The history of the development of astronautics is a story about people with an extraordinary mind, about the desire to understand the laws of the Universe and about the desire to surpass the usual and possible. The exploration of outer space, which began in the last century, gave the world many discoveries. They concern both objects of distant galaxies and completely terrestrial processes. The development of astronautics contributed to the improvement of technology, led to discoveries in various fields of knowledge, from physics to medicine. However, this process took a long time.

Lost Labor

The development of cosmonautics in Russia and abroad began long before the advent of the first scientific developments in this regard were only theoretical and substantiated the very possibility of space flights. In our country, one of the pioneers of astronautics at the tip of a pen was Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky. "One of" - because Nikolai Ivanovich Kibalchich, sentenced to death penalty for the assassination attempt on Alexander II and, a few days before the hanging, developed a project for an apparatus capable of delivering a person into space. It was in 1881, but Kibalchich's project was not published until 1918.

rural teacher

Tsiolkovsky, whose article theoretical foundations flight into space came out in 1903, he did not know about the work of Kibalchich. At that time he taught at Kaluga School arithmetic and geometry. His well-known scientific article "Research of the World Spaces with Jet Instruments" touched upon the possibilities of using rockets in space. The development of astronautics in Russia, then still tsarist, began precisely with Tsiolkovsky. He developed a project for the structure of a rocket capable of taking a person to the stars, defended the idea of ​​the diversity of life in the Universe, spoke about the need to design artificial satellites and orbital stations.

In parallel, theoretical astronautics developed abroad. However, there were practically no connections between scientists either at the beginning of the century or later, in the 1930s. Robert Goddard, Hermann Oberth, and Esnault-Peltri, an American, a German, and a Frenchman, respectively, who worked on similar problems, knew nothing about Tsiolkovsky's work for a long time. Even then, the disunity of peoples affected the pace of development of the new industry.

Pre-war years and the Great Patriotic War

The development of cosmonautics continued in the 1920s-1940s with the help of the Gas Dynamics Laboratory and the Groups for the Study of Jet Propulsion, and then the Jet Research Institute. In the walls scientific institutions the best engineering minds of the country worked, including F. A. Zander, M. K. Tikhonravov and S. P. Korolev. In the laboratories, they worked on the creation of the first liquid and solid propellant rockets, and the theoretical basis of astronautics was developed.

In the pre-war years and during the Second World War, jet engines and rocket planes were designed and built. During this period, for obvious reasons, much attention was paid to the development of cruise missiles and unguided rockets.

Korolev and V-2

The first modern-type combat missile in history was created in Germany during the war under the command of Wernher von Braun. Then the V-2, or V-2, did a lot of trouble. After the defeat of Germany, von Braun was transferred to America, where he began to work on new projects, including the development of rockets for space flights.

In 1945, after the end of the war, a group of Soviet engineers arrived in Germany to study the V-2. Among them was Korolev. He was appointed chief engineering and technical director of the Nordhausen Institute, formed in Germany in the same year. In addition to studying German missiles, Korolev and his colleagues were developing new projects. In the 50s, the design bureau under his leadership created the R-7. This two-stage rocket was able to develop the first and ensure the launch of multi-ton vehicles into near-Earth orbit.

Stages of development of astronautics

The advantage of the Americans in the preparation of vehicles for space exploration, associated with the work of von Braun, remained in the past when on October 4, 1957 the USSR launched the first satellite. Since then, the development of astronautics has gone faster. In the 1950s and 1960s, several animal experiments were carried out. Dogs and monkeys have been in space.

As a result, scientists have collected invaluable information that made possible a comfortable stay in human space. At the beginning of 1959, it was possible to reach the second space velocity.

The advanced development of domestic cosmonautics was accepted all over the world when Yuri Gagarin poisoned himself in the sky. It was, without exaggeration, the great event of 1961. From that day began the penetration of man into the boundless expanses surrounding the Earth.

• October 12, 1964 - an apparatus with several people on board was launched into orbit (USSR);
• March 18, 1965 - the first (USSR);
• February 3, 1966 - the first landing of the apparatus on the Moon (USSR);
• December 24, 1968 - the first launch of a manned spacecraft into Earth satellite orbit (USA);
• July 20, 1969 - day (USA);
• April 19, 1971 - the first orbital station was launched (USSR);
• July 17, 1975 - for the first time there was a docking of two ships (Soviet and American);
• April 12, 1981 - the first Space Shuttle (USA) went into space.

The development of modern astronautics

Today, space exploration continues. The successes of the past have borne fruit - man has already visited the moon and is preparing for a direct acquaintance with Mars. However, manned flight programs are now developing less than projects of automatic interplanetary stations. Current state space exploration is such that the spacecraft being created are capable of transmitting information about distant Saturn, Jupiter and Pluto to Earth, visiting Mercury and even exploring meteorites.
In parallel, space tourism is developing. International contacts are of great importance today. gradually comes to the conclusion that great breakthroughs and discoveries occur faster and more often if the efforts and capabilities of different countries are combined.

Moscow State Technical University named after Bauman

Faculty of Fundamental Sciences.

Essay on the history of the fatherland of a student group

HISTORY OF SOVIET SPACE

manned flights and exploration of other planets

Introduction

Why did people go into space? Why do we spend so much energy and money to reach other planets, many months of people's work in space, expensive devices and carriers? For people who call themselves thinking, excuses have been practically invented: they say, you see how much use satellites already bring to us - satellite television, navigation, weather prediction, search for minerals, etc., etc. ...

In fact, those people who created and are creating this technique are primarily inspired not by the existing and future benefits that space exploration brings to mankind and not even by solving many of our earthly problems due to this, but by simple human curiosity. The desire to look at the far side of the Moon, to look under the cloudy layer of Venus, to find out if there is life on Europa (a satellite of Jupiter). And one more thing, the most important thing - the desire to make sure that we are not alone in the Universe. There is indirect evidence that this is so, but we still have not found in space not only traces of other civilizations, but in general traces of organic life, despite all our attempts. The search continues.

Our country was a pioneer in the field of space exploration. For a long time, the space industry has been a symbol of progress for us, a matter of legitimate pride for our country. Cosmonautics was part of politics - our space achievements were supposed to "once again demonstrate the advantage of the socialist system." Therefore, in official reports and monographs, our achievements were described with great pomp and were modestly silent about the failures, and most importantly about the successes of our main opponents, the Americans. exploration of interplanetary space and we see that not everything went easily and smoothly. This in no way detracts from the achievements of our space industry - on the contrary, it testifies to the firmness and spirit of people, despite the failures of those who went to the goal.

First steps

The founder of modern cosmonautics is considered to be the great Russian self-taught scientist K.E. late XIX century put forward the idea of ​​the possibility of the need for human exploration of outer space. Initially, these thoughts were published by him in the form of scientific papers. fantastic stories, and then, in 1903, the famous work “Investigation of world spaces with jet instruments” was published, in which he showed the possibility of achieving cosmic velocities and other celestial bodies using liquid fuel rockets. Subsequently, Tsiolkovsky published a number of other works on rocket technology and space exploration.

Tsiolkovsky gained followers and popularizers both in our country and abroad. In America, Professor Goddard, who in 1926 built and tested in flight the world's first liquid-fueled rocket. In Germany, Oberth and Senger. In our country, the popularizer of Tsiolkovsky's ideas was, in particular, Ya.I. Perelman (the author of "Entertaining Physics" and other books of the entertaining genre). Some engineers and scientists took up the further development of his ideas.

In 1918, a book by Yu.V. Kondratyuk "For those who will read to build" was published in Novosibirsk, in which the author gives an original derivation of the Tsiolkovsky formula, proposes a scheme for a three-stage oxygen-hydrogen rocket, an orbital spacecraft, aerodynamic braking in the atmosphere, a gravitational maneuver, a scheme flight to the moon (it was according to this scheme that the Americans flew because it turned out to be optimal). It is a pity that this talented engineer could not take part in the creation of rocket technology - in the 30s he was imprisoned "sabotage" (he was then engaged in the construction of elevators) then released, but he died during the war.

In 1924, the work of another engineer, fascinated by the idea of ​​interplanetary communications, appeared - F.A. Zander "Flights to other planets" in which he proposed a combination of an aircraft with a rocket. In 1931, two public groups for the study of jet propulsion (GIRD) were organized - in Moscow - under the chairmanship of Zander and in Leningrad, under the chairmanship of V.V. Razumov. Initially, they were intended only for propaganda and educational activities.

Back in 1929 as part of the Gas Dynamics Laboratory (GDL) (funded by the state), Glushko's division was formed to develop electric and liquid rockets (even earlier, Glushko proposed the Heliorocket Plan project - a disk plane equipped with an electric rocket engine powered by solar batteries - a rather bold project for the 20s). In 1932, the Moscow GIRD was provided by the state with an experimental base for the construction and testing of rockets, and a young graduate of the Moscow Higher Technical School, an active participant in the creation of the GIRD S.P. Korolev, was appointed its head. Research institute(RNII). The state supported rocket scientists not at all out of a desire to bring humanity closer to the world space, but from “defense” considerations - even then it was clear that a rocket is a formidable weapon, and other countries, especially Germany, were actively researching in this direction. Aroused the interest of the military and the possibility of using rocket boosters on combat aircraft, from which it was not far from jet aircraft.

The newly created institute actively set to work. In 1933. was launched the first Soviet rocket on hybrid fuel (solid and liquid) GIRD-09, design M. K. Tikhonravova. In the same year, the first domestic liquid-fueled rocket GIRD-X, designed by Zander, was launched. At the end of the 30s, under the leadership of Korolev, the RP-318-1 rocket plane with an engine designed by Glushko was built and tested. At the same time, the first automatic cruise missile 212 designed by Korolev was tested, also with the Glushko engine. In 1939 -1941. in the RNII were built under the leadership of Yu.A. Pobedonostsev multiple rocket launchers - "Katyusha". As we can see, the RNII worked mainly for the military, in other countries a similar situation developed then - jet vehicles that later lift a person to heaven were originally created to destroy their own kind.

It is also impossible not to mention this important event, as the creation in our country perhaps the first educational institution, for the training of specialists for the rocket and space industry - in 1932. in Moscow, on the initiative of the GIRD, engineering and design courses were organized. Prominent Soviet scientists lectured at the courses, in particular, the creator of the theory of air-breathing engines B.S. Stechkin, one of the founders of aviation medicine N.M. Dobrotvorsky (already then they taught a course in the physiology of high-altitude flight). A graduate of these courses was, in particular, I.A. Merkulov, the creator of a ramjet engine (ramjet). In 1939, the world's first two-stage rocket with a ramjet of his design was tested. Although these engines were not used either in aviation or in astronautics, in recent times interest in them resumed in connection with the creation of reusable vehicles space systems, because A ramjet, drawing oxygen from the environment, will dramatically reduce required amount fuel on board.

From V-2 to the first satellite

During the Second World War, the most advanced rocket technology was created in Nazi Germany- this is, first of all, a single-stage ballistic missile with a V-2 rocket engine, built by 1942, designed by Wernher von Braun. With their help, the Nazis shelled London, launching rockets from the coast of occupied France. In 1943 tests were carried out on a fighter with a Messerschmitt-163V liquid-propellant rocket engine with a Walter engine, however, in aviation, air-propelled engines seemed more promising, which German designers did not have time to sufficiently improve before Germany's defeat in the war.

By 1943, Vaughn Brown developed a project for a two-stage intercontinental (!) Ballistic missile A9 / A10 (V-3), with a take-off weight of about 100 tons (!). This year, the V-3 made 18 launches, 16 of which ended in an explosion. The following year, about 30 launches were made, information about which has not yet been found. The V-3 was intended for shelling New York. The pilot had to aim it at the target - it was assumed that after guidance, he would leave the rocket on a parachute and be picked up by a submarine. For this, the first cosmonaut detachment in history was recruited, but we do not have data on whether there were people on board the launched rockets. German designers managed to do what the US and the USSR will be able to do more than 10 years later - after all, such a rocket is quite capable of putting an artificial satellite into orbit. There is an opinion that during the war the Germans took a man into space on this rocket - I consider this a fiction because, firstly, the V-3 was still rather weak for an orbital flight (and suborbital flights without going into orbit can be classified as space with a large degree of conventionality), and secondly, in 1944 Germany had other problems than space flights.

The defeat of Germany stopped the further development of this rocket technology (possibly to the great happiness of all mankind), and its potential in this area was literally stolen by the allies. The main trophies went to the Americans, advancing from the west and capturing the factories, training grounds and design bureaus located there. Most of the German designers, led by von Braun, who later fruitfully worked on American rocket technology, were captured by them. We almost didn’t get any trophies, but our designers are all they managed to get the drawings and thoroughly study German technology. Thus, rocket and space technology in both "space" powers began to develop on the basis of German experience. The first ballistic missiles in the USSR and the USA were essentially copies of the V-2.

In 1946 (and in fact, immediately after the defeat of Germany), an acute confrontation between the USSR and the USA began in all sectors of the economy, science and technology, on the verge of an armed conflict, which received the name “ cold war”, and caused by the desire of both powers for world domination.

In 1945, the United States got atomic weapons and there are plans to apply nuclear strikes across the USSR. However, in 1949 atomic bomb appeared in the Soviet Union, and in 1953 the first thermonuclear bomb was detonated in our country. Now each of the opposing sides had nuclear weapons, and much attention began to be paid to the means of their delivery. Because The bomber was too vulnerable and slow, work begins on the creation of intercontinental ballistic missiles.

In 1946, S.P. Korolev was appointed chief designer of the Design Bureau, which was supposed to design multi-stage ballistic missiles. In 1948, the flight of the first domestic ballistic missile R-1 took place (the former, however, an almost exact copy of the V-2). In 1951, the R-2 rocket was put into service, with a flight range of 600 km, and in 1956. - rocket R-5M, with a range of 1200 km. In 1954 OKB M.K. was formed. Yangel, which was engaged in the development of combat ballistic missiles for long-term storage.

In addition to combat missiles in the Soviet Union since 1949. scientific research rockets V-1E, V-2A, V-1A (created on the basis of ballistic missiles), etc., were regularly launched, with the help of which the upper layers of the atmosphere, cosmic rays, and the behavior of experimental animals (dogs) during the flight were studied. Thus, the foundation was laid for the future flight into space of man ...

Single-stage missiles could not satisfy the military - they needed a multi-stage intercontinental missile capable of delivering a "load" to any point the globe. The development of such a rocket was carried out at the Korolev Design Bureau, but the old Kapustin Yar test site was no longer suitable for its launch even in 1955. in the Kazakh steppe, not far from the Tyura-Tam railway station, construction began on a new test site, which is still called the Baikonur cosmodrome, although it is quite far from the cosmodrome to the village of Baikonur. This name was chosen, apparently for reasons of confusing "enemy spies." "Enemy saboteurs" the party officials probably dreamed at night, because they rejected the original project, where the launch was located on a hill, considering that the launch rocket in this case would be too vulnerable and moved the launch to another place. They did not have time to carry out geological exploration there, and when they began to dig a pit, the builders were in for a "surprise" - in the waterless steppe they discovered an underground reservoir with water, which made construction very difficult. If it were not for the ingenuity and heroic work of the builders, then the start would not have been completed on time then it is still unknown whose satellite would be the first.

In 1957, the construction of the cosmodrome was completed, and flight tests of the new two-stage ballistic missile R-7 began. After three unsuccessful attempts, it was finally possible to achieve a stable flight of the rocket. The R-7 was the largest and most powerful rocket of that time - its take-off weight was about 300 tons and it was about 30 meters long. The Seven was built at the Korolyov Design Bureau, the engines were created under the direction of Glushko, and the control system was under the direction of Pilyugin. This design proved to be the champion of longevity in such a new and rapidly developing industry as cosmonautics - the Soyuz rocket, which to this day delivers astronauts into orbit, is nothing more than an improved "seven" with an added third stage.

The creation of a powerful launch vehicle allowed our country to take a leading position in space exploration. October 4, 1957 R-7 launched the first artificial earth satellite into orbit. It was an aluminum ball with a diameter of 58 cm and a mass of 83 kg, equipped with a radio transmitter. For the first time the device created by the person reached the first space speed. This event is considered to be the beginning of the space age - the era of practical astronautics. Communication with the first satellite lasted 20 days (the battery charge was enough), after which it circled above the earth for about two and a half months until it burned out in dense layers of the atmosphere. In the course of this experiment, the earth's ionosphere and the possibility of establishing communication with a spacecraft were studied, as well as (during the observation of the satellite's movement) the upper atmosphere.

Following the first satellite on November 3, the second (three-stage version of the rocket) was sent, weighing 508 kg. (!), also launched into a fairly high orbit. On this satellite was the first "cosmonaut" - the dog Laika. The vital activity of the animal in space conditions was studied. The third satellite had a mass of 1327 kg. and was intended for space exploration and geophysical research. Solar panels were installed on the satellite for the first time.

The launches of the first satellites pursued not only scientific goals, but were also designed to demonstrate the power of our ballistic missiles. Possibilities American missiles at that time, they left much to be desired - the Explorer satellite launched by the Jupiter-S rocket in February 1958 had a mass of only 14 kg.

In January, the Molniya launch vehicle (R-7, supplemented by two more stages) reached the second space velocity for the first time, and launched the Luna-1 station, weighing 1472 kg, into space. "Luna-1", having passed 6 thousand km. from the surface of our satellite entered orbit around the sun. Communication with the station was maintained up to a distance of 600 thousand km. (a record for that time). In September of the same year, the Luna-2 station reached the surface of the Moon (it simply fell on it). For the first time, a man-made apparatus reached the surface of another celestial body. By the way, Goddard back in the 20s. was going to "send a projectile to the moon", but then this project rightly caused skeptical remarks from scientists.

Both of these launches, as we see, did not give much to science and were more of a "sports" and propaganda character. However, in October of the same “lunar” year, the Luna-3 station, equipped with a camera, went to our celestial neighbor. She flew around the moon and transmitted to the earth pictures of the lunar surface, including its far side, invisible from the Earth.

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Manned flights

The launches of the first satellites and Lunars certainly made a huge impression on the world community and demonstrated high level development of science and technology in the Soviet Union. But a manned flight into space would certainly be an even more spectacular event, and our space "firms" began to design the first manned spacecraft. Moreover, the Americans were also working on a similar project, and N.S. Khrushchev firmly decided to overtake America in everything.

It was necessary in a short time (less than four years passed from the first satellite to the first cosmonaut) to build an apparatus in which a person could stay in space for several days, and then safely return to earth. Under such conditions, priority was given to the speed of development and reliability, rather than the perfection of technical solutions. The Vostok ship was relatively simple, but reliable (remember, not one manned Vostok crashed).

The ship was a ball covered with a thick layer of thermal insulation (with a large margin), to which an instrument compartment with a brake engine was attached using two metal tapes. The astronaut and life support systems were in the ball. The balloon shape was chosen because its re-entry behavior was well studied and there was no time for aerodynamic studies of other shapes. The landing system was also quite simple - the nozzle of the brake engine was directed strictly at the Sun, the engine was turned on and the device rushed to the Earth. Further, one single squib was fired, tearing the metal tapes and separating the instrument compartment, and the “ball” performed aerodynamic braking in the atmosphere. There was no soft landing system, and therefore, at an altitude of several kilometers, the pilot ejected. In order for the brake engine to give an impulse in the right direction, the moment of descent was chosen so that the sun occupied at that time the appropriate position relative to the ship. There was no spare engine, and therefore the ship was supposed to be launched into such an orbit that in a week or two it would itself enter the dense layers of the atmosphere.

The first ships of this series were unmanned. They worked out the descent from orbit, and also studied the behavior of experimental dogs. Belka and Strelka flew safely on one of these ships. The other two “dog” crews, due to malfunctions in the landing systems, could not be returned to the ground. The ships of the next series were already intended for humans, but in the first two flights their passengers were a dummy and experimental dogs. During the flight, two-way radio communication was checked, for which a record of the beating of a human heart was transmitted from orbit. These radio signals were picked up by a number of radio amateurs, which gave rise to rumors about allegedly unsuccessful attempts to launch a man into space, undertaken in the USSR even before Gagarin's flight.

At the beginning of 1960. the Cosmonaut Training Center was established and the first detachment of cosmonauts was recruited from fighter pilots. The first manned flight was to take place in December 1960. but was postponed due to a terrible catastrophe at Baikonur - a ballistic missile R-14 (Yangel Design Bureau) exploded on the launch pad. Dozens of people died, including members of the state commission headed by Marshal Nedelin (it was officially announced that he died in a car accident). There was a danger that the Americans would overtake us - their flight was scheduled for May 1961. (although it was a suborbital flight, the first man in space would still be an American).

However, April 12, 1961. Yu.A. Gagarin made the first space flight on the Vostok, the third spacecraft in the series, and safely returned to Earth. True, the flight did not go as smoothly as TASS reported. The ship was launched into too high an orbit, and if the brake engine had failed, it would have fallen to Earth not in 10 days, as expected, but in 50, for which the resources of the life support system were not designed. Fortunately, the brake engine worked normally and the ship rushed to the Earth, but one of the connectors connecting the descent vehicle to the instrument compartment did not open, and the compartment was dragged behind the descent vehicle until the ill-fated wire burned out in the atmosphere.

At an altitude of about 7 km. the cosmonaut ejected calmly and landed. For a long time, we somehow hushed up the fact that the pilots of the first ships had to eject. So in one work it is said "cosmonauts ... could ... either remain in the ship until landing, or eject." In the event that the astronaut would have remained in the ship, it would be difficult to envy him - this is eloquently evidenced by the dents and cracks left on the descent vehicles after a hard landing. This half-truth comes from the fact that, according to the rules of the International Aviation Federation, a record is fixed only if (and Gagarin's flight was, of course, a record one), when the pilot was in the aircraft at the time of landing. Therefore, in the official countdown, it was vaguely stated that the pilot landed with the descent vehicle.

We achieved our goal - Alan Shepard's flight took place almost a month after Gagarin, and J. Glen's "real" orbital flight took place only in February of the following year. By that time, the second orbital flight had already been carried out in the Union - the flight of G.S. Titov, which lasted more than a day. During this flight, the effect on the human body of a long stay in space was clarified. Titov was the first to face "satellite sickness" - when a person begins to "sway" in weightlessness. It is now known that these symptoms appear in the first days of the flight and are caused by the body's adaptation to weightlessness, but then it caused great concern and special methods were developed for training the astronauts' vestibular apparatus.

In August 1962 two Vostok-3 spacecraft, piloted by A.G. Nikolaev, and Vostok-4, piloted by P.A. Popovich, which launched a day later, turned out to be over the planet at once. The ships flew at a short distance so that the astronauts could see each other's ships and two-way communication was established between them. For the first time, the image of an astronaut in the cabin during the flight was broadcast on central television. The astronauts spent four and three days in space, respectively.

The following year, we decided to prove to the whole world that every cook in our country not only knows how to manage the state, but also a spaceship. Back in 1961. women were recruited into the cosmonaut corps. And June 1963. V.N. Tereshkova, a former worker in the textile industry and an amateur parachutist, flew on the Vostok-6 ship. She made a joint flight with V.F. Bykovsky, who was in Vostok-5 launched into space two days earlier. After a three-day group flight, the astronauts landed safely and Tereshkova thus became the first woman cosmonaut.

In 1961 Immediately after Gagarin's flight, US President J.F. Kennedy announced a national program aimed at landing astronauts on the moon. The first step towards the realization of this goal was to be the Gemmini project, which provided for the launch of ships with crews of two people, and their development of such activities as going to outer space, docking and undocking, 14-day stay of people in space, necessary for lunar missions.

Since we were doing our best to maintain a leading position in space exploration (or at least the appearance of leadership), it was also necessary to develop a fundamentally new multi-seat ship. But the flights of the "Gemmini" were supposed already in! 965. and our new ship The Soyuz obviously did not keep up with this deadline. Then it was decided to send the modernized Vostok, designed for a crew of three, into flight.

In October! 964 the new Soyuz launch vehicle (built on the basis of the same R-7) launched the Voskhod spacecraft, on which for the first time in the world there were three cosmonauts at once: commander V.M. Komarov, cosmonaut-researcher K.P. Feoktistov doctor B.B. Egorov. For the first time, cosmonauts flew without spacesuits (otherwise, they probably wouldn’t fit in a cramped cabin), a backup braking engine and a soft landing system appeared on the ship (it would be problematic to eject three people) After spending a day in space, the ship landed safely . It is noteworthy that in that year there was a certain lull - it was the only manned flight (on both sides).

In March 1965 Voskhod-2 started with P.I. Belyaev and A.A. Leonov on board. The ship was equipped with a sliding lock chamber for spacewalk, which was successfully carried out by Leonov. He stayed in free space for 12 minutes. and at the same time moved away from the ship at a distance of up to 5m. True, problems arose when returning to the ship - the spacesuit swelled from internal pressure and it did not crawl through the hatch, fortunately the astronaut guessed to relieve pressure and safely returned to the ship. When returning to Earth, an unforeseen situation also arose - the automatic landing control system failed and the cosmonauts were on manual control for the first time. The descent was successful, but the ship did not land in the specified area, and the crew could not be found for a long time. Thus, with a spacewalk, we were ahead of the Americans, but then the Americans in 1965-1966. made 10 very successful flights under the Gemmini program and took a leading position in manned cosmonautics (in 1966, the total flight time of our cosmonauts was about 500 hours, while the Americans - about 2000 hours and 12 hours in open space, all experiments , planned by the Gemmini program, were successfully implemented).

Our answer followed in! 967. - On April 23, a new Soyuz spacecraft, piloted by Komarov, went into space. Unfortunately, the Chief Designer S.P. Korolev did not see the start of the new ship - in January 1966. he died suddenly at the age of 59. The Soyuz was designed for three people and consisted of three compartments: an instrument compartment, in which there was an engine and a supply of fuel for maneuvering and landing; the descent vehicle, in which the crew was at the start, and in which they returned to the ground; and the orbital compartment, which was designed to conduct various experiments in space and, if necessary, could serve as an airlock for spacewalks. The ship was equipped with a docking system that made it possible to make an orbital station out of two Soyuz. The next step in space exploration after human flight was to be the creation of a long-term manned orbital station. For research in this direction, the ships of the Soyuz series were intended.

The first flight of the Soyuz ended in the first space tragedy - during the descent in the atmosphere, the parachute system did not work and the descent vehicle with the astronaut was literally flattened by impact on the ground. Komarov became the first cosmonaut to die in flight. The analysis of the causes of the accident dragged on and the second flight of the Soyuz took place only a year and a half later. A kind of consolation for us could be the fact that the Americans did not get along with Apollo either - in the same year, during ground tests, a fire broke out on the ship and three astronauts died: V. Grissom, E. White, R. Chaffee.

After the failure with the first "Union" in October 1968. a number of unmanned ships were launched, and then the unmanned Soyuz-2, and three days later Soyuz-3, piloted by G.T. Beregov. (It should be noted that since then, each new ship has been launched with us first in an unmanned version.). In orbit, the cosmonaut approached the unmanned spacecraft and checked the operation of the onboard systems. Three days after the launch, the Soyuz-2 descent vehicle landed, and two days later, Beregovoy sat down safely.

In January 1969 a significant event took place - Soyuz-4 (V.A. Shatalov) and Soyuz-5 (B.V. Volynov, A.S. Eliseev, E.V. Khrunov) launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome with an interval of a day. In orbit, the ships docked (!) And formed the first orbital station - a prototype of future orbital complexes (in which our country still holds first place in the world). Eliseev and Khrunov made the transition from ship to ship, albeit in a rather strange way - through outer space. The official documents say that this was planned, but I have big doubts about this, perhaps such a decision was made due to the fact that the tightness of the transition was not ensured.

In October of the same year, a whole squadron of three ships was launched - Soyuz-6, Soyuz-7 and Soyuz-8 were launched with an interval of a day, which made a joint flight, mutual maneuvering and rendezvous. Soyuz-6 was the first to conduct experiments on welding, cutting and processing materials in space.

So far, the duration of our flights did not exceed five days, and for serious work at orbital stations (and, in the future, for interplanetary flights), much more was required. Work on extending the flight time was already underway, for example, a biosatellite was launched with two dogs on board, which spent 22 days in space, and a series of ground-based experiments were conducted to simulate weightlessness. In June 1970, the first long-term flight took place - A.G. Nikolaev and V.I. Sevastyanov spent almost 18 days in space and returned safely to earth. Now it sounds ridiculous, but then they were called "cosmic centenarians", because the effect of weightlessness on the human body was still poorly understood and such a flight required a fair amount of courage.

However, let us digress for a while from the successes of our manned cosmonautics, which soon led to the creation of the first orbital stations (about them later), and look at one little-known (until recently), but most interesting episode of our space history.

moon race

Immediately after the successful flights of the first lunar explorers at the end of the 50s. we have begun preparations for manned flights to Selena. First, they started designing a flyby ship, which was carried out in parallel in two design bureaus - Korolev and Chelomey. The "Korolevtsev" project provided for the launch of parts of the spacecraft into near-Earth orbit by a carrier based on R-7, followed by their docking and flight around the Moon. Chelomey assumed a direct flight, for which it was necessary to use the Proton carrier designed in his design bureau. After Gagarin's flight, the Chelomey team followed the project of flying around the moon, and after the Korolev Design Bureau, a landing on the surface. Later, the management of both programs was concentrated in the Korolev Design Bureau.

The flyby of the moon was supposed to be carried out with the help of the Proton rocket and the upper stage, which brought the spacecraft, made on the basis of the designed Soyuz - L1, onto the flyby trajectory. To reduce the mass, the orbital compartment and the rendezvous and docking systems were removed from it. It was assumed that the astronauts would spend a week in a descent vehicle with a volume of 2.5 cubic meters. all the time in a sitting position - an unpleasant prospect for the first conquerors of the moon.

The ships intended for landing were to be launched into orbit by the new heavy-duty carrier H-1. Because the carrying capacity of our rocket was about 100 tons, it was decided to make the crew of the ship minimal - 2 people (the Americans needed a system weighing 135 tons to deliver 3 people to the Moon). only one cosmonaut landed on the moon, and in the event of an “emergency situation” there was no one to help him (here even an accidental fall on his back could become deadly - in a bulky spacesuit a person could not get up without outside help). The lunar ship, which received the designation L3, was supposed to be built on the basis of the Soyuz.

While our "firms" were swinging and offering various projects , the Americans have already begun to manufacture and test prototypes of machines (recall that in 1961 the moon landing program was declared national by J.F. Kennedy). As a result, we were far behind and the system was designed based on the maximum use of existing units, this is of course accelerated the construction and testing time, but also weighed down the carrier and the ship. So, we could not produce engines of the required power at that time, and the technological re-equipment of production would take too much time. As a result, 30 engines were placed in the first stage of the H-1, which did not contribute to any reduction in the mass of the system. Due to such costs, the N-1 had almost the same launch weight as the American "lunar" carrier Saturn-5 (2750 and 2800 tons, respectively), having a carrying capacity of 97 tons against 135 tons for Saturn. (By the way, the Saturn-5 rocket was built under the guidance of ... Wernher von Braun, the creator of the V-2).

The situation with the engines was further complicated by disagreements that arose between Korolev and Glushko, whose design bureau was the main "supplier" of powerful rocket engines. Korolev considered it necessary to use liquid oxygen and hydrogen as fuel, which give a very high specific impulse. Glushko believed that it was necessary to use fluorine and nitric acid, because hydrogen is too low density and would require too large fuel tanks. However, the components proposed by Glushko were extremely poisonous, and such a system could cause enormous damage. environment. As a result of all these disputes, Glushko refused to make engines for the N-1, and N.D. Kuznetsov's design bureau, which had previously developed only aircraft engines, took up their work. As a result, the engines were made, but a lot of time was lost (let's not forget that there was a real race). In the midst of work on the lunar carrier and ships, S.P. Korolev died, which also could not but affect the progress of work.

The lunar flyby project was delayed due to difficulties in testing the Proton. In 1968-69. overflights of our satellite were carried out by L1 spacecraft in an unmanned version, which received the name "Zond 5-8". But in December 1968 "Apollo-8" entered the orbit of the moon's satellite and the program of manned flight around the moon was curtailed. priority has been lost. Although even then it was clear that it would most likely not be possible to get ahead of the Americans with a landing, work on this project was not curtailed, hoping for unplanned failures of rivals.

The first flight tests of the H-1 carrier took place in February 1969. and were unsuccessful - a fire broke out on board. The re-launch that took place after 5 months also failed - the engines spontaneously turned off, the rocket that rose into the air crashed onto the launch pad and exploded, destroying the launcher. It took a long time to restore it, and the next launch took place only in July 1971. - and again failure, in November 1972. - the launch finally took place, but at 107 seconds, due to a malfunction, the flight had to be stopped.

By that time, in July 1969, the Apollo 11 crew, Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldren, had already successfully landed on the moon, and our attempts to be the first to reach the moon became meaningless. But after the unsuccessful flight of Apollo 13, which almost ended in disaster, work was resumed. When the Americans managed to recover from the accident and complete the lunar epic with honor, work was frozen, and then, in 1974, completely stopped. Three finished N-1 missiles were destroyed, disbanded special squad cosmonauts, almost finished lunar spaceships have crept into closed museums. To some, this seemed not enough, and the main part of the technical documentation for the project was destroyed.

As we can see, the program of the flight to the Moon from both sides was considered primarily not as a research expedition, but as a kind of sporting event designed to once again demonstrate the high scientific and technical potential of the state. Why didn't we manage to defend the priority? The underestimation of the opponent also had an effect: after our high-profile achievements (the first satellite, the first man in space, the first soft landing on the moon), our rocket and space "firms" allowed themselves to sway and argue with each other for a long time, while the Americans abruptly "went ahead" and ahead of us. By the end of the 60s. an attempt to “shake up” the economy - Kosygin’s reform successfully died out and the country’s economy was actually already in crisis then (which was clearly manifested during perestroika), and existed mainly due to the sale of oil, gas, timber and others abroad natural resources. The expedition to the moon turned out to be too expensive (the Americans spent more than $25 billion on their program), which our country could no longer afford (if we recall the expensive “constructions of the century” that were taking place at that time).

After the Americans landed on the moon, it was officially announced that we had a different space exploration program - with the help of automatic devices. Let's see what success our machines have achieved in the exploration of other planets.

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Automata explore the planets

Moon

After the first launches to the Moon in 1959. in the exploration of the moon by spacecraft, there is some lull - all forces were thrown into manned flights. But in the early 60s, work began on creating a device capable of making a soft landing on the moon. In 1963 - 1965. five stations went to the moon one after another, but they failed to land - the vehicles crashed. it has no atmosphere and braking is carried out by the jeweler work of the engine. In January 1966. soft landing on the moon finally carried out by the station

Luna-9. The first panorama of the lunar surface was transmitted to the earth. Contrary to the expectations of scientists who believed that the Moon was covered with dust, the ground turned out to be quite solid - the station did not sink into it, and stones are clearly visible on the television image. Luna-9 was five months ahead of the American Surveyor-2 apparatus - as we can see, the races were going on not only in the field of manned flights, but also in the field of automaton flights. In the same year, the first artificial satellite of the Moon, Luna-10, and the Luna-11-13 stations were launched, of which Luna-13 made a soft landing on moon.

In 1970 the Luna-16 station drilled and took soil samples, which were then delivered to the ground. Thus, samples of lunar soil also ended up in the hands of our scientists (their American colleagues got them after successful astronaut flights). In 1972 and 1976. the Luna-20 and Luna-24 stations also delivered samples of lunar soil to the Earth from the mountainous and marine regions, respectively. Two artificial satellites of the Moon were also launched - "Luna -22" and "Luna-23", which conducted long-term studies of the Moon and near-Earth space.

The most interesting part of our lunar exploration program was undoubtedly the study of the night star with the help of lunar rovers. November 1970 The Luna-17 station (of the same type as Luna-16, only without the return stage) delivered the six-wheeled Lunokhod-1, equipped with television cameras and controlled by an operator from the ground, to the surface of the Moon. The self-propelled vehicle passed over the Moon for more than 10 km. He transmitted to the ground excellent television images and the results of the study physical properties soil. In 1972 the improved Lunokhod-2 was delivered to the Moon by the Luna-21 station, which conducted similar studies in another region of the Moon.

Lunokhods and stations that brought lunar soil to earth were created in the design bureau, which was led by the talented designer and organizer G.N. Babakin. that unmanned flights are much cheaper than manned ones ...

Mars

Mars began to excite the minds of earthlings from the second half of the nineteenth century. when the famous channels were discovered and for the first time the idea arose of the existence of a civilization on Mars. Later, astronomers found that the "channels" were an optical illusion. But in the 40s of our century, a hypothesis appeared about the artificial origin of the satellites of Mars, since the features of their movement and calculations showed that the Martian Moons should be hollow (these calculations, as it turned out later, were erroneous).

The first launch of a spacecraft to Mars took place already in 1962. - it was the Mars-1 apparatus, which passed at a distance of 195 thousand km. from the planet ... (communication with it was interrupted three months before). But systematic research of the red planet began only in the 70s, when sufficiently powerful launch vehicles and perfect automation appeared.

In 1971 - in the year of the great confrontation (when flights to Mars require the least energy expenditure), the Mars-2 and Mars-3 stations went to Mars. Which entered the orbit of artificial satellites of the planet. By this time, the American apparatus Mariner-9, which became the first artificial satellite of Mars, was already circling there. The fact is that our device, which was supposed to become an artificial satellite of Mars, and which the Mariner could not overtake due to an error in the onboard computer, was not put on the flight path to the planet, and the lighter American device overtook our stations along the way .

"Mars-2" dropped the pennant of our country onto the planet, and a descent vehicle separated from "Mars-3", which made the first ever landing on the red planet. The descent vehicle began to transmit a “picture” from the surface, but, for a still unclear reason, the signal from the surface of the planet disappeared. In general, our researchers were simply fatally unlucky with Mars.

The orbiters of our stations functioned successfully and transmitted images of the planet's surface to Earth, but nothing could be seen on them - a dust storm was raging on Mars. By the time it ended, our cameras were out of order, and only the American apparatus transmitted the image. On the other hand, our satellites conducted studies of the surface and atmosphere of the planet in the infrared, ultraviolet spectral ranges and in the radio wave range. The temperature and pressure were determined (it turned out to be 200 times less than the earth's) near the surface of the planet.

In the next launch window (1973) the flight conditions to Mars were worse, and we could not launch a station similar to Mars-3 due to mass limitations. Then it was decided to use two stations instead of one - a “clean” satellite and a station that would “dump” a descent vehicle onto Mars and fly further without slowing down near the planet. For the reliability of such pairs, two should have been launched.

Our engineers and production workers managed to do the almost impossible - to manufacture and test as many as four stations by the next launch window. Shortly before the start, it suddenly turns out that shells form in the microcircuits that were used in the equipment of the stations in a year and a half, and they fail. Yes, let down the domestic industry. It was unrealistic to remake the stations. The American Vikings were supposed to launch on the next launch window, and we really wanted to be the first to get images from the surface of Mars. It was decided to launch the stations - after all, there is hope that they will not fail immediately, and will have time to transmit valuable information to Earth.

In August 1973 Orbiters "Mars-4" and "Mars-5" and landers "Mars-5" and "Mars-6" went to Mars - a whole space squadron. On "Mars-4" the brake engine did not work and the station passed by the planet. "Mars-5" managed to reach orbit artificial satellite, but he worked there much less than the estimated period. The Mars-6 descent vehicle entered the planet's atmosphere and, during the descent stage, probed the atmosphere and determined it chemical composition. Shortly before landing, communication with the apparatus was interrupted. The Mars-7 descent vehicle separated from the station, but “did not get into the atmosphere” and passed by the planet. Thus, the flight program was basically not completed.

After this unsuccessful expedition, there was a long break in our flights to Mars. It was connected primarily with the fact that an intensive development of a project for the delivery of Martian soil to earth was underway.

It was known that the Americans were also developing a similar project, and, as you know, we had to be the first in everything, so almost all the forces of the "interplanetary" design bureaus were thrown into the development of this topic. For the sake of this, other programs were curtailed - Lunokhod-3, a delay in work on Luna-24. As a result, both we and the Americans came to the conclusion that it was practically impossible to implement this project at the current level of technological development, and it was closed.

In 1988 finally a new expedition to Mars took place - the Phobos program. The devices were supposed to explore the planet and its satellites from a near-Martian orbit. For the first time, research probes were supposed to be delivered to the surface of Phobos. This would not just be the first landing on a moon of Mars, but the first landing on an asteroid, which in essence Phobos is. Unfortunately, this project was a continuation of our Martian failures.

Even on the way to Mars, a program was sent to Phobos-1, which was supposed to turn on one scientific instrument. But the operator who made it made a mistake (in one letter), and the orientation system was turned off at the station. The solar batteries turned away from the Sun, the batteries were discharged and communication with the device was lost. The second station successfully reached the target and entered the orbit of the satellite of Mars. Through ingenious ballistic maneuvers, the station approached Phobos and, using its photographs, began to select the rendezvous area. Unexpectedly, the station did not enter the next communication session, after hard work it was possible to catch a signal from the station, but it soon disappeared. What caused the loss of communication with the station literally "out of the blue" remains a mystery.

Our last Martian failure was an unsuccessful attempt to launch the Mars-96 station last year. As you know, the station did not enter the flight path to Mars and burned up in the earth's atmosphere.

Venus

When creating spacecraft, designers often cannot start designing the next machine until the flight of the previous one has ended, because. the conditions under which it should work are not yet known. This is most clearly illustrated by the history of the exploration of Venus, information about which before the flights of space stations was generally very scarce, because. this planet is covered with a thick blanket of clouds, under which no telescopes can look.

The first station "Venus-1" went to the morning star at the beginning of 1961. and passed 100 thousand km . from the planet. The task of the station was mainly to study interplanetary space. near Venus, the Venera-2 station flew by, photographing the planet, and the Venera-3 station dropped a descent vehicle onto the planet, which collapsed in the planet's atmosphere. In 1967 "Venera-4" delivered to the planet a descent vehicle designed for a pressure of 10 atm ... It descended to a height where the pressure reached 18 atm., And then collapsed. The descent vehicles of the Venera 5 and Venera 6 stations also did not reach the surface of the planet, being crushed in the atmosphere, although they were designed for 25 atm.

In 1970, the descent vehicle of the Venera-7 station finally reached the surface of the planet and transmitted information from there for 23 minutes. The pressure at the landing site turned out to be more than 90 atm., and the temperature was about 500C. Reaching Venus is easier than Mars, a soft landing in a dense atmosphere also does not cause great difficulties, but the difficulties in ensuring the operation of the devices in truly hellish conditions make the exploration of Venus extremely difficult. It is said that if the designers had known from the very beginning what conditions they would face, they would not have taken up this business.

In 1972 the station "Venera-7" also successfully landed on the surface of the planet and 50 min. transmitted information from there. At this, the flights of the first generation stations ended. President of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR M.V. Keldysh set a new task for the designers - to obtain an image of the surface of Venus. The designers coped with this most difficult (if we recall the conditions on the planet) task - in 1975. The descent vehicles of the Venera-9 and Venera-10 stations transmitted photographs of the Venusian surface to Earth through their orbital blocks.

Success! But Keldysh did not let up: the next task was to obtain color images and take soil samples. for this purpose, the Venera-11 and Venera-12 stations headed for the morning star, the descent vehicles safely reached the surface, but they failed to take pictures - the protective covers of the cameras did not drop off. It was not possible to carry out a soil analysis either - the soil intake did not work. The design was improved in 1981. stations "Venera-13" and "Venera-14" successfully completed the program - they examined soil samples and transmitted color photographs of Venus to the ground.

In 1983 the first cartographers appeared near Venus - the Venera-15 and Venera-16 stations carried out its radar mapping, which made it possible to create quite detailed maps northern hemisphere of the planet.

In 1984 the implementation of the Vega project began, in which, in addition to Soviet scientists, scientists from France and other countries took part. The following year, the landers of the stations carried out a study of the planet's atmosphere and took soil samples. In addition to the descent vehicles, balloons were delivered to Venus for the first time, which drifted in the atmosphere at an altitude of about 50 km and studied the atmosphere of the planet. These balloons were not easy to make, considering that the clouds of Venus are made up of concentrated sulfuric acid!

After dropping the descent vehicles to Venus, the Vega-1 and Vega-2 stations continued their flight - their goal was to meet Halley's comet, which was approaching the earth that year. The stations passed at a distance of several thousand kilometers from the comet's nucleus and transmitted its color image to the earth - it turned out to be a shapeless piece of ice, and conducted research in various wavelength ranges.

As we can see, we were much more lucky with Venus than with Mars. Perhaps the fact that the Americans were not very successful in exploring this planet also affected here - they limited themselves mainly to research from flyby trajectories and from orbit. Therefore, we did not have competition with them here and politics did not interfere in the implementation of programs that were built mainly following the requests of scientists who wanted to study the morning star in order to better understand the mechanisms of formation and evolution of our Earth and the entire solar system.

Orbital stations

After the first manned flights, the next step on the path of space exploration was to be the creation of a large orbital complex in orbit, on which it would be possible to conduct various long-term experiments, and which would become the base for flights to the Moon and planets. This logical path for the development of astronautics was interrupted by the lunar race two space powers, but after its completion (not in our favor), both of them returned to this path.

In 1971 in the Soviet Union, the world's first long-term orbital station Salyut was launched. This almost 20-ton apparatus was launched into orbit by a new powerful Proton carrier. A few days later, docking from the stations of the Soyuz-10 spacecraft was They did not work at the station - this flight was a test flight to test rendezvous and docking systems and lasted only a day.

They were followed by Soyuz-11, which also docked with the Salyut station. For the first time, cosmonauts G.T. Dobrovolsky, V.N. Volkov and V.I. Patsaev made the transition from the ship to the station. After the reactivation of the equipment, they stayed at the station for 22 days and conducted various experiments (mainly biological). The first space greenhouse "Oasis-1", the "Anna" gamma-ray telescope and the astrophysical system of telescopes "Orion-1" were located at the station. To keep in shape for returning to earth after a long stay in weightlessness, the astronauts worked out every day exercise on special trainers. In a word, the first Salyut expedition became the prototype of modern (and future) long-term flights on the orbital complex.

Unfortunately, this expedition ended tragically. As stated in the TASS report: “after opening the hatch, the search group found the crew ... at their workplaces with no signs of life.” It was the most major tragedy in the history of our manned cosmonautics. The reason for the death of the crew was the depressurization of the descent vehicle - then the Soyuz spacecraft was considered absolutely reliable and the cosmonauts flew in it without spacesuits. After this disaster, the launch, docking and undocking with the station, landing are carried out by cosmonauts only in emergency spacesuits.

The flight of the Soyuz-12 took place only two years later. There were only two astronauts on board. The flight lasted only two days . During this flight, experiments were carried out on shooting the earth from space. In the same year, the Soyuz-13 crew continued the astrophysical and biological experiments begun at the Salyut station.

In 1974 research in the field of orbital stations resumed - 3 years after Salyut, the Salyut-3 station was launched into orbit. 8 days after the withdrawal of the station, Soyuz-14 docked to it with cosmonauts P.R. Popovich and Yu.P. Artyukhin on board. During the 14 days of the flight, the astronauts conducted various biomedical experiments and surveyed the Earth's surface in various wavelength ranges.

The Salyut-3 station outwardly almost did not differ from Salyut, but had fundamental differences in the internal structure: Salyut had one large working compartment in which the astronauts carried out Scientific research, and also ate, slept and did physical education. On Salyut-3, as many as four compartments were made, connected by a corridor. Such a scheme, apparently, turned out to be unsuccessful due to the small volume of each compartment, and subsequently did not return to it. Salyut-3", had the opportunity to navigate the sun on their own, without turning the entire complex. This was later also considered redundant, but, given the recent events at the Mir station, this idea may still be returned.

The Soyuz-15 flight was somehow strange - the ship carried out a rendezvous with the Salyut-3 station, but did not dock with it. Landing after two days of flight was made (for the first time) at night. According to official reports, emergency situations were worked out in this flight, however, it is possible that problems really arose during the flight, forcing the astronauts to land urgently, which TASS modestly kept silent about.

The first orbital stations and the work of astronauts on them had to answer the main question on which all the further development of astronautics then depended - how long a person can stay in space without harm to himself, and what could be the consequences of a long stay in weightlessness. Various biomedical experiments made up most of the research on the first two manned stations, and they continued on Salyut-4, launched at the end of 1974.

The first expedition to Salyut-4 took place at the beginning of 1975. The Soyuz-17 crew, consisting of A.A. Gubarev and G.M. Grechko, spent more than 29 days in space, thus setting a new record. During the flight, the effect of weightlessness was studied on the human body. The cosmonauts tested special "load" suits, which do not allow muscles to weaken during a long flight, and a bicycle ergometer, which allows them to "keep in shape" the cardiovascular system. In addition, the growth and development in weightlessness of the simplest organisms, long-suffering fruit flies, frogs and peas were studied. The station also carried out studies of the universe in the X-ray and infrared ranges, impossible from earth, studies of the sun with the help of a special telescope and spectrometers, as well as sounding of the upper layers of the earth's atmosphere.

In the same year, the station was visited by the second crew of P.I. Klimuk and V.I. Sevastyanov, who arrived on the Soyuz-18 spacecraft. Their flight was fantastic (at that time) in duration - 63 days. During the flight, both biomedical experiments and the study of the Earth's atmosphere and the world ocean from space, as well as astrophysical research, were continued. The achievements of our space medicine are eloquently evidenced by the fact that the very next day after the flight, the cosmonauts were able to give a press conference (whereas 5 years before that, returning to earth after an 18-day flight, Sevastyanov and Nikolaev suffered very hard and there were no press conferences was out of the question). To this day, space medicine remains one of the most advanced areas of science in which our country is "ahead of the rest."

The last station of the first generation was Salyut-5, launched in June 1976. Two expeditions were made to this station: 49 daily - B.V. Volynov and V.M. Zholobov ("Soyuz-21") and 17 daily - V.V. Gorbatko and Yu.N. Glazkov ("Soyuz-24" ). During these expeditions, the biological, astro- and geophysical studies begun in previous expeditions were continued. The Soyuz-24 crew also did a lot of work on surveying the earth's surface from space (one of the most "profitable" practical applications of astronautics in our time) and experiments on growing crystals in zero gravity (which promises large incomes). At the Salyut-5 station, a gyroscopic station attitude control system was first used.

At this, the flights of the stations of the first generation were completed. The expeditions on them fulfilled their main task - they proved that a person can stay in space for a long time without harm to health. September 1977 A new generation orbital station, Salyut-6, was launched into orbit. She had two docking stations, which, along with the main expeditions, made it possible to organize visiting expeditions, as well as to dock transport ships to the station. The refueling system made it possible to replenish its reserves in space. All this made the service life of the station quite long - on the order of several years (the stations of the first generation flew for a maximum of a year).

At the station "Salyut-6" from 1977 to 1981. 5 main expeditions were made, lasting 96, 139, 174, 185 (half a year), 74 days. The greatest achievement belongs to the crew of Soyuz-35 (L.I. Popov, V.V. Ryumin). In addition, the Progress transport unmanned vehicle, created on the basis of the Soyuz, and 11 ships of visiting expeditions (duration from 3 to 12 days) moored to the station more than ten times. Poland, East Germany, Bulgaria, Hungary, Vietnam, Cuba. During the expeditions on Salyut-6, for the first time in orbit, a complex was assembled in orbit, consisting of an orbital station and two spacecraft, piloted by four cosmonauts. Spacewalks were carried out in the new Orlan spacesuit, the ships were docked from one node to another. V. A. Lyakhov and V. V. Ryumin, who arrived on Soyuz-32, after almost six months in space, returned on another ship - Soyuz-34, which arrived from Earth in automatic mode. During the flight of the Soviet-Bulgarian crew (N.N. Rukavishnikov, G. Ivanov), docking with the station failed due to the failure of the ship's main engine. The cosmonauts, however, managed to land safely using the spare engine, which once again confirmed the high reliability of the Soyuz spacecraft. From scientific experiments It should be noted the work of the first KRT-10 space radio telescope delivered to the Progress-7 station. The use of space radio telescopes promises astronomers many discoveries, but so far these studies are not very active: of the large instruments, in addition to KRT-10, I know only the Astron satellite (which worked in the 80s).

In December 1979 a new Soyuz-T spacecraft was launched into orbit - a modification of the Soyuz, designed to deliver three people (in spacesuits) into orbit. The first flight was unmanned. It may seem strange that while the Americans were working on a much more advanced Space Shuttle, we preferred to improve the obsolete ship (the Soyuz was made back in the time of the Queen). But there were reasons for this: firstly, despite the disposability, the operation of the Soyuz is not so expensive - after all, the ship is small, and secondly, the Soyuz proved to be a fairly reliable delivery vehicle - after the Soyuz-11 disaster, all crews safely reached their home planet. (Indeed, the Soyuz system "is perhaps the safest manned system ever created - this was shown by his twenty-five years of experience in "accident-free" operation, not without reason, Soyuz-TM is provided as an emergency rescue vehicle for the new Alpha station").

"Soyuz-T" successfully carried out automatic docking with the station. The ship docked safely with the station, the crew joined the fourth main expedition for three days, and then returned to earth. The crew of the next Soyuz-T3 (L.D. Kizim, O.G. Makarov, G.M. Strekalov) for the first time performed repair work in space, which made it possible to extend the life of the station and conduct another long-term expedition on it.

In 1982 the Salyut-7 station, similar in design to the previous one, was launched at this station. 4 long-term expeditions were carried out at this station (211, 150, 236 and 168 days - semi-annual flights have already become the norm), and 5 visiting expeditions, including Soviet- French. In 1985 the station lost its orientation to the sun and its batteries were completely discharged, but V. Dzhanibekov and V. Savinykh, who moored to the station on the Soyuz, managed to completely reanimate the complex - this operation to commission an almost completely out of order station still has no analogues .

In 1986 the base unit of a new generation station, Mir, was launched into orbit, less than a month later the Soyuz-T15 spacecraft (L.D. Kizim, V.A. Soloviev) moored to it, after several months of work on Mir made an interorbital flight and moored to the Salyut-7, where they continued the research, which was not completed due to the illness of the commander of the previous crew, after which they returned to the Mir. After that, Salyut-7 was mothballed and transferred to a higher orbit, which was supposed to be until 2000, however, due to the increase in solar activity, the air in the upper atmosphere rose higher and began to slow down the movement of the station more than expected, as a result of which already in 1992. the station fell to Earth in the Andes region (moreover, it did not completely collapse in the atmosphere and its fragment was found a few tens of kilometers from Buenos Aires).

In 1986 the assembly and operation of the Mir complex began, but this story has not ended yet, so I will allow myself to stop here and draw some conclusions.

Epilogue

The seventies in the history of our country are often called the “epoch of stagnation”, meaning stagnation in the economic and political development of the country, but, as we see, this concept does not apply to the space industry. orbital complexes, our space medicine has accumulated a unique experience that will be used in the next century. It was at this time that the foundations were laid for practical application cosmonautics: space images are now widely used by meteorologists, geologists, ecologists and even archaeologists (not to mention the military), there is no need to prove the need for communication satellites, navigation satellites, growing ultrapure crystals for electronics in space remains very promising.

In addition to these obvious practical benefits, research conducted on satellites and orbital complexes, research on other planets allows us to expand our understanding of the Universe, about solar system, about our own planet, understand our place in this world. Therefore, it is necessary to continue not only the exploration of space for our purely practical needs, but also fundamental research on space observatories, and exploration of the planets of our solar system.

These complex (and expensive) projects cannot be carried out by only one, even very economically powerful state, therefore, international cooperation in them is simply necessary. I deliberately did not write in this work about the Soyuz - Apollo, Mir - Shuttle programs, the ISS is a topic for a separate discussion. This is the story of not just Soviet cosmonautics, and astronautics of the Earth, which has become nationwide.

Literature

“Relay Race of Space Feats” (collection). Moscow “Izvestiya” 1981

“Flights of spaceships about orbital stations” (chronicle), Moscow “Izvestia”, 1981.

S.P. Umansky, “Space Odyssey”, Moscow “Thought”, 1988

Yu.Markov, “Course to Mars”, Moscow “Engineering” 1989

“Academician S.P. Korolev. Scientist. Engineer.Man” (creative portrait

according to the memoirs of contemporaries), Moscow “Nauka”, 1987.

I. Artemyev “Artificial satellite of the earth”, Moscow “Children's Literature”, 1957

Yu.V.Kolesnikov“To build starships for you”, Moscow “Children's Literature”, 1990

as well as "Microsoft Encarta 97 Encyclopedia"

Journal articles:

B.E. Chertok “I see the goal” // “Young technician”, 1989. - 2

V.N. Pikul “Dispute between Korolev and Glushko” // “Young Technician”, 1990 - eight

S. Kolesnikov "The path to parity" // "Technology of youth", 1993 - 5

S. Zigunenko “The space is full of rumors” // “Technique of youth”, 1993 - 4

I. Afanasiev, V. Bandurkin “... For the sake of the flag on the moon” // “Technique of youth”, 1992-8

Space exploration is perhaps the greatest achievement of all mankind. Perhaps we exist in order to explore the world around us. The first country to conquer outer space was Soviet Union. It's great that this share fell to us!

Launch of the first satellite

Isaac Newton proved long ago that if a body is given the necessary acceleration, then it can become a satellite of the Earth, like the Moon. In the 19th century, amateurs around the world made repeated attempts to launch small bodies into space, but at that time there was simply not enough technology to complete such a task. Only in the 20th century did Soviet scientists develop an apparatus capable of putting a satellite into orbit of our planet. Despite the fact that the Second World War pushed back the dreams of the Soviet people about conquering space for several decades, on October 4, 1957, we managed to launch the legendary Sputnik-1. This was a scientific breakthrough not only for the USSR, but for the whole world.

How dogs conquered space

Space success inspired Soviet scientists to new scientific feats. A month after the launch of the first satellite, a dog went into Earth orbit to test survival in space. Although she did not return to Earth, the canine mission was accomplished. "A living being can survive in space!" shouted our scientists. At the end of the summer of 1960, another Soviet rocket launched Strelka and Belka into orbit. These dogs were able to survive and return without any damage from the flight. This event became a new milestone in human space exploration and another achievement of Soviet scientists, who this time were applauded by the whole world.

First man in space

Yuri Gagarin - the name of this man is familiar to the whole world. He paved the way for people into space and opened a new era in the development of mankind - space. On April 12, 1961, on his Vostok-1 spacecraft, he flew into Earth orbit, circled it and returned home. “What a beautiful planet ours is!” - the first cosmonaut of the world admired when he saw the Earth through the window of a space rocket. His feat shook the entire planet. Gagarin, as a native, was met in all corners of the Earth, on all continents, his name was on the lips of every earthling, and photographs of the Soviet space explorer did not leave the front pages of newspapers and TV screens for a long time.

The Soviet Union also got other important space achievements: the first woman cosmonaut, the first Salyut orbital station, the first manned spacewalk. But it is impossible not to admit that our space age is divided into "before" and "after", the boundary between which was established by Yuri Gagarin.

The USSR is a great space power. We had a chance to give the world satellite TV, mobile communications and navigation. And even though today the launch of a research satellite, cargo or manned spacecraft has become, in fact, a common job, and cosmonauts spend not hours, but months and even years in orbit, one must remember that the first satellite and the first rocket were launched into space by the Soviet Union!

Today, the first cosmonaut in the world, Hero of the Soviet Union Yuri Alekseevich Gagarin would have turned 81 years old. ...	The fact that geniuses during their lifetime often remain unrecognized, and their discoveries are appreciated only by subsequent generations, is, alas, a sad pattern. dramatic and sometimes tragic fates many great scientists confirm two truths: all ingenious scientific discoveries and inventions were far ahead of their time, and the rejection of innovation by the public was caused either ...
Vladimir Petrovich Demikhov, famous experimental surgeon and founder of world transplantation. A brilliant scientist, born in 1918, comes from an ordinary peasant family of a small farm in the Volgograd region. A universally recognized genius - unfortunately rarely remembered by those whose lives are supported by an artificial heart, lungs, kidneys ... ...	April 12, 1961 became great date not only for the Soviet Union, but for the whole world. The day when man first ascended into space became for earthlings the starting point of a new era - space. Therefore, the holiday that we celebrate today is a holiday for each of us. Happy cosmonautics day, friends! ...

The USSR went down in history as a superpower, the first to launch a satellite, a living being and a person into space. Nevertheless, during the turbulent space race, the USSR sought - and succeeded - to push the United States into the background in space wherever possible. Although the Soviet Union was the first to earn many key achievements, it also experienced the first tragedy in space involving humans.

Launched on January 2, 1959, the Luna-1 spacecraft was the first to successfully reach the vicinity of the Moon. The 360-kilogram vehicle was carrying various metal emblems, including the Soviet coat of arms, and was supposed to crash into the moon, demonstrating the superiority of Soviet science. Nevertheless, the spacecraft missed the moon, flying 6,000 kilometers from the lunar surface. By releasing a trail of sodium gas, the probe temporarily became as visible as a sixth-magnitude star, allowing astronomers to track its progress.

Luna 1 was at least the fifth attempt by the USSR to crash a craft on the Moon, and previous failed attempts were so classified that even US intelligence did not know about many of them.

Compared to modern space probes, "Luna-1" was extremely primitive: without its own motor system, with batteries providing limited electricity, and without a camera. Transmissions from the probe ceased three days after launch.

First flyby of another planet

Launched on February 12, 1961, the Soviet probe Venera 1 went on a mission to deliberately collide with Venus. As the second Soviet attempt to send a probe to Venus, Venera 1 also carried Soviet medallions in a descent capsule. Although the rest of the probe was supposed to burn up on re-entry into the atmosphere of Venus, the Soviets hoped that the descent capsule would fall on Venus and mark the first successful attempt to bring an object to the surface of another planet.

The launch and configuration of communication with the probe were successful, three sessions of communication with the probe indicated normal operation. But the fourth showed a malfunction in one of the probe's systems, and communication was delayed for five days. Contact was finally lost when the probe was 2 million kilometers from Earth. The spacecraft drifted through space, passing Venus at a distance of 100,000 kilometers, and was unable to obtain data for course correction.

The first spacecraft to photograph the dark side of the moon

Launched on October 4, 1959, the Luna-3 probe became the first spacecraft to successfully launch to the Moon. Unlike the previous two Luna probes, Luna 3 was equipped with a camera to take pictures of the far side of the Moon, a first for the time.

The chamber was primitive and complex. The spacecraft was able to take 40 photographs, which had to be made, corrected and dried on the spacecraft. The onboard cathode ray tube would then scan the images and send the data to the moon. The radio transmitter was so weak that the first attempts to transmit the pictures failed. Only when the probe came closer to the Earth, tracing a circle around the Moon, were 17 low-quality photographs taken, in which at least something could be made out.

In any case, scientists were delighted with what they found in the pictures. Unlike the side of the moon closest to us, which is flat, the far side had mountains and even several dark regions.

First successful landing on another planet

On August 17, 1970, Venera-7, one of the many copies of the Soviet devices, went to Venus. The probe was supposed to land a lander that would transmit data after touching the surface of Venus, thereby making the first successful landing on another planet. To survive in the Venusian atmosphere for as long as possible, the craft was cooled down to -8 degrees Celsius. The USSR also wanted to maximize the amount of time the apparatus would remain cold. Therefore, the module was designed to remain attached to the spacecraft's body during re-entry into the atmosphere of Venus, until atmospheric turbulence forces separation.

Venera 7 entered the atmosphere as planned. However, the parachute designed to slow the craft ruptured and failed to deploy, causing the module to fall to the ground for 29 minutes. The module was thought to have failed prior to impact with the ground, but late analysis of the recorded radio signals indicated that the probe returned temperature readings from the surface within 23 minutes of landing. The engineers who built the spacecraft should be proud of it.

The first artificial objects on the surface of Mars

Mars 2 and Mars 3, twin spacecraft launched almost simultaneously in May 1971, were designed to orbit Mars and map the surface. Both spacecraft carried landers. The USSR hoped that these modules would be the first artificial objects on the surface of Mars.

Nevertheless, the Americans slightly bypassed the Soviet Union and were the first to reach the orbit of Mars. Mariner 9, also launched in May 1971, arrived two weeks ahead of the Soviet probes and became the first spacecraft to orbit another planet. Upon arrival, the Soviet and American probes found that a dust storm had covered Mars, which prevented data collection.

While the Mars 2 lander crashed, Mars 3 successfully landed and began transmitting data. But the data transfer stopped after 20 seconds, and the only photo received could not make out the details and was with poor light. This was largely due to a massive dust storm on Mars, otherwise the USSR would have taken the first clear pictures of the Martian surface.

First robotic sample return mission

NASA had Apollo astronauts who collected moon rocks and brought them back to Earth. The Soviet Union did not have cosmonauts on the surface of the moon who could do the same, so they tried to get around the Americans by being the first to send an automated probe to collect and return lunar soil. The first Soviet such probe, Luna 15, crashed on the Moon. The next five crashes occurred on Earth due to terrible problems with the launch vehicle. Yet Luna 16, the sixth Soviet probe in the series, was successfully launched after the Apollo 11 and Apollo 12 missions.

After landing in the Sea of ​​Plenty, the Soviet probe deployed a drill to collect lunar soil and place it in a take-off stage, which then lifted off and brought the soil back to Earth. Opening the sealed container, Soviet scientists found only 101 grams of lunar soil - far from the 22 kilograms brought with Apollo 11. In any case, the samples were extensively analyzed and shown to have the cohesive qualities of wet sand.

First spacecraft to carry three people

Launched on October 12, 1964, Voskhod 1 became the first spacecraft to carry more than one person into space. Although Voskhod was hailed by the Soviet Union as a new spacecraft, it was for the most part a slightly modified version of the same craft that had launched Yuri Gagarin into space. Nevertheless, it seemed cool to the Americans, since they did not put even two people into space at the same time at that time.

Soviet designers considered Voskhod unsafe. And they continued to insist against its use until the government bribed them with an offer to send one of the designers as an astronaut on a mission. Of course, this did not solve the safety issues of the device.

First, the astronauts could not carry out an emergency ejection in the event of a rocket failure, since it was not possible to build a hatch for each astronaut. Secondly, the astronauts fit so closely in the capsule that they could not put on their spacesuits. If the cabin were depressurized, it would mean certain death for everyone. New system landing, consisting of two parachutes and a retro-rocket, was tested only once before the actual mission. Finally, astronauts had to go on a pre-mission diet to keep the combined weight of astronauts and capsule low enough to be carried by a single rocket.

Despite all these significant difficulties, the mission went remarkably flawlessly.

First docking with a dead space object

On February 11, 1985, the Soviet space station Salyut-7 fell silent. A cascade of electrical shorts swept through the station, knocking out its electrical systems and leaving Salyut 7 dead and frozen.

In an attempt to save the station, the Soviet Union sent two space veterans to repair Salyut-7. The automated docking system was not working, so the astronauts had to get close enough to perform a manual docking. Luckily, the station did not rotate and the astronauts were able to dock, demonstrating for the first time the ability to dock with any object in space, even dead and non-contact ones.

The crew reported that the inside of the station was musty, icicles had grown on the walls, and the internal temperature was -10 degrees Celsius. Restoration work space station took place over several days, the crew had to check hundreds of cables to determine the source of the malfunction in the electrical circuit.

After the launch of the Soviet artificial satellite into orbit in 1957, the great task of conquering space began. Trial launches, when various living organisms, such as bacteria and fungi, were placed in satellites, made it possible to improve spacecraft. And the space flights of the famous Belka and Strelka led to the stabilization of the return descent. Everything went to the preparation of a significant event - sending a man into space.

Human flight into space

In 1961 (April 12), Vostok carried the first cosmonaut in history, Yuri Gagarin, into orbit. The pilot reported via communication channels after a few minutes of rotation that all processes were normal. The flight lasted 108 minutes, during which time Gagarin received messages from the Earth, kept a radio report and a logbook, controlled the readings of on-board systems, and carried out manual control (first trial attempts).

The device with the astronaut landed near Saratov, the reason for landing in an unplanned place was a malfunction in the process of separating the compartments and a failure of the braking system. The whole country, frozen in front of the TVs, followed this flight.

In August 1961, the Vostok-2 spacecraft was launched, commanded by German Titov. The device stayed in outer space for more than 25 hours, during the flight it made 17.5 revolutions around the planet. After a thorough study of the data obtained, two ships, Vostok-3 and Vostok-4, launched exactly one year later. Launched into orbit with a difference of a day, the vehicles controlled by Nikolaev and Popovich carried out the first group flight in history. "Vostok-3" made 64 revolutions in 95 hours, "Vostok-4" - 48 revolutions in 71 hours.

Valentina Tereshkova - woman in space

In June 1963, Vostok-6 launched from the sixth Soviet cosmonaut- Valentina Tereshkova. At the same time, Vostok-5, controlled by Valery Bykovsky, was also in orbit. Tereshkova spent a total of about 3 days in orbit, during which time the ship made 48 revolutions. During the flight, Valentina carefully recorded all observations in the flight log, and with the help of her photographs of the horizon, scientists were able to detect aerosol layers in the atmosphere.

Alexei Leonov's spacewalk

On March 18, 1965, Voskhod-2 launched with a new crew on board, one of whose members was Alexei Leonov. Spaceship was equipped with a camera for bringing the astronaut into open space. A specially designed suit, reinforced with a multi-layer sealed shell, allowed Leonov to leave the airlock chamber for the entire length of the halyard (5.35 m). Pavel Belyaev, another member of the Voskhod-2 crew, monitored all operations with the help of a television camera. These significant events forever entered the history of the development of Soviet cosmonautics, being the crowning achievement of the development of science and technology of that time.