Alexey Leonov

Alexey Arkhipovich Leonov
Cosmonaut.
The first human to conduct a space walk.
Nationality Russian
Status Retired
Born 30 May 1934 (1934-05-30) (age 76)
Listvyanka, Kemerovo Oblast, USSR
Other occupation Fighter pilot, Cosmonaut
Rank General, Soviet Air Force
Time in space 7d 00h 32 m
Selection Air Force Group 1
Total EVAs 1
Total EVA time 12 minutes
Missions Voskhod 2, Soyuz 19
Mission insignia
Voskhod2patch.png Astp-S75-20361.jpg

Alexey Arkhipovich Leonov (Russian: Алексе́й Архи́пович Лео́нов) (born 30 May 1934 in Listvyanka, Kemerovo Oblast, Soviet Union) is a retired Soviet/Russian cosmonaut and Air Force General who, on 18 March 1965, became the first human to conduct a space walk.

Contents

Biography

Leonov's Near the Moon (1967)
Aleksei Leonov exited VOSKHOD-2 and made the First Walk in Open Space on 18 March 1965

Leonov was one of the twenty air force pilots selected to be part of the first cosmonaut group in 1960. As all the Soviet cosmonauts Leonov was a member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. His spacewalk was originally to have taken place on the Vostok 11 mission, but this was cancelled, and the historic event happened on the Voskhod 2 flight instead. He was outside the spacecraft for 12 minutes and nine seconds on 18 March 1965, connected to the craft by a 5.35 meter tether. At the end of the spacewalk, Leonov's spacesuit had inflated in the vacuum of space to the point where he could not re-enter the airlock. He opened a valve to allow some of the suit's pressure to bleed off, and was barely able to get back inside the capsule. Leonov had spent some eighteen months undergoing intense weightlessness training for the mission.

In 1968, Leonov was selected to be commander of a circumlunar Soyuz flight. However as all unmanned test flights of this project failed, and the Apollo 8 mission already gave that point in the Space Race to the USA, the flight was canceled. He was also selected to be the first Soviet person to land on the Moon, aboard the LOK/N1 spacecraft. This project was also canceled. (Incidentally, the design required a risky spacewalk between lunar vehicles, something that contributed to his selection). Leonov was to have been commander of the ill-fated 1971 Soyuz 11 mission to Salyut 1, the first manned space station, but his crew was replaced with the backup after Cosmonaut Valery Kubasov was suspected to have tuberculosis.

Leonov was to have commanded the next mission to Salyut 1, but this was scrapped after the deaths of the Soyuz 11 crew members, and the space station was lost. The next two Salyuts (actually the military Almaz station) were lost at launch or failed soon after, and Leonov's crew stood by. By the time Salyut 4 reached orbit Leonov had been switched to a more prestigious project.

Leonov's second trip into space was similarly significant—he commanded the Soviet side of the Apollo-Soyuz mission, Soyuz 19, the first joint space mission between the Soviet Union and the United States.

From 1976 to 1982, Leonov was the commander of the cosmonaut team ("Chief Cosmonaut"), and deputy director of the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center, where he oversaw crew training. He also edited the cosmonaut newsletter "Neptune". He retired in 1991.

Leonov is an accomplished artist whose published books include albums of his artistic works and works he did in collaboration with his friend Andrei Sokolov. Leonov has taken colored pencils and paper into space, where he has sketched the Earth and drawn portraits of the Apollo astronauts who flew with him during the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project.[1] Arthur C. Clarke writes in his note to 2010: Odyssey Two that, after a 1968 screening of 2001: A Space Odyssey, Leonov pointed out to him that the alignment of the Moon, Earth, and Sun shown in the opening is essentially the same as that in Leonov's 1967 painting Near the Moon, although the painting's diagonal framing of the scene was not replicated in the film. Clarke kept the autographed sketch of this painting, which Leonov made after the screening, hanging on his office wall.[2]

In 2001, he was a vice president of Moscow-based Alfa Bank and an advisor to the first deputy of the Board.[3]

In 2004, he and former American astronaut David Scott began work on a dual biography / history of the Space Race between the United States and the Soviet Union. The book, "Two Sides of the Moon: Our Story of the Cold War Space Race" was published in 2006. Neil Armstrong and Tom Hanks both wrote introductions to the book.

Leonov was also a contributor to the 2007 book "Into That Silent Sea" by Colin Burgess and Francis French, which describes his life and space career.

Trivia

Monument of Alexey Leonov on Cosmonauts Alley in Moscow

Stamps

Alexey Leonov on Soviet Union 1965 Stamp 10 kopeks

1965

1966

1967

1969:

1972

Notes

  1. ↑ "Alexei Leonov: winner of the 2005 IAAA Lucien Rudaux Memorial Award". http://www.iaaa.org/gallery/rudaux/. Retrieved 2007-07-02. 
  2. ↑ Clarke, 2010: Odyssey Two, Author's Note, pp. xvii-xviii. Clarke describes the painting itself on page 76. (ISBN 0-345-41397-0)
  3. ↑ "Aleksei Leonov and Alexander Gafin become members of the American Pushkin Academy of Art". 2001-02-23. http://www.alfa-bank.com/media/news/2001/02/23/. Retrieved 2007-07-08. 

References

Russian title: Ждите Нас, Звезды.
Text and captions in Russian and English; table of contents is in English.
Album of space art.

External links