Part 2 2.1 OverviewFigure 2-1 is a space station family tree depicting the evolutionary relationships described in this section. 2.1.1 Early Concepts (1903, 1962)The space station concept is very old in Russia. Space pioneer Konstantin Tsiolkovskii wrote about space stations as early as 1903.[1] The first space station event relevant to this discussion occurred in March 1962, when Sergei Korolev’s OKB-1 design bureau (ancestor of RKK Energia–until recently, NPO Energia) produced a report called “Complex for the Assembly of Space Vehicles in Artificial Earth Satellite Orbit (the Soyuz).” The report was |
largely concerned with assembly in
Earth orbit of a vehicle for circumlunar flight, but also described a small station made up of independently launched modules. Three cosmonauts were to reach the station aboard a manned transport spacecraft called Siber (or Sever) (“north”), shown in figure 2-2. They would live in a habitation module and observe Earth from a “sciencepackage” module. Korolev’s Vostok rocket (a converted ICBM) was tapped to launch both Siber and the station modules. In 1965, Korolev proposed a 90-ton space station to be launched by the N-1 rocket. It was to have had a docking module with ports for four Soyuz spacecraft.[2][3] 2.1.2 Almaz: Conception (1964-1967)However, the Korolev organization was preoccupied with preparing the Soviet entry in the Moon race with the United States. The task of developing the first space station fell to V. N. Chelomei’s OKB-52 organization (ancestor of NPO Mashinostroyeniye).[4] On October |
12, 1964, Chelomei called upon his staff to develop a military station for two to three cosmonauts, with a design life of 1 to 2 years. They designed an integrated system: a single-launch space station dubbed Almaz (“diamond”) and a Transport Logistics Spacecraft (Russian acronym TKS) for reaching it (see section 3.3). Chelomei’s three-stage Proton booster would launch them both. Almaz was to be equipped with a crew capsule, radar remotesensing apparatus for imaging the Earth’s surface, cameras, two reentry capsules for returning data to Earth, and an antiaircraft cannon to defend against American attack.[5] An interdepartmental commission approved the system in 1967. OKB-52 and its Branch No. 1 (ancestor of KB Salyut) divided responsibility for the system’s components.[6]
2.1.3 First Space Stations (1970-1974)Work on the Almaz stations proceeded apace, but the subsystems rapidly fell behind the original schedule. In February 1970, the Soviet Ministry of General Machine Building decided to transfer Almaz hardware and plans from Chelomei’s bureau to Korolev’s bureau.[7] This was done in hopes it would permit the Soviet Union to launch a space station ahead of the U.S. Skylab project.[8] The transfer was less physical than administrative, because both Energia Soyuz and Mashinostroyeniye Almaz hardware were assembled in the Krunichev plant. Using Soyuz hardware for subsystems and Almaz hardware for large components such as the hull, Korolev’s bureau and OKB-52 Branch No. 1 completed the world’s first space station, Long-Duration Station-1 (Russian acronym DOS-1), in just 12 months. DOS-1 was called Zarya (“dawn”) 1 until shortly before its launch, when it was realized that |
 Figure 2-2. Conceptual drawing of Siber multimodule space station and Siber ferry (1962). | ||
- ↑ Konstantin Tsiolkovskii, Beyond the Planet Earth, Pergamon Press, 1960, pp. 8-10.
- ↑ Christian Lardier, “Proton Celebrates its 25th Anniversary,” Aviation Magazine International, No. 1022, February 15-30, 1991, pp. 53-55.
- ↑ I. B. Afanasyev, “Unknown Spacecraft (From the History of the Soviet Space Program),” What’s New in Life, Science, and Technology: Space Program and Astronomy Series, No. 12, December 1991. Translated in JPRS Report, Science & Technology, Central Eurasia: Space, October 5, 1993 (JPRS-USP-93-005), p. 6.
- ↑ Dmitri Payson, “Without the Secret Stamp: Salyut and Star Wars,” Rossiskiye Vesti, November 21, 1992, p. 4. Translated in JPRS Report, Science & Technology, Central Eurasia: Space, March 25, 1993 (JPRS-USP-93-001), p. 67.
- ↑ Payson, March 25, 1993, p. 67.
- ↑ Afanasyev, p. 18.
- ↑ Afanasyev, p. 19.
- ↑ Dmitri Payson, “We’ll Build a Space Station for a Piece of Bread,” Rossiskiye Vesti, June 1, 1993, p. 8. Translated in JPRS Report, Science & Technology, Central Eurasia: Space, June 28, 1993 (JPRSUSP-93-003), p. 12.
