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Soviet space program

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Part of a series of articles on the
Soviet space program
Human spaceflight programs
Space probes
Expendable launch vehicles
Notable figures
Cosmonauts
Soviet Soyuz rockets like the one pictured above were the first reliable means to transport objects into Earth orbit.[1]
Launch of a Proton-K

The Soviet space program is the rocketry and space exploration programs conducted by the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (the Soviet Union or U.S.S.R.) from the 1930s until its dissolution in 1991. Over its sixty-year history, this primarily classified military program was responsible for a number of pioneering accomplishments in space flight, including the first intercontinental ballistic missile (1957), first satellite (Sputnik-1), first animal in space (the dog Laika on Sputnik 2), first human in space and Earth orbit (cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin on Vostok 1), first woman in space and Earth orbit (cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova on Vostok 6), first spacewalk (cosmonaut Alexey Leonov on Voskhod 2), first Moon impact (Luna 2), first image of the far side of the moon (Luna 3) and unmanned lunar soft landing (Luna 9), first space rover, first space station, and first interplanetary probe.

The rocket and space program of the USSR, initially boosted by the assistance of captured scientists from the advanced German rocket program,[2][3] was performed mainly by Soviet engineers and scientists after 1955, and was based on some unique Soviet and Imperial Russian theoretical developments, many derived by Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovskii, sometimes known as the father of theoretical astronautics.[4][5] Sergey Korolyov[6] (also transliterated as Korolev) was the head of the principal design group; his official title was "chief designer" (a standard title for similar positions in the USSR). Unlike its American competitor in the "space race", which had NASA as a single coordinating agency, the USSR's program was split among several competing design groups led by Korolyov, Mikhail Yangel, Valentin Glushko, and Vladimir Chelomei.

Because of the program's classified status, and for propaganda value, announcements of the outcomes of missions were delayed until success was certain, and failures were sometimes kept secret. Ultimately, as a result of Mikhail Gorbachev's policy of glasnost in the 1980s, many facts about the space program were declassified. Notable setbacks included the deaths of Korolyov, Vladimir Komarov (in the Soyuz 1 crash), and Yuri Gagarin (on a routine fighter jet mission) between 1966 and 1968, and disastrous experiences with the huge N-1 rocket intended to power a manned lunar landing, and which exploded shortly after launch on each of four unmanned tests.

The Soviet Space Program was dissolved with the fall of the Soviet Union, with Russia and Ukraine becoming its immediate heirs. Russia created the Russian Aviation and Space Agency, now known as the Russian Federal Space Agency (ROSCOSMOS),[7] while Ukraine created the National Space Agency of Ukraine (NSAU).

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Sputnik and Vostok

Yuri Gagarin, the first human in space

The Soviet space program was tied to the USSR's Five-Year Plans and from the start was reliant on support from the Soviet military. Although he was "single-mindedly driven by the dream of space travel", Korolyov generally kept this a secret while working on military projects—especially, after the Soviet Union's first atomic bomb test in 1949, a missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead to the United States—as many mocked the idea of launching satellites and manned spacecraft. Nonetheless, the first Soviet rocket with animals aboard launched in July 1951; the two dogs were recovered alive after reaching 101 km in altitude. Two months ahead of America's first such achievement, this and subsequent flights gave the Soviets valuable experience with space medicine.[8]: 84–88, 95–96, 118 

Because of its global range and large payload of approximately five tons, the reliable R-7 was not only effective as a strategic delivery system for nuclear warheads, but also as an excellent basis for a space vehicle. The United States' announcement in July 1955 of its plan to launch a satellite during the International Geophysical Year greatly benefited Korolyov in persuading Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev to support his plans in January 1956, in order to surpass the Americans.[8]: 148–151  Plans were approved for Earth-orbiting satellites (Sputnik) to gain knowledge of space, and four unmanned military reconnaissance satellites, Zenit. Further planned developments called for a manned Earth orbit flight by 1964 and an unmanned lunar mission at an earlier date.

After the first Sputnik proved to be a successful propaganda coup, Korolyov—now known publicly only as the mysterious "Chief Designer of Rocket-Space Systems"[8]: 168–169 —was charged to accelerate the manned program, the design of which was combined with the Zenit program to produce the Vostok spacecraft. Still influenced by Tsiolkovsky—who had chosen Mars as the most important goal for space travel—in the early 1960s the Russian program under Korolyov created substantial plans for manned trips to Mars as early as 1968 to 1970. With closed-loop life support systems and electrical rocket engines, and launched from large orbiting space stations, these plans were much more ambitious than America's goal of landing on the moon.[8]: 333–337 

Funding and support

Despite the Soviet space program's achievements, it was "neither a high priority nor a central tool of Soviet state policy." Khrushchev had decided that the Soviet military's funding would focus on the Strategic Rocket Forces' ICBMs, and the space program "rode its coattails". While the West believed that Khrushchev personally ordered each new space mission for propaganda purposes, and the Soviet leader did have an unusually close relationship with Korolyov and other chief designers, he "was more concerned about money and missiles than he was about cosmonauts and the cosmos...[H]e was never particularly interested in competing with Apollo."[8]: 351, 408, 426–427 

While the government and the Communist Party used the program's successes as propaganda tools after they occurred, systematic plans for missions based on political reasons were rare, one exception being Valentina Tereshkova, the first woman in space, on Vostok 6 in 1963.[8]: 351  Missions were planned based on rocket availability or ad hoc reasons, rather than scientific purposes. For example, the government in February 1962 abruptly ordered an ambitious mission involving two Vostoks simultaneously in orbit launched "in ten days time" to obscure John Glenn's Mercury-Atlas 6 that month; the program could not do so with Vostok 3 and Vostok 4 until August.[8]: 354–361 

Internal competition

File:200px-Glushko Valentin Petrovich.jpg
Valentin Glushko
Sergey Korolyov
File:Stamps of Germany (DDR) 1986, MiNr Zusammendruck 3005-3008.jpg
Stamps honoring Sigmund Jähn

Unlike the American Space program which had NASA as a single coordinating structure directed by its Administrator, James Webb through most of the 1960s, the USSR's program was split between several competing design groups. Despite the remarkable successes of the Sputniks between 1957 and 1961 and Vostoks between 1961 and 1964, after 1958 Korolyov's OKB-1 design bureau faced increasing competition from his rival chief designers, Mikhail Yangel, Valentin Glushko, and Vladimir Chelomei. Korolyov planned to move forward with the Soyuz craft and N-1 heavy booster that would be the basis of a permanent manned space station and manned exploration of the Moon. However, Ustinov directed him to focus on near-Earth missions using the very reliable Voskhod spacecraft, a modified Vostok, as well as on interplanetary unmanned missions to nearby planets Venus and Mars.

Yangel had been Korolyov's assistant but with the support of the military he was given his own design bureau in 1954 to work primarily on the military space program. This had the stronger rocket engine design team including the use of hypergolic fuels but following the Nedelin catastrophe in 1960 Yangel was directed to concentrate on ICBM development. He also continued to develop his own heavy booster designs similar to Korolyov's N-1 both for military applications and for cargo flights into space to build future space stations.

Glushko was the chief rocket engine designer but he had a personal friction with Korolyov and refused to develop the large single chamber cryogenic engines that Korolyov needed to build heavy boosters.

Chelomei benefited from the patronage of Khrushchev[8]: 418  and in 1960 was given the plum jobs of developing a rocket to send a manned craft around the moon and a manned military space station. With limited space experience, his development was slow.

The Apollo program's progress alarmed the chief designers, who each advocated for his own programs as response. Multiple, overlapping designs received approval, and new proposals threatened already approved projects. Due to Korolyov's "singular persistence", in August 1964 —more than three years after the United States declared its intentions— the Soviet Union finally decided to compete for the moon. It set the goal of a lunar landing in 1967 —the 50th anniversary of the October Revolution— or 1968.[8]: 406–408, 420  At one stage in the early 1960s the Soviet space program was actively developing 30 projects for launchers and spacecraft. With the fall of Krushchev in 1964, Korolyov was given complete control of the manned space program.

After Korolyov

Korolyov died in January 1966 following a routine operation that uncovered colon cancer and from complications from heart disease and severe hemorrhaging. Kerim Kerimov,[9] who was formerly an architect of Vostok 1,[10] was appointed Chairman of the State Commission on Piloted Flights and headed it for the next 25 years (1966–1991). He supervised every stage of development and operation of both manned space complexes as well as unmanned interplanetary stations for the former Soviet Union. One of Kerimov's greatest achievements was the launch of Mir in 1986.

Former Space Pavilion at the All-Soviet Exhibition Centre.

Leadership of the OKB-1 design bureau was given to Vasili Mishin, who had the task of sending a man around the Moon in 1967 and landing a man on it in 1968. Mishin lacked Korolyov's political authority and still faced competition from other chief designers. Under pressure Mishin approved the launch of the Soyuz 1 flight in 1967, even though the craft had never been successfully tested on an unmanned flight. The mission launched with known design problems and ended with the vehicle crashing to the ground, killing Vladimir Komarov. This was the first in-flight fatality.

Following this disaster and under new pressures, Mishin developed a drinking problem. The Soviets were narrowly beaten in sending the first manned flight around the Moon in 1968 by Apollo 8, but Mishin pressed ahead with development of the problematic super heavy N1 rocket in the hope that the Americans would have a setback, leaving enough time to make the N-1 workable and land a man on the moon first. There was a success with the joint flight of Soyuz 4 and Soyuz 5 in January 1969 that tested the rendezvous, docking and crew transfer techniques that would be used for the landing, and the LK Lander was tested successfully in earth orbit. But after four unmanned test launches of the N-1 ended in failure, the heavy booster was abandoned and with it any chance of the Soviets landing men on the moon in a single launch.

Besides the manned landings, abandoned Soviet moon program included a building the multipurpose moonbase Zvezda, first detailed such project with developed mockups of expedition vehicles[11] and surface modules.[12] Later proposed new moon manned program "Vulkan-LEK" were not adopted on economic reasons.

Following this setback, Chelomei convinced Ustinov to approve a program in 1970 to advance his Almaz military space station as a means of beating the US's announced Skylab. Mishin remained in control of the project that became Salyut but the decision backed by Mishin to fly a three-man crew without pressure suits rather than a two-man crew with suits to Salyut 1 in 1971 proved fatal when the re-entry capsule depressurized killing the crew on their return to Earth. Mishin was removed from many projects, with Chelomei regaining control of Salyut. After working with NASA on the Apollo Soyuz Test Project, the Soviet leadership decided a new management approach was needed and in 1974 the N-1 was cancelled and Mishin dismissed. A single design bureau was created NPO Energia with Glushko as chief designer.

Despite of failure of manned lunar programs, USSR achieved a significant success with two historical firsts, the automatic Lunokhod and the Luna sample return missions. Also, the Mars probe program was continued with some small success, while the explorations of Venus and then of the Halley comet by Venera and Vega probe programs was more effective.

List of Projects and accomplishments

Completed projects

The Soviet space program has undertaken a number of projects, including:

Vostok I capsule used by Yuri Gagarin on the first manned space flight, now on display at the RKK Energiya Museum outside of Moscow.

Notable firsts

This image was recorded by astronauts as the Space Shuttle Atlantis approached the Russian space station before docking during the STS-76 mission. Sporting spindly appendages and solar panels, Mir was orbiting about 350 kilometers above New Zealand's South Island and the city of Nelson near Cook Strait.

Two days after the United States announced its intention to launch an artificial satellite, on July 31, 1956, the Soviet Union announced its intention to do the same. Sputnik 1 was launched on October 4, 1957, beating the United States and stunning people all over the world.[13]

The Soviet space program pioneered many aspects of space exploration:

Mir's Legacy - The core modules of the International Space Station, Phase Two of the ISS program.

Other Projects

Buran

The Soviet space program produced the Space Shuttle Buran based on the 3rd in history super heavy Energia launcher. Energia would be used as the base for a manned Mars mission. Buran was intended to operate in support of large space based military platforms as a response first to the US Space Shuttle and then the Strategic Defense Initiative. By the time the system was operational, in 1988, strategic arms reduction treaties and the end of the Cold War made Buran redundant. On November 15, 1988, the Buran orbiter and its Energia rocket were launched from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, and after three hours and two orbits, glided to a landing a few miles from its launch pad.[14] Several vehicles were built, but only the one flew an unmanned test flight; it was found too expensive to operate as a civilian launcher.

Canceled interplanetary projects

Mars 4NM

Marsokhod heavy rover Mars 4NM was going to be launched by the abandoned N1 launcher sometime between 1974 and 1975.

Mars 5NM

Mars sample return mission Mars 5NM was going to be launched by a single N1 launcher in 1975.

Mars 5M

Mars sample return mission Mars 5M (ru) was to be double launched in parts by Proton launchers, and then joined together in orbit for flight to Mars in 1979. [1]

Vesta

The Vesta mission would have consisted of two identical double-purposed interplanetary probes to be launched in 1991. It was intended to fly-by Mars (instead of an early plan to Venus) and then study four asteroids belonging to different classes. At 4 Vesta a penetrator would be released.

Tsiolkovsky

The Tsiolkovsky mission was planned as a double-purposed deep interplanetary probe to be launched in the 1990s for exploration of the Sun and Jupiter.

Saturn

The Saturn mission was planned as a deep interplanetary probe to be launched in 2012 for exploration of Saturn and Titan.

Incidents, Failures, and Setbacks

The Soviet space program has experienced a number of fatal incidents and failures. The so-called Nedelin catastrophe in 1960 was a disastrous explosion of a fueled rocket being tested on launchpad, killing many technical personnel, aerospace engineers, and technicians working on the project at the time of the explosion.

The first cosmonaut fatality during training occurred on March 23, 1961 when Valentin Bondarenko died in a fire within a low pressure, high oxygen atmosphere.

A few months later, two Italian brothers who had made a serious hobby out of recording the Soviet space agency's radio transmissions, picked up and recorded what appeared to be the voice of a woman who appeared to have been involved in testing of the ability for humans to cope with space. The audio (in Russian) says: “Isn’t this dangerous? Talk to me! Our transmission begins now. I feel hot. I can see a flame. Am I going to crash? Yes. I feel hot, I will re-enter…” The audio stopped at that point. This transmission, while never publicly acknowledged by the Soviet authorities, would appear to be the final words of - if not a female cosmonaut - at least a test pilot.

The Voskhod program was canceled after two manned flights owing to the change of Soviet leadership and nearly fatal 'close calls' during the second mission. Had the planned further flights gone ahead they could have given the Soviet space program further 'firsts' including a long duration flight of 20 days, a spacewalk by a woman and an untethered spacewalk.[citation needed]

The deaths of Korolyov, Komarov (in the Soyuz 1 crash) and Gagarin (the first human is space who was on a routine fighter jet mission) within two years of each other understandably had substantial negative impact on the Soviet program.[citation needed]

The Soviets continued striving for the first lunar mission with the huge N-1 rocket, which exploded on each of four unmanned tests shortly after launch. The Americans won the race to land men on the moon with Apollo 11 on July 20, 1969.

On April 5, 1975, the second stage of a Soyuz rocket carrying 2 cosmonauts to the Salyut 4 space station malfunctioned, resulting in the first manned launch abort. The cosmonauts were carried several thousand miles downrange and became worried that they would land in China, which the Soviet Union was then having difficult relations with. The capsule hit a mountain, sliding down a slope and almost slid off a cliff; fortunately the parachute lines snagged on trees and kept this from happening. As it was, the two suffered severe injuries and the commander, Lazerev, never flew again.

On March 18, 1980 a Vostok rocket exploded on its launch pad during a fueling operation, killing 48 people.[citation needed]

In August 1981, Kosmos 434, which had been launched in 1971, was about to re-enter. To allay fears that the spacecraft carried nuclear materials, a spokesperson from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the USSR assured the Australian government on August 26, 1981 that the satellite was "an experimental lunar cabin". This was one of the first admissions by the Soviet Union that it had ever engaged in a manned lunar spaceflight program.[8]: 736 

In September 1983, a Soyuz rocket being launched to carry cosmonauts to the Salyut 7 space station exploded on the pad, causing the Soyuz capsule's abort system to engage, saving the two cosmonauts on board.

See also the complete list of space disasters.

See also

References

  1. ^ Wade, Mark (1997 - 2008). "Soyuz". Encyclopedia Astronautica. Retrieved July 15, 2009. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |year= (help)
  2. ^ "Gorodomlya Island". Retrieved 2009-08-11.
  3. ^ "German rocket scientists in Moscow". Retrieved 2009-08-11.
  4. ^ American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics - Home Page
  5. ^ The early US space program was developed predominantly by scientists and rocket engineers from Nazi Germany who immigrated to the United States after World War II and was based on German technological experience, and the early Soviet program also benefited from Nazi German experience (see Helmut Gröttrup).
  6. ^ http://www.iafastro.com/index.php?id=524
  7. ^ http://www.roscosmos.ru/index.asp?Lang=ENG
  8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Siddiqi, Asif A. Challenge To Apollo: The Soviet Union and the Space Race, 1945-1974. NASA.
  9. ^ http://space.hobby.ru/baykonur/kerimov.html
  10. ^ Peter Bond, Obituary: Lt-Gen Kerim Kerimov, The Independent, 7 April 2003.
  11. ^ LEK Lunar Expeditionary Complex
  12. ^ DLB Module
  13. ^ Launius, Roger (2002). To Reach the High Frontier. University Press of Kentucky. pp. 7–10. ISBN 0-8131-2245-7.
  14. ^ "Buran - the Soviet 'space shuttle'". BBC. November 20, 2008. Retrieved 2010-01-01.

Chronologies


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