Valerie Ryumin, a Soviet tank commander who became an astronaut and spent more than a year in space and set an endurance record, died 18 years later, this time on the US Space Shuttle, but died on Monday. I did. He was 82 years old.
The Russian Federation space company Roscosmos has announced his death. The company’s board member, Dmitry Rogozin, called Ryumin’s death an “irreparable loss,” but didn’t say where he died or why.
Ryumin’s first mission, Soyuz 25, was supposed to last for 90 days, but ended in just two days due to a failed docking with the Salyut 6 orbital space station.
In the next two missions, Ryumin and his crew set a space endurance record. In 1979, Soyuz 32 was with Vladimirlyahov for 175 days, and in 1980, Soyuz 35 was with Leonid Popov for 185 days.
These early flights were considered invaluable to the advancement of science. They were also the cornerstone of advertising.
Ryumin and his crew conducted experiments such as gamma-ray telescope testing and quail egg hatching. They welcomed the first Cuban, Hungarian, and Vietnamese astronauts on the space station and performed live on the video screen of the Moscow Stadium during the 1980 Summer Olympics.
By the time Ryumin retired in 1980, he recorded 362 days of space flight after his third mission. This is the record of astronauts and astronauts at that time.
From 1981 to 1989, he was the flight director for Salyut 7 and the Mir Space Station. (Salyut failed in 1985 and was recovered by the Soviet Union in the rescue that was the basis of the 2017 Russian movie “Salyut 7”.) He was later recovered by NASA and the Russian Space Agency.
Ryumin applied to join the crew of the US Space Shuttle Discovery STS-91 in 1998, perhaps 18 years after his third and last flight. The shuttle was scheduled to dock with the Russian space station Mir, which had been in orbit for 12 years.
“I thought it would be nice to fly a fourth after flying three times in the 80’s,” he said. Interview with NASA 2 months before release.
“I found it very convenient for people with very good flight and life experience to visit the station,” he added. “I believe we can see more details and things compared to young astronauts and crew.”
Ryumin had to lose about £ 55 to qualify for the mission. Discovery docked with Mir in June 1998. He spent four days on the space station before returning home, recording a total of 371 days of space stay on all four missions.
“During these joint operations during the Phase 1 program, we learned a lot.” He said. “We learned how to understand each other. We are familiar with the philosophies of each country.”
Valerie Victorovich Ryumin was born on August 16, 1939 in Komsomolsk-on-Amour, Russian Far East. He graduated from Kaliningrad Mechanical Engineering College in 1958.
He was the commander of army tanks from 1958 to 1961, and in 1965 received a degree in electronics and computing technology from the Moscow Forest Engineering Institute, which specializes in spacecraft control systems.
Ryumin joined the Astronaut Corps in 1973 after working for Rocket and Space Corporation. He was twice nominated as a hero of the Soviet Union.
Survivors include his wife, astronaut Yelena Kondakova. Their daughter, Yehugeniya. And two children, Victoria and Vadim, from their previous marriage to Natalia Lumina.
When he was a graduate student, Ryumin was trained at the company that manufactured the first Sputnik satellite. But he said in a NASA interview that he never dreamed that he would one day orbit the Earth.
“At that time it was like a big fantasy, and I couldn’t imagine I would have to do this,” he said. “I couldn’t dream about it.
“Now children can dream and from an early age they can say,’I will be an astronaut or an astronaut,'” he added. “People of my generation couldn’t dream about it because they didn’t know what to dream about at the time.”