2.3 Failed Salyuts (1972-1973)2.3.1 DOS-2 (July 29, 1972)A year after the Soyuz 11 failure, the Soviet Union felt ready to send crews to a second DOS-type station. Like Salyut 1, its large compontents were originally built for the Almaz program. Failure of the second stage of its three-stage Proton launch vehicle prevented the station from reaching orbit. It fell into the Pacific Ocean. |
2.3.2 Salyut 2/Almaz 1 (April 3-May 28, 1973)On April 3, 1973, the day of the Salyut 2 launch, the Soviet magazine Nauka i Zhian published an interview with Soviet Academician Boris Petrov. In it he declared that lunar space stations would be established to act as bridgeheads for excursions to the lunar surface. He also predicted the advent of multimodular stations with crews of up to 120 people.[1] The failure of Salyut 2 a few days later must have made these goals seem distant indeed. Salyut 2, the first Almaz station, reached orbit on April 3, 1973. Soon after, Salyut 2 lost stability and began tumbling. In 1992, Mikhail Lisun, backup cosmonaut for the Soyuz 24 flight to Almaz station |
Salyut 5, attributed the loss of Salyut 2 to an electrical fire, followed by depressurization.[2] Salyut 2 broke up on April 14, and all trackable pieces reentered by May 28, 1973. 2.3.3 Cosmos 557/DOS-3 (May 11-22, 1973)The third DOS-type station reached orbit just ahead of the U.S. Skylab workshop. Like DOS-2 and Salyut 1, it was based on a hull transferred from the Almaz program in 1970. Shortly after attaining orbit, the station suffered a failure in its attitude control system ion sensors, leading to depletion of most of its attitude control fuel supply. One account states that a command to raise its orbit was sent, but the station was in the wrong attitude, so it reentered.[3] |
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