A Salyut for Russia

Cosmodromes on the barren steppes of Kazakhstan trembled with the thunder of departing rockets last week. An unmanned space vehicle named Salyut (Salute) roared off its launch pad and was sent into a near-earth orbit. It was followed four days later by a three-man crew in Soyuz (Union) 10. As many as three additional Soyuz ships were reported poised to join the others in orbit. Ten years after Yuri Gagarin's pioneering flight, the Soviet Union had seemingly begun its most ambitious venture into space: a long-expected attempt to assemble a manned station hi earth orbit.

The launch of Salyut--believed to be a cylindrical craft 60 ft. long, 30 ft. in diameter, and weighing as much as 50 tons--followed a week of rumors hi Moscow and a call at last month's 24th Soviet Communist Party Congress for a "piloted orbiting station." Hailed by headlines in Moscow newspapers, Salyut seemed clearly intended to function as the core unit of what Russian sources called an "orbiting shish kebab," with a number of manned spacecraft attached to it.

Switched Emphasis. Then, during the predawn hours Friday, Western radio telescopes picked up a second craft racing in pursuit of Salyut. Observers saw the two ships, shining as brightly as first-magnitude stars, crossing the night skies of northern Europe. Actually, Soyuz 10 was given a bigger boost than intended, and it arced into a 130-by 154-mile orbit, placing it above Salyut's path. Observed Flight Commander Vladimir Shatalov, 43: "Looks like you threw us up a bit too high. Well, it doesn't matter, we'll fix it." By briefly firing Soyuz's engine, the crew lowered the spacecraft's orbit. At week's end they had rendezvoused and docked successfully with Salyut for 5 1/2 hours. But then Soyuz undocked and returned its three-man crew safely to earth, inexplicably leaving the space station's central unit, Salyut, alone hi orbit.

Since switching their emphasis to space stations--after it became obvious that the U.S. would be first to land men on the moon--the Russians have been stressing the practical aspects of orbiting laboratories. Said U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences President Matislav Keldysh last month: "These stations will make it possible to engage in all-round investigation of the globe and the near-earth space in the interests of meteorology, geophysics, oceanology and other branches of knowledge." Keldysh even mentioned plans to gather solar energy at such stations and beam it to earth for conversion to electrical power.

Run and Stop. Space stations have other advantages unmentioned by the Russians. Aside from making telescopic spying and communications eavesdropping more effective, a well-outfitted space lab can easily detect the thermal wake left, for example, by a nuclear submarine. Some Western scientists have even worried aloud about the possibility of space piracy; in previous space experiments, the Russians have already demonstrated the ability to chase and destroy one satellite with another. Had the current Soviet mission fulfilled its rumored goal of assembling a complex space station, it would have opened a two-year lead over the U.S., accomplishing what NASA has planned for its first Skylab. Using leftover Apollo hardware, three or more astronauts at a time are scheduled to orbit in a converted S-4B rocket for as long as 56 days in 1973. Further cuts in NASA's budget, however, might delay or even doom Skylab. In Houston last week Astronaut Alan Shepard discussed the woes of the U.S. space program that have been caused by erratic funding. "We shouldn't run and stop," he warned, "and then run and stop again." The challenge of Salyut, during this or one of its subsequent missions, like that of Sputnik in 1957, may well be what it takes to get the U.S. space program running again.

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