Pyotr Ilyich Klimuk

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Pyotr Ilyich Klimuk
Pyotr Ilyich Klimuk
Pyotr Klimuk next to Vladimir Putin in a training center (2000)
Country: USSR
selected on October 23, 1965
Calls: 3 space flights
Start of the
first space flight:
18th December 1973
Landing of the
last space flight:
5th July 1978
Time in space: 78 d 18 h 18 min 42 s
retired on March 3, 1982
Space flights

Pyotr Klimuk ( Belarusian Пётр Ільліч Клімук ; Russian Пётр Ильич Климук , * 10. July 1942 in Kamarouka , Brest Region , Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic ) is a former Soviet cosmonaut Belarusian nationality .

Life

Klimuk was born in a rural region of Belarus. His father died in World War II in 1944, and his mother later remarried. Klimuk studied at the military college in Chernigov and after graduating in 1964 joined the Soviet Air Force , where he was trained on the fighters MiG-21 , MiG-15 and the airliner Il-14 .

Cosmonaut activity

Selection and training

Klimuk was accepted as a cosmonaut aspirant on October 23, 1965. This was the third group of military pilots and engineers after 1960 and 1963.

Lunar program

During the basic training, Klimuk was assigned to the lunar program and trained as the commander of a manned orbit around the moon. Most recently, Anatoly Voronov was assigned to him as a flight engineer. Klimuk passed the final exam at the end of his basic training on December 30, 1967. From 1969 to May 1971 Klimuk trained for the command of a Soyuz space flight as part of the contact program, in which two Soyuz spacecraft were to couple. At first Viktor Pazayev was assigned to him as a flight engineer. When Pazayev switched to the Salyut program, he was replaced by Yuri Artjuchin .

Salyut

With the launch of Salyut 1 , the first space station in the history of space travel was in orbit. While the first team was on board, Klimuk was given the command for a mission on board the second space station. Artjuchin was reassigned to him as a flight engineer, and another cosmonaut was to come from the ranks of the engineers at the ZKBEM design office . However, those plans were put on hold after Soyuz 11's crew were killed on landing.

From October 1971, Klimuk again prepared for a stay on board the next Salyut station. As a flight engineer he was assigned Vitaly Sevastyanov , who had already completed a space flight with Soyuz 9 . The rocket, with which the space station should be brought into space, exploded during the launch on July 29, 1972, so that the two were not used. Another Salyut space station was launched on May 11, 1973. However, it could not be stabilized in orbit and was given the code name Kosmos 557 . This station could not be manned either and Klimuk did not come to his first space flight again.

First flight: Soyuz 13 (1973)

After the space station was no longer available, two solo flights of the Soyuz spaceship were scheduled to test the changes made after the Soyuz 11 disaster. On the flight of Soyuz 12 in September 1973, Klimuk and Sevajastjanow belonged to the support team, at Soyuz 13 Klimuk moved up to the substitute team in May 1973. Valentin Lebedev was assigned to him as a flight engineer .

On December 7th, the State Commission made a decision that the originally planned cosmonauts Vorobyov and Yazdovsky should not be deployed and Klimuk and Lebedev moved up. Klimuk and Lebedew were both only 31 years old, making them the youngest crew on a multi-seat spaceship. In addition, Klimuk is so far (as of 2018) the youngest commander of a spaceship crew.

Klimuk and Lebedew started Soyuz 13 on December 18, 1973 . The Orion 2 camera was used to take both astrophysical recordings and earth observations. The landing took place on December 26th in a snow storm.

Second flight: Soyuz 18 (1975)

From January 1974, Klimuk was trained for a stay on board the Salyut 4 space station . On the first mission, which started with Soyuz 17 in January 1975, Klimuk and his flight engineer Sevastyanov were part of the support team.

On the next flight, Klimuk and Sevastyanov moved up to the substitute team. However, the launch on April 5, 1975 failed when the third stage of the Soyuz rocket did not properly separate from the second. The cosmonauts Lazarew and Makarov survived the aborted launch. This flight was not officially numbered, but is often listed as Soyuz 18-1 .

Klimuk and Sevastyanov then formed the crew for the next flight, called Soyuz 18 . The launch took place on May 24, 1975, the coupling with Salyut 4 one day later. After landing on July 26, 1975, Klimuk and Sevastyanov had set a new long-term Soviet record with a flight duration of 62 days, but were still below the 84 days of the American Skylab-4 crew .

Third flight: Soyuz 30 (1978)

From August 1977, Klimuk was preparing for a flight as part of the Interkosmos program, in which pilots from friendly nations came on a space flight. Klimuk commanded the second flight in this program, with on board Soyuz 30 was Mirosław Hermaszewski from Poland . Klimuk thus came to his third space flight. After Schatalow and Jelissejew (both 1971) he was only the third cosmonaut to reach this mark.

Klimuk and Hermaszewski took off on June 27, 1978 and docked the next day with the Salyut 6 space station , which at that time was manned by Vladimir Kovaljonok and Alexander Ivanchenkov . After four weeks in the space station, Klimuk and Hermaszewski returned to earth on July 5, 1978.

After the space flights

From January 1978, Klimuk took on leading positions in the Juri Gagarin cosmonaut training center . On March 3, 1982, he officially resigned from the cosmonaut corps. On September 12, 1991, Klimuk became head of the cosmonaut training center and held this position until he retired on September 17, 2003. After German Titow and Leonid Kisim , he too achieved the rank of Colonel General .

Parallel to his work in the space program, he had always pursued his academic career. Klimuk had already graduated from the Air Force Military Academy "JA Gagarin" in 1977 . He graduated with honors from the Lenin Military Political Academy in 1983 . In December 2000 he received his PhD in technical sciences . Klimuk holds two professorships : one from UNESCO (1997) and one from the State Agricultural University of Belarus (2005).

With the last rank of Colonel General, he has been a ret. D.

Even in retirement, he was still active as an advisor to the Belarusian President.

Honors (selection)

Bust of Pyotr Klimuk in Brest

as well as other awards from the Soviet Union, Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Bulgaria, France and Afghanistan

Private

Klimuk is married and has one child.

Web links

Commons : Piotr Klimuk  - Collection of Images