This woman found an astronaut forgotten in space

230 Mi above the Earth traveling at several times the speed of a bullet you gently float over the Space Station's Communications panel it's time for your morning report to Mission Control but as you turn on the screen you're greeted by the face of a man you have never seen before in an ominous voice he announces that the president isn't well and that someone else is taking over things have been tense in your country ever since you left Earth 94 days ago you know deep in the pit of your stomach that they hiding something from you and your worries aren't far off down below tanks and armored personnel carriers full of armed soldiers are rolling up to the government's headquarters blocked by thousands of people setting up barricades and chanting for them to stop the clock is ticking as the final hour approaches for your country that once was all you can do now is wait for news faced with silence floating in Endless space hoping you won't be forgotten [Music] on the 20th of May 1991 Serge KV docked the soyu spacecraft with the Soviet Union space station Mir its name meaning peace or World in Russian as he opened the hatch to the musty interior of the space station he surveyed the surroundings the cramped modular station would be home to Serge calav who was the first engine engineer on the mission and Commander analie arts sparski for the next 5 months with them was Helen Sharman the first British astronaut in space whose previous job was as a chemist in a chocolate factory the Soviet space program was running out of money and selling tickets was their Saving Grace assuming someone could afford the million-- dooll price tag a private British Consortium had bought Helen's way onto the station after she beat out 13,000 other applicants to become the second tourist in space to spend 8 days conducting Botanical experiments and leaving with the crew Serge and an Natalie were replacing Serge knew it wasn't just the Space Program struggling back home food lineups were common and the economy was in shambles the Soviet Union a socialist country that succeeded the Russian Empire in 1922 was starting to fall apart as the republics demanded Independence just a few months back Lithuania broke away and the Soviet Union responded by sending in tanks 14 people died in the violence whenever Sergey asked mission control for news on the country they would just say everything was fine to make things more difficult they only allowed him to talk to his family once a week he was missing a lot isolated in the vastness of space news about his country falling apart and watching his one-year-old daughter grow up one day Sergey was looking through the Handover notes from the cosmonauts who had manned the space station before him when he came across strange scribblings of letters and numbers it was a log the strings turned out to be call signs for for ham radio a hobby for communicating with strangers around the world that predated internet chat rooms using the longest range radio service available to the public as Sergey looked through the logs One Call Sign kept coming up vk3 CFI from a place called kak in Australia so in the evenings when he was done with his work Serge would turn on the station's radio set it to the right frequency and wait to pass over Australia he called out vk3 CFI this is u2m over and over during the 10-minute window but the only response was the crackle of static days passed and he kept trying until finally he heard back a woman's voice U2 M iir U2 M this is bk3 CFI her name was Maggie Yak Quinto a high school computer teacher and ham radio Enthusiast who knew rudimentary Russian she was quirky loved puns and had a big personality a contract to the level-headed quiet Serge she used to chat with the last crew and even taught them how to operate a packet radio which she used radio waves to send email like text from computer to computer Serge wanted her to teach him as well they began to chat often and she would summarize news articles about the Soviet Union to send them via packet radio with stores running out of food people sleeping in train stations and general Law and Order seeming to be breaking down the news was often less than Stellar really less than stellar yes you see Stellar can both mean something outstanding as well as relating to a star I'm fairly proud of that one you are the most intelligent and humorous human I have ever met why thank you it was now July 2 months into his stay when Mission Control finally told Serge some unfiltered news and it wasn't good they said he might not be able to come back home there was a problem the Launchpad was in kazak territory which at this point had decided to secede from the Soviet Union they were offering access but for a steep price so their solution was to send a kazak up to space as a piece offering unfortunately he wasn't an engineer like Serge each crew consisted of a commander a flight engineer and sometimes a researcher the commander and engineer usually stayed up for a 5-month mission while the researcher would stay for 8 days to conduct experiments and then head back down to earth with the returning previous commander and engineer the research spots for the last two missions were taken by space tourists one of them being Helen charman that spot for the upcoming mission was already paid for and taken by an Austrian so they needed to send the kazak up in place of the flight engineer Serge understood the gravity of the situation if you left a space station without its engineer back in 1985 an earlier Soviet space station the salute 7 was in between Crews when it lost power and went into a death spiral Serge was writing instruction manuals for cosmonauts at the time when he was asked to join the res Rescue Mission he ran simulations and guided the cosmonauts through a very risky docking where they had to match the spin like that docking scene in interstellar then he helped guide them through repairs and bring the frozen station back to life because of his involvement in the rescue Ser was chosen to become a cosmonaut that same year now Mission Control was giving s a choice to stay on mirror and keep the station shining brightly in the night sky or to let the Soviet Union star die out there was a lot to think about Stang meant putting his body through an ordeal in microgravity muscles weaken the heart shrinks and bone mass is lost at a rate of up to 2% each month that's why astronauts need to make sure they get some exercise in then there was his mind to think about stuck in a claustrophobic Tin Can hurdling through space at 17,200 mph with no guaranteed D in sight he wouldn't be able to see his daughter or his wife who were eager for him to return home and they lived in a chaotic unpredictable country his family's safety was front and center in his mind the duty bound Cosmonaut believed in keeping this slice of the Soviet Union alive and didn't want to endanger the next crew if they stayed long term so he told them he would stay even though the Space Program could barely afford to send up Rockets anymore and they had no idea when he would be able to return with 3 months left until this change over of which he would no longer be apart he continued with his routine his days were planned out to every minute with endless power out outages computer problems and air leaks to fix in the evenings he would relax with analie look out to The Majestic peaceful View and chat with Magi as July rolled around Magi sent news about a new treaty to be signed next month President Gorbachev wanted to give the Republic's more power hoping it would keep the country together perhaps Serge's family would be safe after all unfortunately this treaty would lead the country down a dangerous path it was August 19th 1991 4 months into his mission when Serge woke up tired from his Restless sleep the sunrise every 90 minutes was disturbing his circadian rhythm weightlessness was stretching his spine leading to back pain and fluid shifted aimlessly in his body causing severe congestion it was no space walk in the park to live and sleep in space he rubbed his eyes and floated over to the communications panel just as he was about to give mission control his vitals a man in round glasses reading from a piece of paper in a flat somber tone appeared on screen president Mikel corbach can no longer perform his duties for health reasons and vice president Gennady yanayev will take over as president sergey's stomach was in knots he knew something was very very wrong little did Sergey know down below this news flash was playing on every television set in the Soviet Union interspersed with Swan Lake on a loop soon Sergey received news of what was actually going on from Magie and it didn't look good communist hardliners unhappy with the new treaty wanted things back to how they once were so they put President Gorbachev under house arrest and dispatched tanks and armored personnel carriers to Moscow citizens marched the streets in defiance but all Serge could do was get on with his day repairing the space station while questions riddled his mind was his family okay what was happening to his country and was he going to be forgotten amidst the chaos more news from Maggie tanks had lined up in front of the White House of the Russian government thousands gathered to stop them with blockades made of buses concrete blocks machinery and anything they could find S felt helpless and could only watch his country from above he saw no conflict and no people only a fragile planet with a thin atmosphere then tragedy struck three men died while trying to stop a tank and the coup attempt ended just as quickly as it started the hardliners gave up and were arrested Serge was relieved it was over but unbeknownst to him it was just the beginning of the end October came and the new crew arrived Commander an Natalie was switched over with Alexander vulkov all Serge could do was watch as the capsule he should have been on detached the station and left leaving the homesick Cosmonaut to wonder if an engineer would ever be sent to replace him so he could return home two more months passed and he got an update from Maggie that changed everything the failed coup caused a domino effect and on Christmas Day day President Gorbachev had resigned the Soviet Union was no more Serge had been in space for 7 months now his body was degrading regardless of the exercise and rations he was eating to try and curb the effects but while he himself had food he learned that in the meantime his family had been struggling to put something anything on the table the switch over from a communist controlled pricing system under the Soviet Union to a free capitalist system under Russia had happened overnight and it caused prices to Skyrocket ham had suddenly jumped to 1,000 rubles per kilo which was 2 months of sergey's salary Mission Control where Serge's wife worked was so underpaid that there were talks of them going on strike the Space Program had no more money and nobody knew if there was going to be a launch in late March which was supposed to have Serge's replacement as March came around things were tense for Serge who had been floating in uncertainty for months but he finally got the news he was hoping for Germany had bought a space ticket for $24 million which helped fund the launch Serge would be able to go home on March 25th 1992 after 10 months in space Serge landed back on Earth still displaying the red Soviet flag on his arm the world's last Soviet was described as pale as flower and sweaty like a lump of wet dough his legs had no strength and he had to be carried out of his capsule it took him weeks to regain his his lost muscle mass he was in a sense a time traveler and not just because of the slight time dilation caused by being in space that long which made him just a tiny fraction of a second younger his hometown of lenrad had been renamed to St Petersburg his pay had changed his status uncertain the political system in turmoil he no longer recognized the country he came back to despite the challenges he faced on Mir Serge continued to fly missions like the first US Russian space shuttle mission in 1994 and the first long duration stay on the International Space Station in 2000 by the end of his career he held the record for most time in space 803 days from a combined six space flights until the record was broken in 2015 by Gennady padala Maggie talked to a total of 19 cosmonauts aboard Mir before the retired space station was sent to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean in 2001 she passed away in 2014 while on Mir Sergey had written Maggie a letter in which he stated from space the Earth is like a map but in contrast to a map there are no borders to be seen it is pleasant when there are fewer borders people can rub shoulders be friends travel freely among each other and get to know one another more while in space his country had changed but so did his perspective he realized that on the pale blue dot we call home we all share the same Journey if you enjoyed this video consider subscribing to our Channel you'd be surprised to know how big of an impact your one sub has on this video's success plus we've got plenty more Mysteries coming that you won't want to miss so until next time thanks for watching and hope to see you again soon

Channel: Brew

Views: 179,517

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Id: rO2AZG0TqGw

Length: 13min 45sec (825 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 11 2024