Svetlana Evgenevna Savitskaya

Svetlana Savitskaya
Svetlana Savitskaya, 2014
Country:	USSR
selected on	July 30, 1980
Calls:	2 space flights
Start of the first space flight:	19th August 1982
Landing of the last space flight:	July 29, 1984
Time in space:	19 d 17 h 6 min
EVA inserts:	1
EVA total duration:	3 h 35 min
retired on	October 27, 1993
Space flights
Soyuz T-7 / Soyuz T-5 (1982) Salyut 7 EP-2 Soyuz T-12 / Soyuz T-11 (1984) Salyut 7 EP-4

Svetlana Savitskaya ( Russian Светлана Евгеньевна Савицкая , scientific transliteration Svetlana Evgen'evna Savickaja *  8. August 1948 in Moscow ) is a former Soviet test pilot and cosmonaut . She was the second woman in space after Valentina Tereschkowa and the first to go into space . Between 1974 and 1981 she also set several world records as a pilot recognized by the international air sports association FAI.

education

Svetlana Savitskaya was born into a privileged family. Her father Yevgeny Savitsky was a highly decorated fighter pilot in World War II, who later made it to the position of Deputy Commander in Chief of the Soviet Air Defense .

Without her parents' knowledge, Zavitskaya began skydiving at the age of 16. When her father found out about it, he furthered this tendency. By her seventeenth birthday, she had already made 450 parachute jumps. In the course of the next year she performed two record stratospheric jumps from 14,250 m and 13,800 m respectively.

After graduating from school in 1966, she enrolled in the Moscow State Aviation Institute (MAI), where she also took flight lessons; In 1971 she acquired her license as a flight instructor. After graduating from MAI, she went to training as a test pilot at the Mikhail Gromov University for Flight Research (LII) in Zhukovsky in 1972 . She achieved this degree in 1976.

From May 1978 to June 1981 she worked as a test pilot for the aircraft manufacturer Jakowlew .

Since 1969 she was a member of the Soviet national team for aerobatics . In July 1970 she surprisingly became world champion in aerobatics in the British city ​​of Hullavington with a Jakowlew Jak-18 . At the 1972 World Championships in Salon she was third, in 1976 in Kiev with a Jakowlew Jak-50 fifth. In 1977 she left the national aerobatic team.

Space activity

Postage stamp for Mission Salyut 7 EP-2

From 1979 Savitskaya took part in the selection process for the second group of female cosmonauts. On June 30, 1980, she was officially accepted into the cosmonaut group. She passed her exam on February 24, 1982.

First flight: Soyuz T-7 / T-5

From December 1981 Savitskaya prepared for her first space flight, a short-term flight to the Salyut 7 space station , during which the long-term crew Salyut 7 EO-1 was to be replaced. The commander of this mission was Leonid Popov on his third flight, and Alexander Serebrov , who, like Savitskaya, was a space novice, was nominated as flight engineer .

The launch of Soyuz T-7 took place on 19 August 1982. This Sawizkaja became the second woman in space, 19 years after Valentina Tereshkova . The three cosmonauts docked with the space station the following day and were greeted there by Anatoly Berezovoy and Valentin Lebedew . This was the first time a space station had a mixed-sex crew. Savitskaya was assigned the Soyuz T-7 orbital module as a private area, but slept like the men in the space station. On August 27, 1982, Popov, Savitskaya, and Serebrov returned to Earth in Soyuz T-5 .

Second flight: Soyuz T-12

Postage stamp for the Salyut-7 / Soyuz-T-12 mission

In May 1983 Savitskaya moved to NPO Energija . In December 1983 she was assigned to her second flight. Again it was to be a short-term mission to Salyut 7, this time urgently needed tools had to be brought to the station so that the third long-term crew Salyut 7 EO-3 could repair a fuel line.

On July 17, 1984, Zavitskaya took off on board the Soyuz T-12 together with commander Vladimir Dzhanibekov and research cosmonaut Igor Wolk . In the space station they met Leonid Kisim , Vladimir Solovyov and Oleg Atkow . On July 25, 1984, Savitskaya conducted the first woman's space exit . Together with Dschanibekow, she tested new tools and processes for coating, cutting and welding materials under space conditions.

The return to earth took place on July 29, 1984.

Possible third space flight

From December 1984 Savitskaya prepared for another space flight, which should consist only of women under her command. The other crew members were the doctor Jelena Dobrokwaschina and the engineer Jekaterina Ivanovna .

In February 1985, however, radio contact with Salyut 7 was lost and the space station could only be saved by a complex operation in the summer of 1985 (Mission Salyut 7 EO-4 ). When the next mission had to be canceled in November 1985 due to the illness of the commander Vasyutin , the women's flight was finally canceled. In addition, the problem had existed that after two unsuccessful flights in 1983 ( Soyuz T-8 and Soyuz T-10-1 ) there were not enough Soyuz spaceships available.

Later it would have been possible to fly to the new Mir space station in a Soyuz-TM spacecraft . However, due to Sawitskaja's pregnancy in 1986, this plan was not pursued any further.

Subsequent activities

In February 1986, Zavitskaya graduated from the Moscow State Technical University Bauman in engineering sciences .

On October 27, 1993 Savitskaya resigned from the cosmonaut corps and became deputy head of the NPO Energija.

In 1994/95 she worked as an assistant professor in the field of economics and investment at the Moscow State Aviation Institute.

From March 1989 Savitskaya was a member of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. After the collapse of the Soviet Union , she ran unsuccessfully in the first elections to the Russian Duma in 1993 . In the next elections in 1995, however, she was able to prevail and was a member of the State Duma until 2019. She participated in 47 drafts and amendments. She stood for the Communist Party of the Russian Federation .

FAI world records

Svetlana Savitskaya set the following women's world records, which were officially recognized by the FAI , the international world air sports association . In total, Svetlana Savittskaya broke 17 world records, including 3 with a parachute.

date	class	discipline	plane	Result	Record broken
June 6, 1974	Turbo jet	Climb to 6000 m	MiG E-33	1: 20.4 min	-
June 6, 1974	Turbo jet	Climb to 9000 m	MiG E-33	1: 46.7 min	-
June 7th 1974	Turbo jet	Climb to 12,000 m	MiG E-33	2: 35.1 min	-
June 7th 1974	Turbo jet	Climb to 3000 m	MiG E-33	0: 59.1 min	-
15th November 1974	Rocket plane	Climb to 12,000 m	MiG E-66B	1: 59.3 min	-
15th November 1974	Rocket plane	Climb to 3000 m	MiG E-66B	0: 41.2 min	-
15th November 1974	Rocket plane	Climb to 9000 m	MiG E-66B	1:21 min	-
2nd June 1975	Turbo jet	Speed ​​over 15/25 km	MiG-25 (Je-266)	2683.45 km / h
August 31, 1977	Turbo jet	Height in level flight	MiG-25 (Je-266)	21,209.9 m	-
October 21, 1977	Turbo jet	Speed ​​on a circuit of 500 km	MiG-25 (Je-266)	2466.31 km / h	-
April 12, 1978	Turbo jet	Speed ​​on a circuit of 1000 km	MiG-25 (Je-266)	2333 km / h	-
17th January 1979	Internal combustion engine	Climb to 3000 m	Jak-50	4: 21.4 min	-
April 23, 1981	Turbo-Jet, takeoff weight 16–20 t	Payload at an altitude of 2000 m	Jak-40K	5012 kg	-
April 24, 1981	Turbo-Jet, takeoff weight 12–16 t	Payload at an altitude of 2000 m	Jak-40K	4084 kg	-

Honors

Savitskaya is the only woman who has twice become Hero of the Soviet Union (August 27, 1982 and July 29, 1984). She is also a two-time holder of the Order of Lenin . The Soviet astronomer Lyudmyla Shuravlowa named each asteroid she discovered after Savitskaya (4118) Sveta and her father (4303) Savitsky .

Private

Svetlana Zavitskaya is married and has one child. In 1988 she published her memoir “Вчера и всегда” (“Yesterday and Always”).

See also

• List of spacemen
• Valentina Vladimirovna Tereshkova (first female cosmonaut)
• Jelena Vladimirovna Kondakova (third cosmonaut)

Web links

Commons : Svetlana Yevgenevna Savitskaya  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Short biography on spacefacts.de
• Savitskaya, Svetlana Yevgeniyevna in the Encyclopedia Astronautica (English)
• Biography with a photo of the space exit on great.russian-women.net (English)
• Biography on warheroes.ru (Russian)
• Excerpt from her memoirs (Russian)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Wilfried Copenhagen: Encyclopedia Soviet aviation. (Reprint) Elbe-Dnjepr-Verlag, Klitzschen 2007, ISBN 978-3-933395-90-0 , p. 235 f.
2. ↑ Aviation Review. No. 3/1983, p. 102
3. ↑ World Aerobatic Championships 07/13/1970 - 07/26/1970 Women's Results . Retrieved on July 7, 2009 from the website of the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale (no longer available online).
4. ↑ 7th FAI World Aerobatic Championships 18/07/1972 - 31/07/1972 Women's Results . Retrieved on July 7, 2009 from the website of the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale (no longer available online).
5. ↑ 8th FAI World Aerobatic Championships 23/07/1976 - 05/08/1976 Women's Results. Retrieved on July 7, 2009 from the website of the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale (no longer available online).
6. ↑ Официальный сайт Государственной Думы Федерального Собрания Российской Федерации. Retrieved July 20, 2020 . 
7. ^ Aviation and Space World Records. Retrieved on July 7, 2009 from the website of the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale (no longer available online).