparedness.
Problems in Soyuz-1 began immediately after entering orbit: one of the ship’s solar panels did not open, then both orientation systems failed. Komarov did the impossible, managing to manually guide the uncontrollable ship onto a landing trajectory.
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But during landing, at an altitude of seven kilometers, both parachutes failed - the technology was violated during their manufacture at the plant. The ship with the astronaut collided with the ground in the Orenburg region at a speed of 60 m/sec.
“After an hour of excavation, we discovered Komarov’s body among the wreckage of the ship. At first it was difficult to make out where the head was, where the arms and legs were. Apparently, Komarov died when the ship hit the ground, and the fire turned his body into a small charred lump measuring 30 by 80 centimeters,” recalled the commander-in-chief of the Soviet Air Force for space, Nikolai Kamanin.
Komarov’s wife was not officially explained the reasons for her husband’s death, having only been given a death certificate with the entry “extensive burns to the body,” and the place of death was listed as the city of Shchelkovo. She gradually learned details at receptions in the Kremlin, where she was invited as the widow of an astronaut.
Death of the Apollo 1 crew: three victims
The victorious story of the American Apollo lunar mission began with tragedy. In 1967, a month before the planned launch, a fire occurred in Apollo 1.
This happened during ground tests at the Kennedy Space Center. Inside the ship was a crew of three astronauts: Vigil Griss, Edward White and Roger Chaffee. The cabin was filled not with air, but with pure oxygen.
The fire was caused by the engineers' shortcomings and a chain of accidents: some wires were poorly insulated, and one of the mechanics left a wrench inside. This metal key was apparently moved by one of the astronauts, coming into contact with the wiring. A short circuit occurred, oxygen ignited and the interior lining, which contained a lot of flammable materials, caught fire. To top it all off, the astronauts were unable to open the hatch.
People burned in 14 seconds. The last thing heard from the burning ship was 31-year-old Chaffee screaming "We're burning! Get us out of here!"
Soyuz-11 disaster: three victims
In June 1971, Soyuz-11 was launched into space with three cosmonauts on board - Georgy Dobrovolsky, Vladislav Volkov and Viktor Patsayev. The spacecraft docked with the Salyut orbital station, operated in orbit for 23 days, and then began returning to Earth.
On June 30, the descent vehicle successfully landed in Kazakhstan. But the search group that arrived at the landing site found all three astronauts dead.
The investigation showed that when the descent apparatus was separated from the ship, a ventilation valve opened and the compartment became depressurized. This valve was designed to allow air to flow into the cabin in the event of an unsuccessful landing, but for some reason it opened at an altitude of 150 km.
The astronauts did not have time to close the valve or even plug the small hole with their finger. The cabin was filled with fog, and the control panel was located at some distance from the seats - to reach it, you had to unfasten and get up from the seat. Just 20 seconds after depressurization, people lost consciousness.
The death of the astronauts could have been avoided if they had been wearing spacesuits. But at that time, the Soviet Soyuz spacecraft were designed for one cosmonaut, and three people were literally rammed into them, but it was necessary to send at least three, because that’s what the Americans did. The spacesuits did not fit in such tight spaces.
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After the deaths of Dobrovolsky, Volkov and Patsayev, the next Soyuz rockets flew into space with two cosmonauts in spacesuits.
Challenger shuttle disaster:seven victims
Despite the deaths of four Soviet cosmonauts, the Soyuz spacecraft ultimately proved to be less dangerous than the American shuttles. Two of NASA's five space shuttles have crashed.
Challenger completed nine successful flights. On January 28, 1986, dozens of reporters, schoolchildren and other spectators came to Cape Canaveral to watch the tenth shuttle launch. The launch was broadcast on satellite television. The shuttle crew included seven people, including one non-professional astronaut - a former teacher who won the right to fly into space in a competition.
The morning turned out to be cold - 2 degrees below zero, while the space shuttles were recommended to launch at a minimum of +11 degrees.
The accident occurred 73 seconds into the flight: one of the parts of the shuttle came off and pierced the fuel tank. The Challenger exploded in the sky in front of astonished spectators. Many were horrified, but most did not understand what had happened. Some even began to applaud, thinking that this was a planned disconnection of the boosters.
As it turned out, at least three astronauts were still alive after the explosion, as the bow section was torn off from the rest of the ship. Most likely, they immediately lost consciousness, because the cabin was depressurized and no air was supplied to them. In any case, those who survived the explosion were killed when pieces of the shuttle hit the water with great force.
Columbia shuttle disaster: seven victims
In February 2003, the space shuttle Columbia was returning from its 28th flight. There were seven people on board. In addition to the Americans, the astronauts included an Indian citizen and an Israeli.
NASA lost contact with the ship 16 minutes before its intended landing at Cape Canaveral in Florida. At this time the shuttle began to fall apart. The crash occurred at a speed of 20 thousand km/h. All seven astronauts died.
The falling of the debris was filmed on amateur cameras by random eyewitnesses to the tragedy. Almost immediately after the disaster, fragments of Columbia began to be picked up by enterprising people and sold at online auctions.
The investigation showed that even during the launch, a piece of thermal insulation fell off the Columbia and damaged the ship's skin. This incident, which no one paid attention to, had tragic consequences 16 days later, during the landing.
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Let's remember that last year... In April, the last shuttle Discovery was sent from Cape Canaveral to the Washington Museum.
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