Oleg Grigoryevich Makarov

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Oleg Grigoryevich Makarov
Cosmonaut
Nationality Flag of the Soviet Union Soviet Union
Flag of Russia Russia
Born January 6, 1933
Udomlya, Russia
Died May 28, 2003
Moscow, Russia
Other occupation Engineer
Space time 20d 17h 20m
Selection Civilian Specialist Group 3
Missions Soyuz 27, Soyuz 12, Soyuz T-3

Oleg Grigoryevich Makarov (Russian: Оле́г Григо́рьевич Мака́ров) (January 6, 1933 – May 28, 2003) was a Soviet cosmonaut.

Makarov was born in Udomlya, Tver Oblast, USSR. He graduated from Bauman Moscow Higher Technical School in 1957 and started working at the Special Design Bureau Number One (which is now RSC Energia) as an engineer, working on the Vostok spacecraft. In 1966, he was selected for cosmonaut training.

At first he did work on the Soviet lunar program and was training with Aleksei Leonov for a circumlunar flight. After the success of Apollo 8, however, the flight was cancelled.

His first spaceflight was Soyuz 12 in 1973, a test flight to check the changes made to the Soyuz spacecraft after the Soyuz 11 disaster. His second flight was the abortive Soyuz 18a that made an emergency landing in the Altay Mountains, 21 minutes after launch. With his third launch on Soyuz 27 he flew to space station Salyut 6 and landed five days later with the Soyuz 26 spacecraft. His last mission was Soyuz T-3, during which several repairs on Salyut 6 were done. He was also in backup crews for Soyuz 17 and Soyuz T-2. Altogether he spent 20 days, 17 hours, and 44 minutes in space.

After his final spaceflight he continued to work for Energia, both in the Mir space station program as well as the Energia-Buran development.

Among other decorations he received the title of Hero of the Soviet Union twice, and the Order of Lenin four times.

He died in Moscow, Russia, in 2003 from a heart attack.