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On Thursday, the launch of the Russian Soyuz-ST-B carrier rocket with two spacecraft for the European navigation satellite system Galileo was to take place. However, due to malfunctions, it was postponed, and today Soyuz-ST-B was launched from the Kourou cosmodrome in French Guiana
In this regard, we decided to recall the main space successes of the USSR and present you our rating.
won a decisive victory in World War II, Soviet Union did a lot for the study and exploration of space. Moreover- he became the first among all: in this matter, the USSR was ahead of even the US superpower. The official start of practical space exploration was laid on October 4, 1957, when the USSR successfully launched the first artificial Earth satellite into near-Earth orbit, and three and a half years after its launch, on April 12, 1961, the USSR launched the first living person into space. Historically, it turned out that the Soviet Union held the lead in space exploration for exactly 13 years - from 1957 to 1969. KM.RU offers its choice of dozens of the most important achievements over this period.
1st Luck (First ICBM). In 1955 (long before the flight tests of the R-7 rocket), Korolev, Keldysh and Tikhonravov approached the USSR government with a proposal to launch into space using a rocket artificial satellite Earth. The government supported this initiative, after which in 1957, under the leadership of Korolev, the world's first intercontinental ballistic missile R-7 was created, which in the same year was used to launch the world's first artificial Earth satellite. And although Korolev tried to launch his first liquid rockets into space back in the 30s, nevertheless, the first of the countries that started work on the creation of intercontinental ballistic missiles back in the 1940s was Nazi Germany. Ironically, the ICBM was designed to hit the East Coast of the United States. But man has his plans, and history has its own. These missiles failed to fall on the United States, but they managed to carry human progress into reality forever. space.
2nd luck (first artificial earth satellite). On October 4, 1957, the first artificial Earth satellite, Sputnik-1, was launched. The second country to own an artificial satellite was the United States - this happened on February 1, 1958 (Explorer 1). The following countries - Great Britain, Canada and Italy launched their first satellites in 1962-1964 (though on American rocket carriers). The third country to independently launch the first satellite was France on November 26, 1965 (“Asterix”). Later, Japan (1970), China (1970) and Israel (1988) launched the first satellites on their launch vehicles. The first artificial Earth satellites of many countries were developed and purchased in the USSR, the USA and China.
3rd Luck (First Astronaut Animal). On November 3, 1957, the second artificial Earth satellite Sputnik-2 was launched, which for the first time put into space creature, - the dog Laika. Sputnik-2 was a conical capsule 4 meters high, with a base diameter of 2 meters, it contained several compartments for scientific equipment, a radio transmitter, a telemetry system, a software module, a regeneration and cabin temperature control system. The dog was housed in a separate sealed compartment. It so happened that the experiment with Laika turned out to be very short: due to the large area, the container quickly overheated, and the dog died already on the first orbits around the Earth.
4th luck (the first artificial satellite of the Sun). January 4, 1959 - the Luna-1 station passed at a distance of 6 thousand kilometers from the surface of the Moon and entered the heliocentric orbit. It became the world's first artificial satellite of the Sun. The carrier rocket "Vostok-L" brought the device "Luna-1" to the flight path to the Moon. It was a rendezvous trajectory, without the use of orbital launch. This launch, in fact, successfully completed an experiment to create an artificial comet, and for the first time using an onboard magnetometer, the outer radiation belt of the Earth was registered.
5th luck (first lander on the moon). September 14, 1959 - the station "Luna-2" for the first time in the world reached the surface of the Moon in the region of the Sea of Clarity near the craters Aristides, Archimedes and Autolycus, delivering a pennant with the coat of arms of the USSR. This unit did not have its own propulsion system. Of the scientific equipment, scintillation counters, Geiger counters, magnetometers, and micrometeorite detectors were installed on it. One of the main scientific achievements The mission was to directly measure the solar wind.
6th lucky (first man in space). On April 12, 1961, the first manned flight into space was made on the Vostok-1 spacecraft. In orbit, Yuri Gagarin was able to conduct the simplest experiments: he drank, ate, made notes with a pencil. "Putting" the pencil next to him, he found that it instantly began to float upwards. Before his flight, it was not yet known how the human psyche would behave in space, so special protection was provided so that the first astronaut in a panic would not try to control the flight of the ship. To enable manual control, he needed to open a sealed envelope, inside of which was a sheet with a code that could be unlocked by typing on the control panel. At the moment of landing after ejection and disconnection of the air duct of the descent vehicle, the valve in Gagarin's airtight spacesuit did not immediately open, through which outside air should flow, so that the first cosmonaut almost suffocated. The second danger for Gagarin could be falling on a parachute into the icy water of the Volga (it was April). But Yuri was helped by excellent pre-flight preparation - controlling the lines, he landed 2 km from the coast. This successful experiment immortalized Gagarin's name forever.
7th Luck (First man in outer space). On March 18, 1965, the first human spacewalk was made in history. Cosmonaut Alexei Leonov made a spacewalk from the Voskhod-2 spacecraft. The Berkut suit used for the first spacewalk was of a ventilation type and consumed approximately 30 liters of oxygen per minute with a total supply of 1666 liters, designed for 30 minutes of an astronaut's stay in outer space. Due to the pressure difference, the spacesuit swelled and greatly interfered with the movements of the astronaut, which made it very difficult for Leonov to return to Voskhod-2. The total time of the first exit was 23 minutes 41 seconds, and outside the ship - 12 minutes 9 seconds. Based on the results of the first exit, a conclusion was made about the ability of a person to perform various works in open space.
8th luck (first "bridge" between two planets). March 1, 1966 960 kg station "Venera-3" for the first time reached the surface of Venus, delivering a pennant to the USSR. It was the world's first flight of a spacecraft from Earth to another planet. Venera-3 flew in tandem with Venera-2. They failed to transmit data on the planet itself, but scientific data were obtained on outer and near-planet space in the year of the quiet Sun. A large volume of trajectory measurements was of great value for studying the problems of ultra-long distance communication and interplanetary flights. Magnetic fields, cosmic rays, low-energy charged particle flows, solar plasma flows and their energy spectra, as well as cosmic radio emissions and micrometeors were studied. The Venera-3 station became the first spacecraft to reach the surface of another planet.
9th luck (first experiment with living plants and creatures). September 15, 1968 the first return of the spacecraft (“Zond-5”) to the Earth after a flyby of the Moon. On board were living creatures: turtles, fruit flies, worms, plants, seeds, bacteria. "Probes 1-8" - a series of spacecraft launched in the USSR from 1964 to 1970. The manned flight program was curtailed due to the US losing the so-called "moon race". The Zond devices (as well as a number of others called Kosmos) under the Soviet program of flying around the moon during the "moon race" worked out the technique of flying to the moon with a return to Earth after a ballistic flyby of a natural satellite of the Earth. The latest vehicle in this series has successfully circled the Moon, photographed the Moon and the Earth, and also worked out a landing option from the northern hemisphere.
10th Luck (First on Mars). On November 27, 1971, the Mars-2 station reached the surface of Mars for the first time. The launch to the flight path to Mars was made from the intermediate orbit of an artificial earth satellite by the last stage of the launch vehicle. The mass of the apparatus "Mars-2" was 4650 kilograms. The spacecraft's orbital compartment contained scientific equipment intended for measurements in interplanetary space, as well as for studying the environs of Mars and the planet itself from the orbit of an artificial satellite. The Mars 2 descent vehicle entered too abruptly into martian atmosphere, because of which he did not have time to slow down at the stage of aerodynamic descent. The device, having passed through the atmosphere of the planet, crashed on the surface of Mars in the Nanedi Valley in Xanth Earth (4 ° N; 47 ° W), reaching the surface of Mars for the first time in history. A pennant of the Soviet Union was fixed on board Mars-2.
Starting from 1969-71, the United States zealously picked up the baton of human space exploration and made a number of important, but still not so epoch-making steps for the history of astronautics.
Despite the fact that the USSR continued to actively explore space in the 1970s (the first artificial satellite of Venus in 1975, etc.), starting from 1981 and, alas, to this day, the leadership in astronautics has been held by the United States. And yet, history does not seem to stand still - since the 2000s, China, India and Japan have actively entered the space race. And, perhaps, soon, due to the powerful economic growth, the leadership in astronautics will pass into the hands of post-communist China.
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Our country began to dream about flights to planets and stars even before the Revolution. The revolutionaries dreamed of a breakthrough to the stars of the Society of the Future, realizing that only the society for which they were going to die could do this. The brilliant inventor-revolutionary Kibalchich, sentenced to death on death row, does not write letters to his relatives, not petitions for pardon, but draws sketches of a jet interstellar apparatus, knowing that it can be preserved in the prison archive for posterity. The most advanced people of Russia dreamed of the Cosmos, a whole trend in the philosophy of Russian - Cosmism was formed. The founder of cosmonautics, Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky, also belongs to the cosmist philosophers, who laid the foundation for theoretical basis space flights, gave a philosophical and technical justification for space exploration by Mankind. Tsiolkovsky was so ahead of his time that he was simply not understood in the West at that time and ... forgotten! Only the Russians remembered and honored him.
Nevertheless, starting from the 60s in the West, prominent scientists began to put forward space exploration projects, one-to-one coinciding with Tsiolkovsky's projects, but fully appropriating the authorship of his ideas. This category includes the so-called "Dyson Sphere", "O'Neill Space Settlements" and much more. In the West, the legacy of the great scientist and philosopher is almost erased from history and is practically unknown even to specialists.
Tsarist Russia, as well as modern oligarchic Russia, did not need any and was even harmful. The Great October Socialist Revolution gave a chance for the development of Tsiolkovsky's ideas. The enthusiasm for the construction of the New Society, which was overwhelming the Land of Soviets, was inseparable for a Russian person with a dream of other worlds.
There is even a semi-legend that the red star on the coat of arms of the country is none other than Mars. A planet you MUST go to! A ruined, impoverished peasant country dreamed of flying into space. In the 1920s, A. Tolstoy's wonderful science fiction book Aelita, about the flight of two enthusiasts to Mars on a homemade rocket, gained immense popularity in the USSR. Fantastic for that time was an interplanetary rocket, but the reflection of the state of mind in Red Russia was completely real: groups of enuziast engineers lived with the idea of creating real means of overcoming interplanetary spaces. By the end of the twenties of the twentieth century, it became obvious that only rocket technology with reactive thrust was suitable for space exploration. The prototype of the engineer Los from Aelita was a real Soviet engineer - Friedrich Zander, a teacher at the Moscow Aviation Institute. Mortally ill with an incurable form of tuberculosis, he manages to found a scientific and engineering group GIRD, lay the foundations for theoretical calculations of jet engines, rocket astrodynamics, calculate the duration of space flights, put forward the concept of a space plane - a combination of an aircraft and a rocket, theoretically substantiate the principle of a gliding descent from near-Earth space, prove the idea " gravitational sling, which is now used by almost all spacecraft sent to study groups of planets. Almost all subsequent developments in rocket technology were based on Zander's work.
The Moscow GIRD group included the future Chief Designer of Soviet launch vehicles - Sergei Pavlovich Korolev. At the beginning of the work, our rocket scientists had only one idea: to build a spacecraft for flying into space, as Zander dreamed - to Mars, which was supposed to be habitable, and as an intermediate stage - to the Moon, as Tsiolkovsky believed. But reality has shown that without the completion of Industrialization, there can be no chance of a flight to Mars. Therefore, not romantic plans began to be built, but more realistic, but executable ones: rockets were supposed to be used in two main areas: “geophysical rockets” for research upper layers atmosphere, where then balloons and planes could not rise, and even in military affairs. Geopolitical and ideological adversaries did not hide their plans to prepare for military destruction Soviet Russia. By the way, the result of the development of the military direction was simple in concept, but with terrifying efficiency, multiple launch rocket systems - Katyusha rocket launchers designed by Ivan Platonovich Grave, who is also the inventor of a solid-propellant rocket on smokeless powder. Unfortunately, due to the total falsification of history, the name of the real creator of the legendary weapon is now little known. After the outbreak of the War, it was clearly not up to the development of flights to Mars, things were done that could directly help defeat the enemy: jet fighters, rocket boosters for heavy bombers, heavy 300-mm rocket mines ("Andryusha"), etc. were designed.
The use of V-1 cruise missiles and V-2 ballistic missiles by the Germans against England showed their high efficiency. Practice has shown that ballistic missiles were invulnerable to air defense of that time and were an irresistible weapon.
By the way, the idea of a cruise missile and the priority of its creation belongs to S.P. Korolev, who called her "aircraft projectile". Such a rocket was tested by the Moscow GIRD in 1936. The Germans repeated this idea, according to their statements, not knowing about the Soviet development, however, according to one of the versions, the promising development was nevertheless stolen by German intelligence.
The birth of the space program
The rapid development of rocket technology after the Great Patriotic War inevitably led to the development of the Soviet Space Program. The Soviet Space Program was born as a natural extension of defense programs. The plan for the flight of man into space was proposed to Stalin in 1946, but the answer was: "Half the country is in ruins, we must wait 7-8 years until we rise." Stalin remembered these plans and the state plans for the creation of the R-7, the basis of all Soviet space exploration, were signed by Stalin and accepted for execution just a few weeks before his death.
It was planned not only to send a man into near-Earth space, but also to create an unprecedented weapon delivery vehicle in history - an intercontinental ballistic missile. By that time, the USSR had managed to create a nuclear bomb, but without means of delivery to the target, it could not become a full-fledged weapon of retaliation. The Americans had a completely reliable means of delivery - B-52 heavy bombers, especially the Americans, surrounded the USSR on all sides with their military bases, from which they can freely reach any city in the USSR with their bombers, while the main American cities were out of reach Soviet bombers. The territory of the United States, with the exception of Alaska, remained practically inaccessible for a retaliatory strike. The Americans believed that the USSR was in a hopeless situation and would be a practically defenseless victim.
The US plans to deliver nuclear strikes on the cities of the USSR and unleash a war were well known, and yesterday's allies did not particularly hide them - preparations for the destruction of the USSR and the Russian people were in full swing in the USA. According to the Dropshot plan, it was planned to drop 300 atomic bombs on Soviet cities, destroying almost half the population and most of the industrial potential. Plans were seriously created for dividing Russia into zones of occupation, personnel were selected for this, and so on.
To thwart these plans, it was vital to create such a delivery vehicle. atomic bomb, which could reach the opposite hemisphere, otherwise the terrible blow of the Anglo-Saxon fascists to Russian civilization was inevitable. Reachability of the territory of the aggressor for the retaliatory nuclear strike I would seriously cool down these nonhumans, who delight in exterminating defenseless people, but fearing a formidable enemy. Which, by the way, confirmed the near future.
In the mid-40s, our engineers had two options for solving the problem: a long-range bomber and a ballistic missile that went into near space.
Calculations showed that the United States could well protect itself from bombers mainly because of military bases around the world, often almost on the border of the USSR. It was almost impossible to shoot down a rocket. It is only now that relatively reliable means of intercepting warheads have appeared, but even in the foreseeable future they are still unable to repel a massive strike of thousands of missiles.
It is quite natural that it was the development of the rocket industry that received the maximum funding. But our engineers continued to dream about the stars. The rocket not only can deliver an atomic bomb to any point on the Earth, but can also be put into orbit by an artificial earth satellite (AES). Soviet people they believed that the military theme of their developments was an inevitable but transient evil that was about to end. They believed in a bright future, when war and violence would go forever into the past, and it would be possible to directly study the secrets of the universe.
In the country that defeated fascism, such ideas were in the air. Works of fantastic literature of the 30s and postwar years directly testify to this.
Even before the launch of the First Artificial Earth Satellite (AES) in our country, Ivan Antonovich Efremov created a brilliant fantasy work "The Andromeda Nebula" about the people of the Future and flights to the stars. I.A. Efremov could have known about the deeply classified work on the creation of powerful rockets capable of launching satellites into Earth orbit and launching devices to celestial bodies. He simply reflected the current state of mind of the people of the country, their dreams and specific ideas about the beautiful Future. And the fact that this Future is directly connected with the stars was very significant.
First steps for the atmosphere
Naturally, in the process of creating missiles, it could not do without test launches. These launches were often used to probe the upper atmosphere. Therefore, even a special direction in the design and use of ballistic missiles stood out - a geophysical missile. Almost all the rockets before the "seven", which launched the first satellite into orbit, were also geophysical. The numbering was unpretentious: the first letter was "rocket", and then the model number. The seventh model is the one that brought out both the first satellite and the first ship with a man on board.
The more powerful rockets became, the higher they climbed into the upper layers of the atmosphere, which were already less and less different from outer space. Already R-5 could go into space along a ballistic trajectory. But for a full-fledged launch of the satellite, it was not yet suitable.
Our scientists were aware that the US was also working on rocket issues, especially since they brought the talented inventor of German rockets, von Braun, to the US and managed to kidnap a number of other prominent German scientists. But since the United States had carriers of nuclear weapons, the B-52 aircraft, they were in no hurry to develop powerful missiles. Apparently, they believed that it would not come to this - the USSR would fall earlier. Nevertheless, they announced quite noisily that they were going to launch the first artificial satellite of the Earth. They even demonstrated what they were going to launch - an apparatus the size of an orange. Around this case, as usual for Americans, an incredible propaganda noise was raised. It was believed that this launch would be a triumph of American science and an undoubted demonstration to the whole world of the absolute superiority of Anglo-Saxon science over all others, above all over Soviet science. They did not even doubt that this would be the case - they would be the first. Moreover, there was deafening silence on the part of the “Russians” in this area. US intelligence knew that work on missiles was being carried out in the USSR, but they did not know how successful it was. By default, it was believed that the Russians "always" lag behind the Americans.
The launch of the American rocket was timed to coincide with the International Geophysical Year. But they were followed by a series of failures.
We also thought about launching the first satellite.
A preliminary design of a rocket for launching a satellite was even carried out on the basis of already worked out, working models. In the course of these works, it became clear that even with the R-5 it is technically possible, although it was a medium-range missile. It was supposed (according to the draft design) to link four of these rockets to launch a satellite.
Sputnik Photo
But most important goal at that time, there was the creation of an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of carrying an atomic bomb.
Therefore, the satellite launch project was put on hold until the R-7 arrived. "Seven" was successfully tested just in time for the geophysical year. Since it was absolutely not important for the rocket what kind of cargo to carry, it was decided to put Sputnik as a payload in one of the launches.
By the way, Sputnik, according to engineers, was made very interestingly: the shell of an atomic bomb with a completely removed filling served as its body. The filling for the first satellite was a simple radio transmitter.
The political significance of the launch of the first satellite
Already the weight of the first satellite plunged American engineers into amazement. If they were counting on using their super-advanced launch vehicle to "launch an orange", then the Soviet satellite weighed almost a centner.
The second artificial satellite of the Earth is the first biological satellite in the world, in the pressurized cabin of which in November 1957 the dog Laika flew. And the launch of the third satellite was generally shocking - its weight was one and a half tons.
Second Sputnik Model
Photo of the third satellite.
Further detailing the space program
At first, the program as such was only in the minds of engineers and scientists directly involved in the creation of rocket technology. She wore a completely abstract character like: “It would be nice to fly to the Moon, to Mars, to the Stars,” but when it became absolutely clear that Sputnik would be launched in the next few years, Korolev sent a letter to the academicians asking them to express their opinion on the tasks, that could be solved and research that could be carried out on board an artificial Earth satellite. Some academicians thought that this was a stupid joke and answered in the spirit: “I'm not fond of science fiction!” - there were, unfortunately, retrogrades. But the proposals of those scientists who approached the issue seriously became the basis of the Soviet Space Program.
All proposals that were received were grouped into the following sections:
study of the upper layers of the Earth's atmosphere (ionosphere), and near-Earth space;
study of the Earth from space in the interests of cartography, meteorology, geophysics;
Study of near-Earth space;
extra-atmospheric astronomy;
Direct study of the Moon and the bodies of the solar system.
Subsequently, this Program was only supplemented in detail and concretized.
It was somehow taken for granted that this Program was forever, and that the study and exploration of outer space would be a continuous, planned process and completely abstracted from any purely “entertainment”, ambitious goals, such as the naked pursuit of records. As always in the USSR, in relation to such areas of activity, the planning horizon was "for centuries", in contrast to the Western 4-5 years.
Clarifications from S.P. Queen
Korolev was an engineer, and, of course, he calculated those steps that led to the solution of the grandiose tasks laid down in the Space Program. Korolev had a specific goal-dream - a flight to Mars, and for its implementation he built his "stairway to heaven" - consistently, methodically, purposefully. All those steps that he outlined for the Martian expedition, the country subsequently carefully passed without an empty pursuit of records and useless spending of funds to achieve momentary benefits to the detriment of the main thing.
Everything was done according to the master plan drawn up by S.P. Korolev, designed for decades to come, with which most engineers agreed, as well as those who were responsible for decision-making in the country's leadership. It is quite natural to forget about "Earthly affairs", and no one was going to take care of the current needs of the country. But setting long-term goals along with closer and more purely pragmatic goals was the rule, because the country was building communism - the Society of General Social Justice, and this plan was for centuries. And if so, now it was necessary to attend to the solution of those small and large tasks that are necessary for the implementation of such a superproject. Think over the steps by which Soviet science will be able to solve the problem of sending a manned expedition to Mars, to solve it without overstraining forces and means. Hence the questions...
What do you need "for Mars"?
AMS or...?
Obviously, it was necessary to obtain reliable preliminary data on the nature of Mars in order to know what astronauts would face on this planet. It was extremely difficult to find out by purely astronomical methods. So, it was necessary to find out by flying there, but how? Reliable automatic spacecraft have already appeared, but they flew near the Earth. Is it even possible to send an apparatus to Mars and, by controlling it at a distance of hundreds of millions of kilometers, accurately “taxi” to Mars? This was a completely new question when celestial navigation was on the agenda. It was necessary to have a very clear idea in space and time where the spacecraft at distances unimaginable to humans. In addition, it was necessary to know a lot of things, for example, would the conditions of space flight kill a person? It turned out that there were two possibilities - a manned expedition and flights of automatic interplanetary stations. An interesting problem arose: where does what can be studied with the help of automatic stations end and what can only be done by a person begin?
Already from the most rough calculations it followed that the expedition itself was an extremely expensive business. After all, the apparatus with people not only needs to be launched towards Mars, but also to ensure its return, to ensure a minimum of comfort and safety for people, and much more.
With an automatic, everything was easier. It does not need to be returned back - it is made for a specific task. Consequently, AMS (automatic interplanetary station) is simpler, lighter and thousands of times cheaper. One way or another, it followed that the beginning of the direct study of the bodies of the solar system would be laid by Automatic Interplanetary Stations.
And what is needed for a manned expedition?
But one way or another, a person will still have to fly sooner or later. What is needed for this?
First, life support systems capable of working reliably for the required time and providing astronauts with clean air and water.
Secondly, to find out the impact on a person of the impact of all factors of long-term space flight (primarily weightlessness) and neutralize them as far as possible.
Thirdly, to create efficient engines for interplanetary ships. The available chemical ones were not suitable due to the low velocity of the jet. As a result, the launch mass of the spacecraft turned out to be prohibitively large.
Immediately there were ideas to use nuclear energy to run the engine. There are two types of such engines:
Electric rocket (invented back in 30 g), but with a compact nuclear reactor - a current source
Actually a nuclear engine.
According to the last of all possible, three directions were singled out that can give results in the near future - solid-phase, liquid-phase and gas-phase nuclear engines.
In the first type, the core of the engine is a small nuclear reactor, where the fissile material is in a solid state, through which hydrogen is driven, which is heated and ejected, due to heating, at speeds of 8-10 km / s.
In the second, the fissile substance is in a liquid state and is pressed against the walls of the chamber by its rotation, and the speed of the outflow of hydrogen will be up to 20 km/s.
But the most promising, though the most problematic, is the gas-phase nuclear jet engine. His idea is based on the fact that if it is possible to isolate the gaseous fissile material from contact with the walls of a nuclear engine, then hydrogen can be dispersed up to 70 km / s! If such engines were created, then travel within the solar system would become something very everyday, for example, it would be possible to make a manned expedition to Saturn in 1 year. The launch mass of the ship in near-Earth orbit would be very small - several hundred tons, and not hundreds of thousands, as for a chemical rocket. It should be noted that the USSR last years came very close to solving this problem. We stood on the threshold of intensive human study solar system and sending automatons to the nearest stars. One of the reasons for such an urgent destruction of the USSR was the task of stopping the movement of the Red Project and all of humanity to the Stars. Consideration of the causes of the latter question is far beyond the scope of this work.
Pragmatic tasks
Well, these are lofty and distant goals, so to speak. But what to use right now? This is also logically connected with distant goals - "near space" - near-Earth space
Providing satellites with reliable television and radio communications with all points of our vast country. Several satellites cost hundreds of times cheaper than building a permanent network of relay stations.
The study of the meteorological situation on a scale of the entire Earth in order to reliably predict the weather, warning of disasters for a sufficiently long period.
Watching natural resources Earth and natural hazards - forest fires, insect migrations, tsunamis and geological shifts ...
Production of unique materials in space. Ultra-pure vacuum and almost unlimited time weightlessness provide exceptional opportunities for the production of materials that are simply impossible to obtain on Earth.
And, of course, as long as there are countries that are actively nurturing plans to destroy the USSR, military satellites are needed - space reconnaissance, a warning about aggression, and, if necessary, a counterattack.
To accomplish these tasks, it was necessary to provide the country with a whole range of vehicles that completely cover all possible tasks here - from launching a satellite into orbit, to ensuring communication with them and the subsequent delivery of the received materials to Earth.
This meant:
Building heavy launch vehicles to put more payloads into orbit at a lower cost. Development of reusable systems.
Creation of a permanent outpost in near-Earth orbit, where it would be possible to carry out the entire range of research: from biomedical, technological, military to fundamental scientific research Space. Research into the behavior of materials in space was needed. This knowledge was necessary to create reliable, permanent objects in space. At that time, they did not know at all how terrestrial materials would behave in a vacuum under continuous long-term exposure to all types of radiation.
Automated robots can handle relatively simple experiments and measurements, which means they need to be created, which requires the development of applied mathematics, computer technology and many other industries. But complex tasks required the presence of a person, that is, the creation of a permanent orbital station.
All this represented a single Soviet Space Program, interconnected to such an extent that it was often impossible to separate one direction from another.
One of the distant targets of this program was Mars.
The first manned flight into space. Space race.
After the triumph of the first satellite, only the first manned flight into space could really save the face of American science. At that time, the United States did not have a sufficiently powerful launch vehicle to launch a spacecraft with a man on board into near-Earth orbit, so that it became an Earth satellite, so only a short-term launch of the vehicle into space along a ballistic trajectory was planned. American engineers figuratively called it "flea jump".
The ship started from the ground, emerged for about ten minutes from the atmosphere into space and fell back. It is quite natural that such space flight"could not be complete. But for the United States, the main thing was to stake out space first and thereby save face.
Unlike the USA, the USSR already had a fairly powerful P7. Therefore, immediately after the launch of the satellite, it was the orbital, and not the ballistic flight of the ship with a person on board that began to be planned.
Here, it is true, one should mention the episode when the R-5 rocket was created. Soviet engineers calculated that a bunch of four such rockets could take a cabin with a man into space (“flea jump” in American). This worthless and very expensive option of setting an altitude record was abandoned in favor of a real, and not propaganda, goal - the launch of an artificial satellite and orbital flight.
After a successful experiment with the launch of the automaton, the following stages of space exploration unfolded - the second and third satellites were biological. The effect of space flight factors was studied on living organisms. The first animal astronauts flew into space. The name of the first dog in space - Laiki - flew around the world. Her mongrel muzzle was printed on the front pages of all the newspapers of the world, they played documentary footage with her in all cinemas. The next "cosmonauts" who returned to Earth alive were dogs - Belka and Strelka, not only a purely scientific program was worked out, but also the technical problem of returning a spacecraft from space to earth with a soft landing was also solved. Having worked out on dogs what a person later had to go through, the Soviet space program came close to solving the problem of human flight into space.
The first apparatus for manned space flight was created with preliminary testing of all nodes in an unmanned mode and many of them modularly - in parts, this was the rule in Soviet cosmonautics. After all the parts were worked out, flew unmanned ships"East". One of the flights was unsuccessful - due to incorrect processing of the deorbit impulse, instead of landing on Earth, the device switched to more high orbit. Instead of an astronaut, a mannequin flew in the pilot's seat. Our engineers, who prepared it for flight, jokingly called the mannequin "Uncle Vanya".
Apparently, these unmanned launches of the Vostok spacecraft with dummies became the basis for a wild legend, according to which, before Y. Gagarin's flight, someone else allegedly flew, who even died.
Finally, when all the elements of the flight were successfully worked out, on April 12, 1961, starting from the cosmodrome, the Vostok spacecraft with a person on board made one complete revolution around the Earth and sat down in a given area of the Soviet Union. Thus, the first manned flight into space in the history of mankind took place. Yuri Alekseevich became the first cosmonaut of the planet.
The second flight was the flight of German Titov on August 7, 1961 (he was Gagarin's understudy). Titov spent more than a day in orbit - 25 hours and 11 minutes.
Photo: at the Mission Control Center
After SUCH achievements, the American “flea jump” performed on the Mercury spacecraft, quite naturally, was not perceived as a full-fledged space flight (although they pompously announced two space flights performed between Gagarin’s launch and Titov’s flight).
For the Americans, this circumstance was no longer just a serious failure, but a shame. Trying to somehow wash it off and restore the completely destroyed legend of “the undeniable leadership of science and technology in the United States,” America violently joined the space race.
New manned flights and our priorities
Unfortunately, at present, a targeted campaign is being carried out in our country to tarnish the great victories of the past. Many young people often simply do not know anything about what really happened in the days of "totalitarianism". They hear only the slander of the enemies of the USSR, but real facts from them are "behind seven seals." The policy of slanderers against the Soviet Union is elementary here: to convince a person that there was nothing good "then" ... and in general there was nothing special - everything important and important happened only in the USA, and we only knew that we were lagging behind and repeating other people's achievements.
But in reality, it was quite the opposite. And a vivid example of this is the Soviet achievements in the exploration of outer space.
Here is just a small list of what was done and MADE FOR THE FIRST TIME IN THE WORLD by the Soviet Union in space.
The first female cosmonaut, Valentina Tereshkova. She flew 16-19.06.1963. on the Vostok-6 ship with a flight duration of 2 days 22 hours 50 minutes. This flight was not a purely political action, but was aimed at obtaining serious scientific information about the behavior of the female body in space flight conditions, which was later used during the flights of other female astronauts, including American women who flew much later than ours.
Photo of Gagarin with Tereshkova
Since the Soviet Union intended to seriously explore near space, it was necessary to make ships on which it was possible to “carry” not one, but several astronauts, performing not only the functions of piloting the ship, but also full-scale scientific experiments. This first three-seat spacecraft was launched on 10/12/1964. The crew consisted of the spacecraft commander V.M. Komarov, researcher K.P. Feoktistov and doctor B.B. Egorova.
In order to find out for the possibility of human operations outside a spacecraft, for the first time in the world, our Soviet cosmonaut Alexei Arkhipovich Leonov carried out a manned spacewalk as part of the Voskhod-2 flight on March 18-19, 1965. Duration of stay in space - 12 min 9 s. Needless to say, for this it was necessary for the first time to create a special spacesuit, which was not equal then?
Photo: Leonov in space.
Leonov was not only an astronaut, but also an artist. Himself and together with the artist Sokolov, he painted many "space paintings". The legacy of these two artists is truly enormous and priceless. The artist can display such facets of the world and perception that no photo or film can reproduce.
Naturally, our achievements were not limited to these priority actions. And further, our science has more than once placed the Americans in an extremely difficult and unrespectable position of catching up and repeating other people's achievements. Our ability to do something first and for the first time in the world ended only in 1991 with the treacherous destruction of the USSR.
The first flight outside the earth's atmosphere on the Vostok spacecraft was made by our compatriot Air Force Major Yuri Alekseevich Gagarin on April 12, 1961. Since then, about […]
From 1958 to 1963.
The first manned Vostok, launched on April 12, 1961, became at the same time the first in the world spacecraft which made it possible to carry out flight person in space. This day (April 12) is celebrated in Russia and in many other countries of the world, World Aviation and Cosmonautics Day.
Subsequently, five more ships of the series flew, including two group ships (without docking), including with the world's first female cosmonaut Tereshkova. The planned 4 more flights (including longer ones, with the creation of artificial gravity) were canceled.
Sunrise
The ship actually repeated the ships of the series "East", but had an enlarged front instrument sub-compartment, its descent vehicle was reconfigured for flight and landing inside the SA of two or three astronauts (for which they were excluded ejection seats and to save space, the astronauts were located without spacesuits), and the option for spacewalks had a hinged airlock.
The flight of Voskhod-1 in 1964 was the world's first multi-seat flight, Voskhod-2 with the world's first spacewalk. After two flights, several more planned flights (including low-orbit, longer, group flights, with the first mixed female-male crew, the first spacewalk by a woman) were still ahead.
Union
The Soyuz spacecraft began to be designed in 1962 in OKB-1 first for flying Moon. A bunch of spaceship and upper stages 7K-9K-11K. Subsequently, this project was closed in favor of flying around the moon on the L1 spacecraft, launched on the launch vehicle "Proton", and on the basis of 7K and the closed project of the Sever near-Earth spacecraft, they began to make 7K-OK- a multi-purpose three-seat orbital ship (OK) with solar panels, designed to practice maneuvering operations and docking on the near-Earth orbit, for various experiments, including the transition of astronauts from ship to ship through open space.
Testing of 7K-OK began in 1966. The first 3 unmanned launches were unsuccessful and revealed serious errors in the design of the ship. 4th launch from V. Komarov turned out to be tragic - the astronaut died. Nevertheless, the program continued, and already in 1968 the first automatic docking of 2 Soyuz took place, in 1969 - the first manned docking and group flight three ships, in 1970 - the first long-term flight, in 1971 - the first docking and expedition (after which the crew died) to the Salyut-DOS orbital station.
Several dozen flights have been made and continue (including only two that ended in the death of the crews) of the ship in different versions of the Soyuz (including 7K-T, 7K-TM, 7K-MF6, 7K-T-AF, 7K-S) , Soyuz-T (7K-ST), Soyuz-TM (7K-STM), Soyuz-TMA (7K-STMA), Soyuz-TMA-M/TMAC (7K-STMA-M) , including for the first docking with a foreign ship, expeditions to the Salyut-DOS, Almaz, Mir orbital stations, etc.
The ship became the basis for the creation of unrealized manned spacecraft lunar programs(L1 and L3 and Soyuz-Kontakt for testing the docking of L3 modules) and military programs ( Soyuz 7K-VI military researcher, -P interceptor, -R reconnaissance, multifunctional Zvezda), as well as for the Progress automatic cargo ship.
L1
The lunar flyby manned program of the Design Bureau of Korolev, brought to the stage of the last unmanned developmental launches and flights and canceled before the first manned flight.
L3
The lunar landing manned program of the Design Bureau of Korolev, brought to the stage of the first unmanned test launches and flights and canceled before the first manned flight.
Star
The military manned ship of the Kozlov Design Bureau, the project of which was developed to replace the " Union 7K-VI» Design Bureau Korolev, was brought to the pre-flight stage and was canceled in favor of the Chelomey Design Bureau complex from the Almaz military orbital station and the TKS spacecraft.
tks
Manned spacecraft of Design Bureau Chelomey for maintenance of the Almaz military orbital station and other tasks of the Ministry of Defense, launched on the launch vehicle "Proton" only in unmanned mode, but docked with Salyut-DOS orbital stations (including manned ones).
Dawn
Partially reusable manned transport ship of Design Bureau Koroleva with launch on the launch vehicle "Zenith", the project of which was canceled at the design stage due to the concentration of resources on the creation of the Energia-Buran system.
Diamond
Long-term manned military orbital stations of the Design Bureau of Chelomey, launched on the launch vehicle "Proton" under the names "Salyut-2, -3, -5", "Cosmos-1870", "Almaz-1", of which two were operated by manned aircraft ("Salyut-3, -5"). They had on board, including weapons (guns).
Salyut-DOS
Long-term manned orbital stations TsKBEM, launched on the launch vehicle "Proton" under the names "Cosmos-557", "Salyut-1, -4, -6, -7", of which all but the first were operated by manned aircraft. The latter two had two docking stations each and simultaneously took on board two manned or automatic cargo and other ships, including heavy TCS.
World
Spiral
The only one of the five under construction, the first ship of the series made the only unmanned flight in 1988, after which the program was closed in 1993, due to the collapse of the USSR and difficult economic situation.
Projects of a reusable spacecraft were developed in post-Soviet Russia MAX(cancelled) and partially reusable spacecraft "Clipper"(cancelled) and "Rus"(continues).
The USSR deservedly held the title of the most powerful space power in the world. The first satellite launched into the orbit of the Earth, Belka and Strelka, the flight of the first man into space are more than good reasons for this. But they were in the Soviet space history scientific breakthroughs and tragedies unknown to the general public. They will be discussed in our review.
1. Interplanetary station "Luna-1"
The interplanetary station "Luna-1", which was launched on January 2, 1959, became the first spacecraft to successfully reach the vicinity of the moon. The 360-kilogram spacecraft carried a load of Soviet symbols that were supposed to be placed on the surface of the moon to demonstrate superiority Soviet science. However, the craft missed the moon, passing within 6,000 kilometers of its surface.
During the flight to the Moon, an experiment was carried out to create an "artificial comet" - the station released a cloud of sodium vapor, which glowed for several minutes and made it possible to observe the station from Earth as a star of 6 magnitude. Interestingly, Luna 1 was at least the fifth attempt by the USSR to launch a spacecraft to natural satellite Earth, the first 4 ended in failure. Radio signals from the station ceased three days after launch. Later in 1959, the Luna 2 probe reached the lunar surface with a hard landing.
Launched on February 12, 1961, the Soviet space probe Venera-1 launched towards Venus to land on its surface. As in the case of the Moon, this was not the first launch - the device 1VA No. 1 (also dubbed "Sputnik-7") failed. Although the probe itself was supposed to burn up upon re-entry into the atmosphere of Venus, the descent capsule was planned to reach the surface of Venus, which would make it the first anthropogenic object on the surface of another planet.
The initial launch went well, but communication with the probe was lost after a week (presumably due to overheating of the direction sensor on the Sun). As a result, the unmanaged station passed 100,000 kilometers from Venus.
The Luna-3 station, launched on October 4, 1959, was the third spacecraft successfully sent to the Moon. Unlike the previous two probes of the Luna program, this one was equipped with a camera that was designed to take pictures of the far side of the Moon for the first time in history. Unfortunately, the camera was primitive and complex, so the pictures turned out to be of poor quality.
The radio transmitter was so weak that the first attempts to transmit images to Earth failed. When the station approached the Earth, having made a flight around the Moon, 17 photos were obtained, in which scientists found that the “invisible” side of the Moon is mountainous, and unlike the one that is turned towards the Earth.
4The First Successful Landing On Another Planet
On August 17, 1970, the Venera-7 automatic research space station was launched, which was supposed to land a descent vehicle on the surface of Venus. In order to survive in the atmosphere of Venus as long as possible, the lander was made of titanium and equipped with thermal insulation (it was assumed that the surface pressure could reach 100 atmospheres, the temperature - 500 ° C, and the wind speed at the surface - 100 m / s).
The station reached Venus, and the apparatus began its descent. However, the descent vehicle's drag parachute exploded, after which it fell for 29 minutes, eventually crashing into the surface of Venus. It was believed that the craft could not survive such an impact, but later analysis of the recorded radio signals showed that the probe transmitted temperature readings from the surface within 23 minutes after a hard landing.
5. The first artificial object on the surface of Mars
"Mars-2" and "Mars-3" are two automatic interplanetary stations - a twin, which were launched in May 1971 to the Red Planet with a difference of several days. Since the US had beaten the Soviet Union to orbit Mars first (Mariner 9, which also launched in May 1971, beat two Soviet probes by two weeks to become the first spacecraft to orbit another planet), the USSR wanted to make the first landing on the surface. Mars.
The Mars 2 lander crashed on the surface of the planet, and the Mars 3 lander managed to make a soft landing and began transmitting data. But the transmission stopped after 20 seconds due to a severe dust storm on the surface of Mars, as a result of which the USSR lost the first clear images taken on the surface of the planet.
6. The first automatic device that delivered extraterrestrial matter to Earth
Since the American astronauts of Apollo 11 had already brought the first samples of lunar matter to Earth, the USSR decided to launch the first automated space probe to the Moon to collect lunar soil and return to Earth. The first Soviet apparatus, Luna-15, which was supposed to reach the surface of the Moon on the day of the launch of Apollo 11, crashed while trying to land.
Before that, 5 attempts were also unsuccessful due to problems with the launch vehicle. However, Luna 16, the sixth Soviet probe, was successfully launched after Apollo 11 and Apollo 12. The station landed in the Sea of Plenty. After that, she took soil samples (in the amount of 101 grams) and returned to Earth.
7. The first three-seat spacecraft
Launched on October 12, 1964, Voskhod 1 became the first spacecraft to have a crew of more than one. Although the Voskhod was touted as an innovative spacecraft, it was actually a slightly modified version of the Vostok, which Yuri Gagarin first flew into space. The United States at that time did not even have two-seater ships.
"Voskhod" was considered unsafe even by Soviet designers, since the place for three crew members was freed up due to the fact that ejection seats were abandoned in the design. Also, the cabin was so cramped that the astronauts were in it without spacesuits. As a result, if the cabin had depressurized, the crew would have died. In addition, the new landing system, consisting of two parachutes and an antediluvian rocket, was tested only once before launch.
8. The first astronaut of African descent
On September 18, 1980, as part of the eighth expedition to the Salyut-6 orbital scientific station, the Soyuz-38 spacecraft was launched. Its crew consisted of Soviet cosmonaut Yury Viktorovich Romanenko and explorer Arnaldo Tamayo Méndez, a Cuban aviator who became the first person of African descent to go into space. Mendez stayed aboard the Saluat-6 for a week, where he took part in 24 experiments in chemistry and biology.
9. First docking with an uninhabited object
February 11, 1985, after a six-month absence from space station"Salyut-7" people communication with her was suddenly interrupted. The short circuit led to the fact that all the electrical systems of Salyut-7 turned off, and the temperature at the station dropped to -10 ° C.
In an attempt to save the station, an expedition was sent to it on a Soyuz T-13 spacecraft converted for this purpose, which was piloted by the most experienced Soviet cosmonaut Vladimir Dzhanibekov. The automated docking system did not work, so manual docking had to be carried out. The docking was successful, and work to restore the space station took place over several days.
10. The first human sacrifice in space
On June 30, 1971, the Soviet Union was looking forward to the return of three cosmonauts who spent 23 days at the Salyut-1 station. But after the landing of the Soyuz-11, not a single sound came from inside. When the capsule was opened from the outside, three astronauts were found dead inside, with dark blue spots on their faces, and blood flowing from their noses and ears.
According to investigators, the tragedy occurred immediately after the separation of the descent vehicle from the orbital module. A depressurization occurred in the cabin of the spacecraft, after which the astronauts suffocated.
Spaceships that were designed at dawn space age, seem like rarities compared to . But it is possible that these projects will be implemented.
