7 interesting facts about Soviet space achievements

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

Knowledge is power. And a life hacker needs knowledge doubly. In this series of articles, we collect fascinating and sometimes unexpected facts about the world around us. We hope that you will find them not only interesting, but also practically useful.

In the middle of the last century, the Soviet Union and the United States participated in a real space race, during which each country tried with all its might to assert its priority. The pace of this competition was crazy, the prestige of the state was at stake. We know perfectly well the main records of the USSR: the first artificial satellite, Belka and Strelka, Yuri Gagarin. And in this article, let us recall the not so loud, but no less interesting achievements of the USSR in the development of near-earth space.

The first artificial satellite of the Sun

The automatic interplanetary station "Luna-1" was launched on January 2, 1959. She was supposed to reach the surface of the moon and deliver there the metal coat of arms of the USSR, designed to show the superiority of Soviet science. However, an error crept into the calculations of scientists, due to which the spacecraft missed the Moon and entered a heliocentric orbit, thereby becoming the first artificial satellite of the Sun.

However, this error did not prevent scientists from performing a number of scientific experiments, including establishing the presence of the Earth's outer radiation belt and creating an artificial comet.

The first spacecraft launched to another planet

The launch of the automatic interplanetary station "Venera-1" was carried out on February 12, 1961. For the first time in the world, a spacecraft was launched from a near-earth orbit to another planet. The control center monitored the flight of the object for seven days, but at a distance of about two million kilometers from Earth, communication was lost.

On May 19 and 20, 1961, the Venera-1 spacecraft passed at a distance of approximately 100,000 km from the planet Venus and entered a heliocentric orbit.

The first photograph of the far side of the moon

The Luna-3 spacecraft was launched on October 4, 1959 by the Vostok-L launch vehicle and for the first time in the world photographed the side of the Moon invisible from Earth. It is interesting that for the first time a gravitational maneuver was used to reach the moon, that is, the acceleration of a spacecraft under the influence of the gravitational fields of celestial bodies.

In the same flight, a new orientation system was tested, which made it possible to solve the problem of controlling vehicles in outer space. It included solar and lunar light sensors, gyroscopic angular rotation sensors, jet micromotors powered by compressed nitrogen.

As a result of the flight, almost half of the Moon's surface was captured, and the images were transmitted to Earth using a photo-television system.

First successful landing on another planet

The Venera-7 spacecraft was launched from the Baikonur cosmodrome on August 17, 1970. The purpose of the launch was to deliver the descent vehicle to the surface of Venus. On December 15, 1970, 120 days after the launch, the Venera-7 station reached the vicinity of the planet. Soon the descent vehicle of the Venera-7 station landed on the surface of Venus, thus becoming the first device to successfully land on another planet.

During the landing, or "rendering", valuable scientific data came from the spacecraft, including directly from the surface of the planet.

First automatic launch from the lunar surface

The moon's pioneers were, as you know, Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin of the American Apollo 11 space mission. They were the first to set foot on the lunar surface, stayed there for 2 hours 31 minutes 40 seconds and collected 21.55 kg of lunar soil samples, which were delivered to Earth.

However, the Soviet Union found a way to respond to this magnificent achievement. A year later (September 12, 1970), an automatic space complex went to the Moon to deliver soil from the Moon. He completed all the tasks and returned to Earth in a fully automatic mode, which at a time when the power of all computers in the Mission Control Center was inferior to any modern smartphone was a real scientific feat.

First astronaut of African descent

Achievement from the category of curious, but words cannot be thrown out of the song. It was thanks to the Soviet Union, which actively promoted the Intercosmos program, that the Cuban Tamayo Méndez flew into space. He is officially recognized as the first person of African descent to travel to space. Upon his return to Earth, Mendes was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union and became a brigadier general of the Cuban Air Force.

The first human death in space

The Soyuz 11 crew was in trouble from the very beginning. First, the medical commission suspended the main crew, and a backup team had to fly into space. On the eleventh day, a fire broke out at the station, as a result of which it was decided to stop the flight and leave the station. However, at the moment of separation of the descent module, a depressurization occurred, and the entire crew almost instantly died. The disaster took place at an altitude of about 168 kilometers.

Thus, the Soyuz-11 cosmonauts became the first and so far, fortunately, the only people who died in space.