[FPSPACE] VOSKHOD 2 EVA REVELATIONS

[spacefan]

Thanks Jim

I did see this, but I guess that when they said there would be
"unknown details", I had hoped for fresh revelations rather than yet
another rehash of old stuff.

Oh Well.....


On Sun, 20 Mar 2005 06:55:10 -0600, Jim Oberg <joberg at houston.rr.com> wrote:
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> Wrom: JSNBOHMKHJYFMYXOEAIJJPHSCRTNHGSWZIDREX
> Sent: Sunday, March 20, 2005 2:47 AM
> Subject: [FPSPACE] VOSKHOD 2 EVA REVELATIONS
> > Does anyone know what Alexei said?  Interested to know about the
> > "unknown details"
> > _______________________________________________
> 
> It was also on Novosti:
> 
> 2005-03-18 09:54     * RUSSIA MARKS FIRST SPACE WALK ANNIVERSARY
> 
>     MOSCOW, March 18 (RIA Novosti) - Soviet pilot-cosmonaut Alexei Leonov
> performed the first space walk in history exactly 40 years ago.
> 
>     Alexei Leonov and mission commander Pavel Belyayev flew aboard the
> Voskhod-2 spacecraft. In his written report to state-commission members
> (that was submitted after the flight), Alexei Leonov noted that all
> Voskhod-2 EVA (Extra-Vehicular Activity)-control systems and the space
> suit's autonomous systems had functioned without a hitch. According to
> Leonov, he had spent 23 minutes and 41 seconds in outer space, floating
> freely for 12 minutes and nine seconds.
> 
>     I moved 5.35 meters away from the spacecraft, Leonov wrote. He
> approached the Voskhod-2 several times, subsequently moving away from it.
> 
>     In Leonov's words, space walks are quite feasible. Nor should man
> perceive them as something mysterious, Leonov noted. A cosmonaut wearing a
> special space suit replete with life-support systems can exist in outer
> space, performing purposeful and coordinated operations. One can perform
> manual work in outer space, conducting research, too, Leonov added.
> 
>     Leonov admitted later on that he and Belyayev had faced emergency
> situations more than once during their flight. Temperature-and-humidity
> levels increased considerably during the 26-hour space mission. Space-suit
> systems also developed a malfunction. Internal pressure rose, inflating the
> space suit. Consequently, Leonov faced numerous problems, while re-entering
> the rather narrow Voskhod-2 airlock. The spacecraft's guidance system was
> not up to the mark either. The descent module therefore had to land in the
> manual mode. And, finally, Alexei Leonov and Pavel Belyayev landed in the
> Perm region's Usolye district, rather than in a preset area. Both men had to
> spend nearly 24 hours in snow-bound taiga, before they were rescued.
> 
> 2005-03-18 19:32     * SPACE WALKS ROUTINE FORTY YEARS ON
> 
>     MOSCOW. (Yuri Zaitsev, expert, Institute of Space Research, for RIA
> Novosti). Forty years ago to this day, a man first walked in space after
> stepping out of the Voskhod-2 craft piloted by cosmonauts Pavel Belyayev and
> Alexei Leonov.
> 
>     "When flying in space, you cannot avoid stepping into it, just like, for
> example, when you are sailing across the oceans, you cannot be afraid of
> falling overboard and learning how to swim ... A cosmonaut venturing out
> into space should be able to do all the necessary maintenance work (...).
> This is no fantasy, it is a necessity, and the more people go up into space,
> the more they will feel this need." These words from a space legend, chief
> designer of Soviet space rockets Sergei Korolyov, were prophetic.
> 
>     Today, space walks are a regular occurrence. The creation and
> maintenance of the International Space Station would have been impossible
> without long walks and work in space - specialists call it extravehicular
> activity.
> 
>     Since manned space exploration began, 240 space walks have been made
> (March 1, 2005 data). And if the first hundred of them took 27 years to
> perform, the second required only nine years. How were things forty years
> ago? In the second circuit of orbital flight Alexei Leonov, wearing a
> special spacesuit, stepped through a lock chamber into deep space.
> 
>     Five times the cosmonaut flew away from the ship and five times got
> back. All this time his spacesuit maintained room temperature within, while
> its external surface heated up to plus 60 degrees in the Sun, and cooled
> down to minus 100 degrees in the shade. In effect, the spacesuit was a kind
> of thermos consisting of several layers of aluminum-covered plastic film.
> Linings from screen-and-vacuum thermal insulation were also inserted in his
> gloves and footwear. True, the suit for space walks, compared with ones worn
> by cosmonauts during their early missions was now much heavier - 100
> kilograms - compared with 30, but in zero gravity that played no role.
> Leonov performed all his movements relatively easily, and, with arms wide
> open, he hovered above the Earth in a vacuum.
> 
>     Problems began when the command to return came in. It proved to be a
> difficult exercise, as the spacesuit had become swollen in the outside
> vacuum. That was to be expected, but no one thought it would balloon to such
> an extent. Leonov just could not get into the lock hatch. Attempt followed
> attempt, but to no avail, while the oxygen supplies in the spacesuit (two
> 2-liter bottles) were calculated only for 20 minutes. True, in case of
> emergency, the lock was provided with a stand-by oxygen system linked by a
> hose to the spacesuit. But the time for a command to jettison the chamber
> was approaching rapidly after which the cosmonaut could practically never
> get back into the craft.
> 
>     In the end, after consulting with Belyayev, Leonov made an unorthodox
> decision. He bled the inside pressure in the spacesuit to the maximum and
> contrary to his instructions to enter the chamber and further the ship feet
> first, he "swam inside" headfirst and, fortunately, managed to do so.
> 
>     This was the result of grueling pre-flight training and the optimum
> selection of crewmembers. Many experts believed that someone devoid of a
> customary fulcrum could not perform a single movement outside the ship.
> Others thought that the infiniteness of space would strike such a fear into
> the cosmonaut's heart that he would not be able to detach himself from the
> craft at all. There were also fears for his psychological state. "If it
> becomes difficult, make decisions depending on the situation," Korolyov
> advised the cosmonauts before the blast-off. In the extreme case, the crew
> was allowed to "limit themselves to opening the hatch and ... sticking a
> hand outside."
> 
>     They looked to the Voskhod-2 crew to show particular teamwork and
> coordination, complete understanding, trust, and confidence in each other.
> So when the duties were assigned, account was taken of not so much of
> professional training as of individual psychological qualities.
> 
>     Psychologists said that Belyayev had willpower and self-control, which
> enabled him to keep his head in the most complex situations, logical
> thinking, and was determined when it came to overcoming difficulties and
> achieving tasks. Leonov was impetuous, courageous and determined, and was
> able to explode into activity on the slightest provocation. These two so
> dissimilar men complemented each other perfectly and formed, as the
> psychologists said, a "highly compatible group", which was able to
> successfully carry out the difficult program envisaging the first walk in
> deep space.
> 
>     The Americans, too, planned a space walk and hoped to be first. Edward
> White, a U.S. air force test pilot, was groomed for the mission.
> 
>     News of the Soviet space walk was received in the U.S. as another
> challenge. It was an era of open rivalry in space between the two
> superpowers, and American experts stepped up their efforts drastically.
> White was originally to have only taken a peep out of the craft's hatch. But
> following Leonov's flight, the program was altered literally on the fly.
> 
>     The upcoming flight with a space walk by an astronaut was announced by
> NASA on May 25, 1965, i.e., just over two months after the Belyayev-Leonov
> mission, and on June 3 the Gemini-4 spacecraft lifted off, carrying the
> astronauts James McDivitt and Edward White.
> 
>     Since the Gemini, as distinct from the Voskhod, had no lock chamber, the
> astronauts let out the air from the cabin and opened the access hatch. White
> pushed himself from the craft and "swam out" into space. He was linked with
> the ship by a gilded lifeline 7.6 meters long. The same line was supplying
> the oxygen for breathing. White spent 22 minutes outside the ship.
> 
>     In the forty years of extra-vehicular activities, the duration of a
> space walk has grown from 12 minutes (Alexei Leonov on March 18, 1965) to
> nine hours (James Shelton Voss and Susan Jane Helms who left the American
> shuttle Discovery on March 11, 2001 to work on the ISS). The first woman to
> make a space walk was Svetlana Savitskaya on July 25, 1984. Anatoly Solovyov
> has performed the most walks. He is credited with 16, spending a total of 78
> hours and 32 minutes in space. Sergei Avdeyev made 10 walks totaling 42
> hours. Jerry Ross leads the Americans with nine walks and 58 hours in space.
> 
> 2005-03-18 23:10     * NO OTHER INTELLIGENT FORMS OF LIFE IN SOLAR SYSTEM,
> SAYS COSMONAUT
> 
>     MOSCOW, March 18 (RIA Novosti) - Terrestrial is the only intelligent
> life throughout the solar system. Alexei Leonov, the world's first to emerge
> into the open space, forty years ago, is positive on that point.
> 
>     "The people of Earth have a dream to meet someone outside our planet.
> Alas, that's an ungrounded desire. I know what I say," he remarked to a news
> conference on his sensational venture jubilee.
> 
>     "I led an expert commission that was delving into extraordinary events
> in space, and we never came on a single reliable instance-I swear."
> 
>     The Russian cosmonaut offered newsmen a retrospect of unusual celestial
> objects seen on Earth. He regards some as due to weather, others to space
> rocket launches. Their exhaust fumes often take bizarre shapes in the upper
> atmospheric layers. "Thus, many saw crosses, with huge rings round them,
> staying long in the sky, especially on fine cold weather. That was so near
> the Plesetsk space center, in the Saratov Region, and in the Baikonur space
> center, after Soyuz booster rockets were launched. Many people saw them, and
> thought they were UFOs. That was how myth-making started.
> 
>     "No one in the whole wide world, for that matter, has ever made a
> photograph in which something would clearly show that we could assuredly
> qualify as an UFO.
> 
>     "Besides, no shots are coming up now that almost all have mobile phones
> with a camera built in-just why?" reasoned Leonov.
> 
>