Salyut 6 was a Soviet orbital station launched. It was
launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on September 29,
1977. With Salyut-6, the Soviet space station program
evolved from short-duration to long-duration stays.
The station had two docking ports,
which permitted refueling and resupply by automated
Progress freighters. Progress docked automatically at the
aft port, and was then opened and unlocked by cosmonauts
on the station. Transfer of fuel to the station took
place automatically under supervision from the ground.
The second docking port allowed the long-duration
resident crews to receive visiting short-duration crews.
Salyut 6 was visited by five
long-duration crews and eleven short-term crews.
Short-duration crews often included cosmonaut-researchers
from Soviet bloc countries or countries sympathetic to
the Soviet Union. Vladimir Remek of Czechoslovakia, the
first space traveler not from the U.S. or U.S.S.R.,
visited Salyut 6 in 1978. The station also hosted
cosmonauts from Hungary, Poland, Romania, Cuba, Mongolia,
Vietnam, and East Germany.
An experimental transport logistics
spacecraft called Cosmos 1267 docked with Salyut 6 in
1982. Originally designed for the Almaz program, Cosmos
1267 proved that large modules could dock automatically
with space stations, a major step toward the multimodular
Mir station and the International Space Station.
The station was deorbited on July 29,
1982.
Specifications
Length: |
15.8 meters |
Maxim | |