We closed the hatch between the work compartment and the transfer compartment of the station, sat down for the road as tradition requires, turned off the lights, and moved into the ship. The indicator “Transfer compartment hatch open” isn’t lit for some reason. Fine, we’ll look into it later.
We sent the command to close the station’s hatch. We watch from the ship as it closes. Closed. We close our own hatch, but with both hatches closed, the “Transfer compartment hatch closed” indicator hasn’t lit up either. We enter the communication session and report to the ground, but they confirm the hatches are closed and give the command to proceed with leak-checking the docking assembly — that is, to vent pressure from the cavity between the two hatch covers. We monitor the pressure drop in the docking assembly; when it reached zero, we switched to monitoring pressure in the station. The marker on the video display is steady. Just as we were about to switch to monitoring docking assembly pressure, the marker suddenly dropped by 40 mm. What on earth — where is a station depressurization coming from? We decided to wait — another drop. We quickly closed the pressure-vent valve on the docking assembly. The pressure drop stopped. Something wrong with the station’s hatch? We went to inspect it, first equalizing pressure between the ship, the docking assembly, and the station. We open the ship’s hatch — and it won’t budge, suction is holding it. The two of us pulled, bracing our feet, and got it open.
We see the station’s hatch isn’t fully closed. We jiggled it — it wobbles. We tried to open it with the wrench, but the wrench doesn’t fit; the extension won’t reach because of the adapter ring on the docking assembly, which had been installed to receive the next-generation spacecraft (“Cosmos-1443”) after us. What to do? I quickly send the hatch-open command from the ship’s control panel. It turned out that after the adapter was installed, the spring force was insufficient to press the hatch tightly shut, and the side latches, which should ride up over the hatch flange around its perimeter, were butting against the hatch’s edge instead. So, had we missed the pressure drop in the station, we would have undocked with a non-hermetic station and lost it for future operations. Time is critically short. We’re in a time crunch. It’s time to move on, to verify the ship’s integrity, and here we are stuck.
While we were figuring things out, checking the hatches for seal, and so on, we entered the communication session. We reported that we’d managed to close the hatch by pulling it manually while the drive motor ran. The ground asked us to quickly put on our spacesuits, since we’d fallen a full orbit behind schedule, check them for leaks, check the docking assembly, and execute undocking and descent at the assigned times — because shifting to the backup orbit for descent is complicated due to search-and-recovery logistics: the landing point shifts by about 300 kilometers, and there’s not enough time to reposition the recovery teams to the new area. But the fact that we’re in a time crunch and that a mistake on our part due to haste could have serious consequences — that they’re overlooking. No time to argue — we got it all done. After venting the docking assembly, we again checked the station’s pressure — we look: what’s this — on the video display it reads zero, there’s not even a pressure reading! My chest went cold. There’s no way the pressure could drop that fast in the station’s volume through a docking assembly valve. But could it really be failure on top of failure in the same system?! We don’t even consider such scenarios in training or in the documentation. We enter the comm session near the Far East. I ask them to check station pressure via telemetry. A couple of minutes later, the ground reports: pressure is around 700 mm, same as the previous orbit. Everything’s fine. In that case, we say, log the station pressure sensor as failed.
So that’s how we’re heading home — one adventure after another, like a final qualifying exam at the training center, with the difference that we hadn’t worked with the transport ship for 7 months, having lived and worked intensively on the orbital flight program. But it all went well. Thorough, serious preparation, with no shortcuts on the small things, paid off — we came through the situation with honor and brought a worthy conclusion to the enormous, productive work we carried out in space.
The time for undocking approaches. We send the command. A few minutes later, the ship’s hooks open — they’d been gripping the station securely, with 8 tons of force needed to seal the docking assembly. Hooks open — we confirm by indicator. The spring pushers fire, and the separation thrusters ignite.
That’s it. Goodbye, Salyut-7! We watch the ship pull away through the optical sight. The station, lit by the Sun, in the greenish-orange light of the sight’s optics, drifts smoothly away from us. “We’re not saying goodbye!” — that’s what Tolya and I wrote on the station’s docking assembly. We believe we’ll work on it again, but for now we’re going back to Earth to rest our souls — the soul is tired from longing for loved ones, family, for everything earthly and even its bustle — to savor this familiar life made for humans, and then to feel homesick again, this time for work in space.
After undocking, at the designated time, we jettisoned the orbital module by issuing the critical command — meaning you have to press two switches simultaneously, positioned at different levels on the control panel. We heard a muffled, cracking blow, as if someone had swung a sledgehammer — not too hard — against the hull, and we saw the hatch from the descent module into the orbital module — and now into open space — flex inward. Through the porthole, I watched white fragments of thermal insulation scatter like splashing droplets.
During the communication session, Shatalov informed us of the weather conditions at the landing site. Wind 3-4 m/s — light, that’s the main thing. Temperature minus 15 degrees. All ground and airborne assets are deployed in the expected landing area.
We initiated the descent program. From here on, all spacecraft operations — orientation, engine ignition and shutdown, engine performance monitoring, vehicle separation into modules, atmospheric descent control, and parachute deployment — will proceed automatically. But that doesn’t mean the crew is free. This is when the most critical phase begins: while monitoring the execution of the onboard computer’s programs as it controls the ship, you have to stay ahead of it in your own mental forecast, so you can step in to help it in time. And for now, everything is normal.
At 21:12:14 the engine fired. We’re over the Atlantic near the equator, communicating through the tracking ships, reporting engine performance and the magnitude of the velocity change. Everything normal. The engine burned for 199 seconds, reducing our speed by 115 m/s. It ran smoothly, gently, steadily — g-forces insignificant. We try to settle as tightly as possible into our seats and pull the straps snugger.
Hard to believe we’re heading home, though in every other way it feels like we’re returning from a long assignment. A pitch angle appeared — we’re flying with our backs to the direction of travel, feet forward along the ground track, so that when the descent module enters the atmosphere and decelerates, the g-forces press us into our seats.
That’s it. No turning back. Home. The angle keeps increasing due to orbital motion, since the ship is stabilized. We’re in the terminator; night is coming soon. Through the porthole I see the Earth, pink from clouds lit by the low Sun, and a blue-indigo glow along the edge of the bright sunset horizon. Beautiful! We were lucky to make a rare descent on the night side of the Earth.
Passing through the terminator — beautiful pink clouds, like waves above the lilac Earth, drifted beneath us, falling away behind. At an altitude of about 190 km, a blow — as if someone struck the back of the descent module with a hammer — and then about 15 seconds later, a muffled crackle as pyrotechnic charges fired in rapid succession, fractions of a second apart. Separation of the spacecraft into modules: the instrument compartment and the descent module. After that came a calm, smooth flight in the descent module.
When we began entering the atmosphere (altitude around 120-130 km), the flight felt like the ascent phase when the rocket puts you into orbit — a light drumming, like cobblestones under wheels. This was the descent module orienting itself aerodynamically in the airflow. The vibrations weren’t strong. After that came oscillations in the intermediate plane, 3-2, 4-1 — simultaneously in pitch and yaw. The porthole was dark, since we’d entered the Earth’s shadow, and then it began to glow with a pale pink light. You get the sensation of seeing depth in the space beyond the porthole, illuminated by the reflections of a mighty furnace that was blazing outside the hull. Then the white-pink glow in the porthole began separating into bands — white and light pink, as if pink had been painted over bright white. The white bands resembled, in brightness and color, the luminous layer just before sunrise, when the Sun’s edge appears at the Earth’s horizon. And suddenly brilliant white bands with a bluish tint appeared — they swept across the porthole like searchlights, rushing up from the ship’s heat shield — and then came streams of sparks, like tracers of pink-white particles of various sizes at intervals of about 3 seconds.
The porthole grew pinker and turned a dense, vivid pink with a white undertone — a very beautiful, deep color, as if inside a furnace. Then the porthole turned dark pinkish-burgundy and began slowly darkening, as if cooling. Suddenly a jolt — and we were thrown forward against the straps, then right and left — the drogue chute had deployed. I said to Tolya: “Get ready, the main chute is coming next.” Sixteen seconds later, another jolt and lurches right and left. We keep up a running commentary the whole time. Completely calm — just that everything is amazingly interesting, and I wanted to see, remember, and record as much as possible. Another jerk — transition to symmetric parachute suspension — and then the seats armed: the pyro-pushers fired, and our seats rose to full shock-absorber stroke, pressing us tightly against the instrument panel. We looked at each other and said: “Now we can say it’s almost all normal.” Earlier, when the engine had finished the braking burn, Tolya said: “Well, Valya, that’s it — no emergency now.” And I told him: “Knock on wood.” After that, we descended on symmetric suspension, and suddenly — a jolt, a flash on the left — the breathing vents opened and the heat shield separated. Descent on the main chute from 5.5 km felt very long. There had been so many intense impressions from the moment of engine ignition to parachute deployment that afterward, the smooth descent on the parachute didn’t register — it seemed like we were just sitting still. I said: “We must have already landed.” But the altimeter still read 2,800 meters. There was absolutely no sensation of descent. Then some slight oscillations appeared. We kept in contact with the relay aircraft. They constantly asked about our condition and the descent, relaying everything to Moscow.
Suddenly a crack — we were thrown up and slammed into the ground. Everything lurched inside me. The shock was so unexpected I actually cursed. We were tossed onto our side, and the parachute began dragging us along the ground. Tolya jettisoned the chute, and the capsule stopped moving. I ended up on top, hanging from my straps; Tolya was on the bottom. I asked: “Alive?” He smiled: “Alive.” “How do you feel?” “Got a good whack on the tailbone,” Tolya said. “Same kind of impact as my first flight,” I told him. “Felt it through every vertebra.” We’re hanging in the straps. The aircraft is circling above us the whole time. They radio us to deploy the antenna, as the recovery team is on approach. Tolya unbuckled and started cutting the straps on our gear bags, then got tired — soaked, sweating — laid his head on me, and we waited for the helicopter. About 35 minutes later, part of the recovery team reached the capsule. The helicopter carrying them had snagged a hilltop with its tail rotor in poor visibility — it was snowing — and crashed, breaking a landing gear strut. Fortunately, no one was hurt. We hear them opening the hatch. The whole time our condition was decent, just an unusual heaviness in the body. The hatch swings open slowly, and I hear the familiar voice of the recovery team’s doctor, Valera Bogomolov: “Guys, hang on a bit — we’re going to roll you so it’s easier to get you out.” They closed the hatch again and began tilting the capsule for a better exit angle. That’s when I felt a sharp deterioration — nausea, intense vestibular disturbance. I told Tolya: “Let’s get out, or I’m going to throw up.” Tolya shouted for them to open the hatch, and they started pulling us out. Tolya climbed out first. With difficulty, I disconnected the communication and medical cable connectors, detached the ventilation and oxygen hoses. When I’d gotten out up to my waist, I said: “Hold me, guys, or I’ll fall,” and they pulled me out.
Outside it was night. Fresh air. Snow falling on my face. And I felt awful. They carried me to a sleeping bag, and when they lifted me in their arms, it felt like they were raising me incredibly high — as if ten meters up. I couldn’t understand what was happening. I knew you can’t lift someone that high by hand, yet I was afraid they’d drop me. They stuffed me into a sleeping bag lined with dog fur, still in my spacesuit, laid me on the ground, and the retching began. I said: “Give me a cloth.” Two heaves, and immediately I felt better; my vision cleared. I’m lying there. Tolya is next to me in a deck chair, and the people around us are covering us from the cold with such care.
The photographer, Yevgeny Viktorovich Morov, covered me with his own fur coat and stood there in his suit jacket in the freezing cold. Then the guys from the technical support team began unloading the payload container with experiment results. They said they’d never seen so many return materials. It filled two spacesuit bags.
I started getting cold, so they carried me to the communications helicopter, since the helicopter with the heated tent couldn’t make it — there was fog and snow. Then they transferred me to the PZU vehicle, a machine purpose-built for crew and spacecraft search and recovery. It was warm inside, and we began to come around.
The body feels heavy. When you sit, something presses down on your shoulders, your head — the sensation is like being in an airplane when it hits an updraft, and if you’re standing at that moment, the g-force pushes down on your legs. We were lucky that the journalists couldn’t reach the landing site, so we rested in peace. I want to eat. Yesterday we skipped lunch and dinner, and today we only had some tea and a few crackers. The doctor also treated us to an apple — so delicious!