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Soyuz 7K-T No. 61

INSIDER CONTENT

Soyuz-14

The Soviet military crew fails to reach its orbital post

On Aug. 26, 1974, the USSR launched the second expedition to the Almaz OPS-2 military space station, operating in Earth's orbit under the cover name Salyut-3. However, commander Gennady Sarafanov and flight engineer Lev Demin failed to dock their Soyuz-15 spacecraft to the outpost, narrowly avoiding a high-speed collision. The crew then urgently headed home after just two days in orbit.

Soyuz-15 mission at a glance:

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Vehicle 7K-T No. 63 prepares for launch

After the mostly successful work of the first crew aboard the Almaz OPS-2 (Salyut-3) space station in July 1974, Soviet specialists in Tyuratam launch site performed a quick turnaround for another expedition to the first functioning Soviet military outpost in orbit. On Aug. 6, 1974, the State Commission that oversaw the Almaz operations sent a letter to the Central Committee of the Communist Party on the status of the project. The document, signed by the commission chairman Mikhail Grigoriev, reported that during its meeting on August 2, its members had confirmed normal operation of all systems aboard Salyut-3 and its readiness to receive a second crew. The launch of the Soyuz 7K-T No. 63 crew vehicle was set for Aug. 23, 1974, and its return was scheduled for Sept. 18, 1974, after 26 days in space. (1059)

According to an established tradition, it was the turn of the backup crew to the previous expedition to fly, meaning that Boris Volynov, a decorated veteran of the Soyuz-4 and -5 docking mission, and Vitaly Zholobov would be on the second crew heading to Almaz OPS-2. However, near the end of the Soyuz-14 mission in mid-July 1974, the program management broke the news to Volynov and Zholobov that their next-in-line rookie colleagues in the Almaz cosmonaut group — Gennady Sarafanov and Lev Demin — would be launching next. The officials tried to somewhat clumsily explain this away, holding Volynov's "stronger" (hence more experienced) crew for the subsequent manning of the follow-on Almaz OPS-3 station, then still months if not years away from launch.

With his prestige on the line, Volynov displayed a rare insubordination by refusing to back up Sarafanov. Immediately after completion of his routine duties monitoring the Soyuz-14 flight at mission control, Volynov departed for a vacation. Undeterred, the State Commission named Sarafanov and Demin as the primary crew, while substituting Volynov and Zholobov with the next pair in the Almaz group — Vechaslav Zudov and Valery Rozhdestvensky, as a backup crew. (231)

The decision was formally sealed at the State Commission meeting at the Kosmonavt hotel at Site 17 in Tyuratam on Aug. 22, 1974, formally appointing Lt. Colonel Georgy Sarafanov as Commander and Colonel-Engineer Lev Demin as a Flight Engineer of the upcoming mission. The crew adopted the call sign "Dunai" (Danube) for its radio communications. At the same time, Lt. Colonel Vechaslav Zudov and Lt. Colonel-Engineer Valery Rozhdestvensky were appointed as the Commander and the Flight Engineer, respectively, on the backup crew.

On the same day, the commission received a report from Vladimir Sachkov, a representative of the engineering team at the TSKBM design bureau, that one of the attitude control thrusters, DMS, aboard OPS-2 had experienced a fall in temperature down to –45C degrees, forcing the switch to a backup manifold feeding the engines and requiring a re-test of the propulsion system. As a result, the commission canceled the upcoming fueling of the launch vehicle with the crew vehicle and postponed the August 23 liftoff.

The next day, the commission delegated Vladimir Chelomei, the head of TsKBM design bureau, to form two investigative teams — one at his bureau campus in Reutov near Moscow and one at the NIP-16 ground station in Crimea, which served as the nerve center for Soviet space station missions at the time. The groups were given until August 25 to report their findings to the commission.

The subsequent analysis showed that the DMS thruster failure had been caused by a breach in the membrane controlling a gymbal mechanism in the engine's valve. Citing the flawless operation of multiple identical engines aboard the OPS-2 during the previous two months, some of which functioned three times longer than the affected mechanism, the specialists deemed the failure as uncommon. Also, the specialists stressed that a backup manifold of the attitude control system provided reliable propellant feed for the attitude control of the station. As a last resort, the precise orientation of the Almaz in orbit could be performed for at least 15 days with the help of an experimental Electric Pneumatic System, EPU (from the Russian Elektro-Pnevmaticheskaya Ustanovka).

Encouraged by these findings, Chelomei sent a telegram to Sergei Afanasiev, Head of Ministry of General Machine Building, MOM, and to the State Commission head Mikhail Grigoriev on Aug. 24, 1974: "In accordance with previously issued conclusions, the Almaz No. 0101-2 is ready for docking with the Soyuz-15 spacecraft and for the joint flight with the crew, assuming the launch of the Soyuz-15 spacecraft on August 26 of this year." (1059)

Soyuz-15 lifts off

Western observers noticed that between Aug. 22 and 24, 1974, Salyut-3 had made a small unannounced orbit correction. Such maneuvers are often done to facilitate a rendezvous of a station with an upcoming launch. (50)

Sure enough, after a three-day delay, the Soyuz 7K-T No. 63 spacecraft lifted off from Site 1 in Tyuratam on Aug. 26, 1974, at 22:58:05 Moscow Time.

The mission was publicly announced as Soyuz-15 and, significantly for observers of the Soviet space space program, both members of the fresh crew heading to Salyut-3 had military ranks, a detail first noticed with the Soyuz-14 crew makeup — another hint about the suspected military role of the latest Soviet space station, which was the assumed destination of the newly launched crew vehicle.

On August 27, Soviet media issued a seemingly routine update on the status of the mission, saying that after the orbital insertion of the Soyuz-15 spacecraft, the crew had begun implementing the flight program. By 17 hours on August 27, Soyuz-15 had completed 12 revolutions around the Earth. The orbit correction put the spacecraft into orbit with the following parameters:

• Maximum distance from Earth (in apogee) — 275 kilometers;
• Minimum distance — 254 kilometers;
• Orbital period — 89.6 minutes;
• Orbital inclination — 51.6 degrees.

It appeared that Soyuz-15 was on a two-day track to dock with Salyut-3, but, the latest official update issued on the morning of August 28, clearly contained half-truths and obfuscations, hinting some major problems with reaching the station:

"By 8 hours on August 28, the Soyuz-15 spacecraft had made 22 revolutions around the Earth. In the process of the flight, cosmonauts Sarafanov and Demin performed experiments on rehearsing techniques for piloting the spacecraft in various flight modes. The crew of the spacecraft performed multiple rendezvous of Soyuz-15 with Salyut-3 station, while monitoring the work of all spacecraft systems and phases of rendezvous with the station. During the maneuvers of rendezvous with the station, Gennady Sarafanov and Lev Demin performed an inspection of its exterior. After that, the crew was issued a command to prepare for the return to Earth. The Salyut-3 space station continued flight in automated mode according to the assigned program."

Another update said that "...until 16 hours on August 28, when the spacecraft was outside the zone of radio communications from the Soviet Territory, the cosmonauts rested. After the rest, information was sent onboard Soyuz-15 from mission control about the time for the activation of the propulsion unit for the descent of the spacecraft from orbit..."

The real story of the Soyuz-15 mission remained under wraps for decades beyond the obvious fact that the crew had failed to achieve docking with Salyut-3 and had to return to Earth prematurely.

Various post-Soviet sources provided some details on what had happened in orbit. On Aug. 27, 1974, Soyuz-15 apparently performed an automated rendezvous with the OPS-2, but during the final approach to the station from a distance of between 300 (78) or 350 meters (1059), the Igla ("needle") rendezvous system, failed to switch to the final-approach mode and, instead, started implementing a sequence which would be normally executed at a range of either three (78) or 20 kilometers from the station. (1059)

On commands from the Igla, the Soyuz fired its engines, accelerating itself in the direction of the station. The relative speed of the Soyuz-15 and OPS-2 reached 72 kilometers per hour (or 20 meters per second). (1059) Due to the fact that at a 20-kilometer distance, the rendezvous system tolerated deviation of the spacecraft from its target, Soyuz-15 zoomed by the station at a distance of just 40 meters, which, in case of a more accurate approach would likely result in a catastrophic collision. (78)

Because the crew apparently failed to realize the problem (and to shut down the Igla), the rendezvous system attempted to re-acquire radio-contact with the target and sent Soyuz-15 to the station two more times, every time narrowly avoiding a deadly crash. (52) "We are chasing it," Sarafanov radioed to the ground at the end of a communications session with the mission control, still clearly unaware of the situation. (1059)

Various sources credit either the crew (1059) or ground controllers (52) with finally turning off the "mad" Igla system, but, in any case, Soyuz-15 barely had enough propellant for the return to Earth after this wild ride. The State Commission canceled the docking with OPS-2 and ordered immediate preparations for landing. The deorbiting maneuver was initiated at 22:25 Moscow Time on August 28, sending the spacecraft to the first Soviet night landing, further complicated by rain in the touchdown area. (231)

As the Descent Module began the atmospheric reentry, fixed-wing aircraft of the search and rescue team circled the landing area, but stayed away from entering it to avoid a collision with the capsule in darkness. After the aircraft had picked up a radio beacon from the module, the planes began spiraling toward the projected touchdown point and transmitted its coordinates to recovery helicopters.

On Aug. 28, 1974, at 23:10:05 Moscow Time, the Descent Module of the Soyuz-15 spacecraft landed 48 kilometers southeast of Tselinograd after two days, 12 minutes and 11 seconds in flight.

At 23:11 Moscow Time, or within a minute after the Soyuz-15 touchdown, the first helicopter crew already reported seeing the capsule on the ground and just 17 minutes later, the rescue teams had already begun the extraction of the crew from the spacecraft.

Aftermath

On Aug. 30, 1974, or two days after the landing, the Military Industrial Commission, VPK, ordered the formation of a secret investigative commission to look into the mishap during the Soyuz-15 mission. It was chaired by the VPK member B.A. Komissarov, with Boris Balmont, from MOM, and Andrei Karas, from the Chief Directorate of Space Assets within the Ministry of Defense serving as the deputies. The commission also included leading industry managers V.S. Avduevsky, Georgy Beregovoi, Valentin Glushko, Aleksei Yeliseev, Gerbert Efremov, V.Ya. Likhushin, A.S. Mnatsakyan, Yuri Semenov, Gherman Titov, V.V. Favorsky, S.G. Frolov, Vladimir Chelomei, Boris Chertok, Vladimir Shatalov and A.I. Eidis.

Although the Igla-1 system was the unquestionable culprit in preventing the Soyuz-15 mission from achieving its mission objectives, flight control specialists also pointed the finger at the crew. Engineers argued that, it was impossible to foresee every contingency and that it was the cosmonauts' duty to quickly identify the problem relying on their instruments and visual observations and to switch off the automated system well before it took the ship on a near-suicidal ride not once, not twice but three times without any crew intervention. Not surprisingly, representatives of the cosmonaut training center involved in the investigation, defended their students by saying that they had never been warned about this type of scenario or its mitigation. (231)

Yuri Semenov, who then oversaw the development of the Soyuz spacecraft, delivered the final report on the causes of the Soyuz-15 docking failure on Sept. 18, 1974. According to the findings, the Igla-1 rendezvous radio system failed at a distance of 360 meters between the spacecraft and the station. The commission also noted that the design of the Igla system did not provide the necessary reliability and required considerable time for serious upgrades, precluding the further operation of the Salyut-3 space station with crews onboard. (1059)

Next chapter: Soyuz-16

The article by Anatoly Zak; Last update: December 2, 2024

Page editor: Alain Chabot; Last edit: August 26, 2024

All rights reserved

Gennady Sarafanov and Lev Demin during training at the Cosmonaut Training Center, TsPK. Click to enlarge.

Gennady Sarafanov and Lev Demin during training inside a simulator of Soyuz' Descent Module. Click to enlarge.

Gennady Sarafanov and Lev Demin during training inside a simulator of Soyuz' Habitation Module. Click to enlarge.

A Soviet stamp dedicated to the Soyuz-15 mission.