- Born
- Died
- Birth nameAleksey Arkhipovich Leonov
- Height5′ 4″ (1.63 m)
- Alexey Leonov was born on May 30, 1934 in Listvyanka, West Siberian Krai, Russian SFSR, USSR [now Kemerovo Oblast, Russia]. He was an actor and writer, known for Petlya Oriona (1981), Sem stikhiy (1985) and Glavnyj (2015). He was married to Svetlana Leonova. He died on October 11, 2019 in Moscow, Russia.
- SpouseSvetlana Leonova(? - October 11, 2019) (his death, 2 children)
- When the call came for cosmonaut candidates in 1959, Leonov was picked as one of the first 20 cosmonauts. He spent over 7 days in space aboard 2 spaceflights. Leonov was the eleventh cosmonaut in Soviet space history and the fifteenth person in space.
- Leonov was a fighter pilot before becoming a cosmonaut. He graduated with honors from Chuguyev Higher Air Force School in 1957. He then joined the Soviet Air Force units as a fighter pilot, becoming an expert parachutist and instructor of military air forces for paratroop training.
- The first man to "walk" in space on March 18, 1965, when he floated outside the spacecraft Voskhod 2 for 10 minutes, secured to the spacecraft by only a safety line. He pushed away from the craft and let himself drift 17.5 feet away before reeling himself back in. There were tense moments during the first of his two extravehicular activities when Leonov found his spacesuit too rigid to reenter the airlock. He bled air out of his suit and was able to fit back through the inflatable airlock capsule.
- Leonov was to be the Commander of the first Soviet Moon mission, which was cancelled when Apollo 11 landed on the Moon in 1969.
- On July 15, 1975, Leonov was commander of the Russian flight in the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, the first linking of Soviet and American spacecraft. Leonov trained in Houston, where he learned to speak English fluently and made friends with everyone with his quick wit, humor, and charm. The Soyuz and Apollo crafts separated after approximately two days. The Soyuz craft was recovered on July 21, fewer than 10 kilometers away from its target point.
- [About the crisis during his first space walk:] There were many problems. One was impossible to test on Earth, namely, how would the space suit react in the vacuum of space? . . . I had to take a decision to lower the pressure inside the space suit, but by how much? Too much would have led to a boiling of blood in the body, which would have finished me off. But I had to do it. I didn't report this down to Earth. I knew the situation better than anyone else. [about the Apollo-Soyuz mission:]
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