On September 26, 1983, a Russian Soyuz rocket exploded on the launch pad. Two cosmonauts Vladimir Titov and Gennady Strekalov were inside their Soyuz T-10-1 spacecraft atop the rocket, and barely made it out alive. Titov and Strekalov’s mission was to launch cosmonauts from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan to the Salyut 7 space station. But about 90 seconds before the rocket was scheduled to launch, a fire broke out on the launch pad. Fortunately, the emergency abort escape system ejected his Soyuz space capsule from the top of the rocket just two seconds before the fire caused the explosion. It was the first time the launch escape system had been used, but sadly it wouldn’t be the last. Russian officials watch the heartbreaking launch abort of the Soyuz T-10-1 spacecraft of cosmonauts Vladimir Titov and Gennady Strekalov on September 26, 1983. (Image credit: NASA via YouTube) Why It Mattered The heartbreaking launch abort of the Soyuz T-10-1 spacecraft (also known as Soyuz T-10A) demonstrated the effectiveness of a launch escape system that no one wanted to see actually used. It was the first abort of a manned launch pad. Russia’s Soyuz spacecraft, when stacked on top of its Soyuz rockets, have a launch escape tower equipped with its own rocket engines that is designed to rip a Soyuz capsule from its rocket so that the spacecraft can parachute to safety in the event of a launch emergency. Similar launch abort systems were used on NASA’s Mercury Gemini and Apollo missions, as well as the agency’s Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft. (SpaceX’s Crew Dragon and Blue Origin’s New Shepard use a “pusher” escape system designed to release a capsule, rather than pulling up and away.) The Soyuz rocket failure was apparently caused by a fire in the booster base about a minute before liftoff, according to the Encyclopedia Astronautics. And although the exhaust system worked as planned, it was not a comfortable ride. The launch abort system tore the Soyuz capsule from its rocket with such force that Titov and Strekalov were subjected to 20G (or 20 times the force of gravity) as the capsule moved away from the exploding rocket. While Soyuz T-10-1 was the first aborted Soyuz launch, it was not the last. On October 11, 2018, a Soyuz rocket carrying NASA astronaut Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Dmitry Rogozin on a mission to the International Space Station failed during flight (i.e., during ascent, not on the pad), triggering the launch abort system. As with Soyuz T-10-1, the Soyuz MS-10 spacecraft landed safely, with the descent module jettisoning its orbital and service modules and deploying parachutes. A propellant separation problem caused the abort. “I imagined my first trip to outer space was going to be memorable,” Hague said in interviews after the abortion. “I didn’t expect it to be so memorable.” Hague and Rogozin experienced about 6.7 G during the launch disruption, but were otherwise safe. Hague later returned to spaceflight in February 2019, safely launching another Soyuz rocket to the ISS. Want more space history? Check out our full archive of On This Day In Space stories and watch our On This Day In Space videos on YouTube. On this day in space! September 25, 2008: China launches Shenzhou 7
