[FPSPACE] No money to put astronauts back on Moon by 2020; Moonnot a rea...

[Chris Jones]

David Portree wrote:

> Probably the USSR could launch two (or more?) Vostok or 
> Vostok-equivalent (spy satellite) spacecraft on need before 1962; but 
> one could not rescue the other, because they could not rendezvous and 
> keep station, let alone dock. That capability did not emerge in the US 
> program until 1965. The US did the world's first prox ops. The USSR 
> program demonstrated that capability a couple of years later when it 
> brought together a pair of automated Soyuz spacecraft (I forget the 
> Cosmos number).

Kosmos 186 and Kosmos 188.

> A rescue capability existed for Skylab, though it was not demonstrated. 
> The USSR demonstrated a rescue capability for the Salyuts; I'm straining 
> my memory here, but I seem to recall that they sent up an unmanned 
> replacement Soyuz during Salyut 6 or 7, in the late 1970s/early 1980s. 

Soyuz 34 was launched without a crew after Soyuz 33 suffered an engine
failure in its docking attempt with the Salyut 6 station.  Soyuz 33 (an
Interkosmos mission carrying a Bulgarian cosmonaut) returned to earth using
its backup engine, but concern that Soyuz 32, docked at Salyut 6, might
have a similar engine problem led to the unmanned launch.  After docking
at Salyut 6, Soyuz 32 returned without a crew and Soyuz 32 was used to
return the crew which had been launched on it.