Orbital Piloted Stations (OPS)
Three Almaz OPS space stations were flown from 1973 to 1976 in the Salyut programme: Salyut 2 (OPS-1), Salyut 3 (OPS-2) and Salyut 5 (OPS-3). Five crewed Soyuz expeditions were flown to the Almaz space stations Salyut 3 and Salyut 5, with three reaching their stations and only two of the missions being considered fully successful at that time – the three crews that had reached their stations had manned Almaz stations for a total of 81 days when the program was ended.
Besides the three flown space stations OPS-1 to OPS-3, seven more spaceframes of Almaz space stations had been build when the program was cancelled: OPS-4, Almaz-205, Almaz-206, Almaz-T, Almaz-T2 (Kosmos 1870), Almaz-1 and Almaz-2 – with Almaz-T2 and Almaz-1 having successfully flown as repurposed unmanned radar-carrying reconnaissance satellites (see below). The partially outfitted hulls of Almaz-205 and Almaz-206 are today in the property of Excalibur Almaz, a company which had stated to have plans to launch these as manned space stations (see below).
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Famous quotes containing the word stations:
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