On December 25, 1991, Gorbachev announced his resignation as president. For a time, the Soviet Union, once a world power, was torn apart. The 15 participating countries were doing their best to strive for more benefits for their countries. However, while the war was fierce on the ground, few people paid attention to an astronaut "floating" in the space station tens of thousands of meters in the air.
His name is Sergey Konstantinovich Krikalev . He was born in Leningrad in 1958. After graduating from the Leningrad Mechanical Institute at the age of 23, he has been working at the Korolev Energy and Space Group. His main task is to test the performance of various space flight equipment. In 1985, Krikalev was elected as a Soviet cosmonaut and began to receive professional training. Three years later, he took the Soyuz TM-7 spacecraft and went to the Mir space station to perform a mission. On April 27, 1989, Krikalev, who had stayed at the Mir space station for 115 days, returned to Earth with another astronaut and successfully completed his first space journey.
In the spring of 1991, Krikalev, already a veteran astronaut, went to the space station for the second time. This time, in addition to him, there were Soviet astronaut Anatoly Artzbarsky and British astronaut Helen Sharman. However, although they went together, their missions were different. Krikalev and Artzbarsky were the previous astronauts who replaced the space station, and Helen, as the first British astronaut, was tasked with conducting some life science experiments. Eight days later, Helen and the previous batch of astronauts returned to Earth, leaving only Krikalev and Artzbarsky to inspect and adjust the instruments in the space station. Five months later, Artzbarsky also returned home. Although Krikalev seemed a little lonely, he didn't mind it at all. After all, he was used to this kind of work.
But he never imagined that this would be the longest mission in his astronaut career.
At this time, the Soviet Union was experiencing an unprecedented political turmoil: starting from an unsuccessful coup led by Defense Minister Yazov and other senior officials on August 19, in just 4 months, the Soviet Union was divided into 15 independent countries. As a result, the Soviet space program appeared to be in jeopardy. After the disintegration, Kazakhstan alone occupied the space rocket launch site and demanded high site usage fees from the Russian Federation, the sole successor to the Soviet Union.
But at that time, Russia's economy was on the verge of collapse, and they could only raise funds by selling the location of the Mir space station: a Japanese TV station spent US$12 million to send a reporter into space; Austria spent US$7 million to send its own astronauts into space. In addition, Russia and Kazakhstan reached an agreement to send Kazakhstan's first astronaut into space, but Russia must have a launch license from the launch site. In this way, the above three people were sent into space one after another and completed their respective missions. Some people may ask, wouldn't it be enough if they just replace Krikalev?
But the fact is not simple. One of the two astronauts is a Kazakhstan and the other is an Austrian. They are not qualified to replace Krikalev. In this way, under the complicated environment, Krikalev had no choice but to continue to stay at the space station .
At that time, some Russian newspapers and periodicals were also full of sympathy for Krikalev: Human beings send their children into space to complete various tasks. But just after he (Krikalev) left the earth, humans lost interest in these missions, so he was left there (the space station).
While Krikalev was stranded on the space station, he only had one chance a week to talk to his wife, who worked in the ground control center. Other than that, he could only face various cold machines. NASA was deeply sympathetic. During a space exploration, American astronauts specially sent him various living supplies. At this time, Russia, which was in chaos, also tried to negotiate with the United States, hoping that the latter could acquire the Mir space station, but the United States did not agree.
In this way, Krikalev survived day after day. Until March 25, 1992, Krikalev, who had been "floating" in space for 311 days, finally waited for the news of returning home. However, when he landed and exited the cabin, everything in front of him seemed a bit strange: the president had changed, and his hometown Leningrad was also renamed St. Petersburg . He was still a Soviet before departure, and he was a Russian when he returned.
Because of this, the media also nicknamed Krikalev "the last Soviet".
However, despite a special journey into space. But Krikalev's enthusiasm for his work has not diminished. Since Russia and the United States implemented space cooperation in October 1992, Krikalev has flown to space many times. Until 2005, he became the 11th director of the International Space Station , completing his mission outstandingly. After returning to Earth, due to various problems such as age and health, Krikalev chose to retire and began to participate in various aerospace activities behind the scenes. It is worth mentioning that Krikalev’s cumulative stay in space reached 803 days, 9 hours and 39 minutes. This record has not yet been broken.
