Valeriy Nikolayevich Kubasov

Valeriy Nikolayevich Kubasov, born in 1935, Russian cosmonaut (see Astronaut). Kubasov flew on the first piloted international space mission and performed the first in-space welding experiments.

Kubasov was born in Vladimir Oblast, a small village northeast of Moscow. He was nicknamed Valera (Russian for “The Brain”) by fellow cosmonauts. Kubasov graduated from the Moscow Aviation Institute in 1958 as a mechanical engineer specializing in aircraft construction.

Kubasov first flew in space in 1969 as the flight engineer aboard the Soviet spacecraft Soyuz 6. During the flight he tested a prototype welding unit designed for assembling orbiting space stations.

Kubasov was next assigned to the joint Soviet-American Soyuz-Apollo Test Project, the first joint space venture between the two major rivals in space (see Apollo program). Following two and one-half years of training and language instruction, Kubasov served as the flight engineer on the Soviet Soyuz spacecraft that docked with the American Apollo spacecraft on July 17, 1975.The two craft remained docked for 44 hours, during which the crews moved back and forth between the craft and performed joint experiments.

Kubasov flew one more spaceflight in 1980, as commander of Soyuz 36. He and Hungarian cosmonaut-researcher Bertalan Farkas docked their craft with the Salyut 6 space station and performed a series of joint Soviet-Hungarian experiments.

After his last mission, Kubasov helped train French spationautes Jean-Loup Chretien and Patrick Baudry. He then worked at the Energiya design bureau on the chemical recycling of urine. Kubasov wrote a memoir entitled To Touch Space that was published in 1984.