The Russians were the first on the moon. Why the Russians have not been to the moon. "Moon Deception" in Russia

MOSCOW, July 20 - RIA Novosti. Famed cosmonaut Alexei Leonov, who personally prepared for participation in the Soviet lunar exploration program, denied years of rumors that American astronauts were not on the Moon, and the footage broadcast on television around the world was allegedly edited in Hollywood.

He spoke about this in an interview with RIA Novosti on the eve of the 40th anniversary of the first landing in the history of mankind of US astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin on the surface of an Earth satellite, celebrated on July 20.

So were or weren't the Americans on the moon?

“Only absolutely ignorant people can seriously believe that the Americans were not on the moon. And, unfortunately, this whole ridiculous epic about the allegedly fabricated footage in Hollywood began precisely with the Americans themselves. By the way, the first person who began to distribute these rumors, was imprisoned for slander," Aleksey Leonov noted in this regard.

Where did the rumors come from?

“It all started with the fact that when, at the celebration of the 80th anniversary of the famous American film director Stanley Kubrick, who created his brilliant film Odyssey 2001 based on the book of science fiction writer Arthur Clarke, journalists who met with Kubrick’s wife asked to talk about her husband’s work on the film in Hollywood studios.And she honestly said that there are only two real lunar modules on Earth - one in a museum where no filming has ever been done, and it’s even forbidden to walk with a camera, and the other is in Hollywood, where, to develop the logic of what is happening on the screen and additional filming of the landing of the Americans on the moon was made," the Soviet cosmonaut specified.

Why was studio photography used?

Alexei Leonov explained that in order for the viewer to be able to see the development of what is happening on the movie screen from beginning to end, elements of additional filming are used in any movie.

“It was impossible, for example, to film the real opening of the hatch of the descent ship on the Moon by Neil Armstrong - there was simply no one to film it from the surface! For the same reason, it was impossible to film Armstrong’s descent to the Moon along the ladder from the ship. Kubrick in Hollywood studios to develop the logic of what is happening, and laid the foundation for numerous gossip that the entire landing was allegedly simulated on the set, "explained Alexei Leonov.

Where Truth Begins and Editing Ends

“Real shooting began when Armstrong, who first set foot on the Moon, got a little used to it, installed a highly directional antenna, through which the broadcast to Earth was carried out. its movement on the surface of the moon," the astronaut specified.

Why did the American flag fly in the airless space of the moon?

“They argue that the American flag was flying on the moon, but it shouldn’t be. The flag really shouldn’t be flying - the fabric was used with a rather rigid reinforced mesh, the cloth was twisted into a tube and tucked into a case. The astronauts took with them a nest, which they first inserted into the lunar soil, and then they stuck the flagpole into it, and only then removed the cover. And when the cover was removed, the flag's cloth began to unfold in conditions of reduced gravity, and the residual deformation of the springy reinforced mesh created the impression that the flag was rippling, as if in the wind " , - Alexey Leonov explained the "phenomenon".

“It is simply ridiculous and ridiculous to argue that the entire film was filmed on Earth. The United States had all the necessary systems that tracked the launch of the launch vehicle itself, acceleration, correction of the flight orbit, the descent capsule flying around the Moon and its landing,” - concluded the famous Soviet cosmonaut.

What did the "lunar race" lead to two space superpowers

“In my opinion, this is the best competition in space that humanity has ever carried out. The “moon race” between the USSR and the USA is the achievement of the highest peaks of science and technology,” Alexei Leonov believes.

According to him, after the flight of Yuri Gagarin, US President Kennedy, speaking in Congress, said that the Americans simply thought too late about what triumph could be achieved by launching a man into space, and therefore the Russians triumphantly became the first. Kennedy's message was clear: within ten years, put a man on the moon and return him safely to Earth.

“This was a very true step of the great politician - he united and rallied the American nation to achieve this goal. Huge funds for those times were also involved - $ 25 billion, today, this is, perhaps, all fifty billion. The program included a flyby of the moon, then the flight of Tom Stafford to the point of hovering and selection of a site for landing on Apollo 10. Sending Apollo 11 already provided for the direct landing of Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the moon. Michael Collins remained in orbit and waited for the return of his comrades, " - said Alexei Leonov.

18 Apollo-type ships were made to prepare for landing on the moon - the whole program was implemented perfectly, except for Apollo 13 - from the engineering point of view, nothing special happened there, it just failed, or rather, one of the fuel cells exploded , the energy weakened, and therefore it was decided not to land on the surface, but to fly around the Moon and return to Earth.

Alexei Leonov noted that only the first flight around the moon by Frank Bormann, then the landing of Armstrong and Aldrin on the moon and the story of Apollo 13 remained in the memory of the Americans. These accomplishments have brought the American nation together and made every individual empathize, walk with fingers crossed, and pray for their heroes. The last flight of the Apollo series was also extremely interesting: American astronauts no longer just walked on the Moon, but traveled on its surface in a special lunar car, making interesting photographs.

Actually there was a peak cold war, and in this situation, after the success of Yuri Gagarin, the Americans simply had to win the "moon race". The USSR then had its own lunar program, and we also implemented it. By 1968, it had already existed for two years, and even the crews of our cosmonauts were formed for a flight to the Moon.

On censorship of the achievements of mankind

"The launches of the Americans as part of the lunar program were broadcast on television, and only two countries in the world - the USSR and communist China - did not broadcast these historical footage to their peoples. I thought then, and now I think - in vain, we simply robbed our people "The flight to the moon is the property and achievement of all mankind. The Americans watched Gagarin's launch, Leonov's spacewalk - why couldn't the Soviet people see it?!", laments Alexei Leonov.

According to him, a limited group of Soviet space specialists watched these launches through a closed channel.

“We had military unit 32103 on Komsomolsky Prospekt, which provided space broadcasting, since there was no TsUP in Korolev then. The Americans set up a television antenna on the surface of the moon, and everything they did there was transmitted through a television camera to Earth, several repetitions of these television broadcasts were also made.When Armstrong stood on the surface of the moon, and everyone in the USA clapped, we are here in the USSR , Soviet cosmonauts, also crossed their fingers for good luck, and sincerely wished the guys success, "recalls the Soviet cosmonaut.

How was the implementation of the Soviet lunar program

"In 1962, a decree was issued, signed personally by Nikita Khrushchev, on the creation of a spacecraft for flying around the moon and using the Proton launch vehicle with an upper stage for this launch. In 1964, Khrushchev signed a program for the USSR to fly around , and in 1968 - landing on the moon and returning to Earth. And in 1966 there was already a decision on the formation of lunar crews - a group was immediately recruited for landing on the moon, "Alexey Leonov recalled.

The first stage of the flyby of the Earth satellite was to be carried out with the help of the launch of the L-1 lunar module by the Proton launch vehicle, and the second stage - landing and returning back - on the giant and most powerful N-1 rocket, equipped with thirty engines with a total thrust of 4.5 thousand tons with the weight of the rocket itself about 2 thousand tons. However, even after four test launches, this super-heavy rocket did not fly normally, so it had to be abandoned in the end.

Korolev and Glushko: the antipathy of two geniuses

"There were other options, for example, using a 600-ton engine developed by the brilliant designer Valentin Glushko, but Sergey Korolev refused it, since he worked on highly toxic heptyl. Although, in my opinion, this was not the reason - just two leaders , Korolev and Glushko - could not and did not want to work together. Their relationship had its own problems of a purely personal nature: Sergei Korolev, for example, knew that Valentin Glushko had once written a denunciation against him, as a result of which he was sentenced to ten years When Korolyov was released, he found out about this, but Glushko did not know that he knew about it, "said Alexei Leonov.

A small step for a man, but a giant leap for all mankind

NASA's Apollo 11 spacecraft on July 20, 1969, with a crew of three astronauts: Commander Neil Armstrong, Lunar Module Pilot Edwin Aldrin, and Command Module Pilot Michael Collins, became the first to reach the Moon in the USSR-US space race. The Americans did not pursue research tasks in this expedition, its goal was simple: to land on the Earth's satellite and return successfully.

The ship consisted of a lunar module and a command module that remained in orbit during the mission. Thus, of the three astronauts, only two went to the moon: Armstrong and Aldrin. They had to land on the moon, collect samples of the lunar soil, take pictures on the Earth satellite and install several instruments. However, the main ideological component of the trip was still the hoisting of the American flag on the moon and the holding of a video communication session with the Earth.

The launch of the ship was watched by US President Richard Nixon and German rocket scientist Hermann Oberth. A total of about a million people watched the launch at the cosmodrome and mounted observation platforms, and more than a billion people watched the television broadcast, according to the Americans, around the world.

Apollo 11 launched to the moon on July 16, 1969 at 1332 GMT and entered lunar orbit 76 hours later. The command and lunar modules were undocked about 100 hours after launch. Despite the fact that NASA intended to land on the lunar surface in automatic mode, Armstrong, as the expedition commander, decided to land the lunar module in semi-automatic mode.

The lunar module landed on the Sea of Tranquility on July 20 at 20:17:42 GMT. Armstrong descended to the lunar surface on July 21, 1969 at 02:56:20 GMT. Everyone knows the phrase that he uttered when he stepped on the moon: "This is one small step for a person, but a giant leap for all mankind."

Aldrin also landed on the moon 15 minutes later. The astronauts collected the necessary amount of materials, placed the instruments and installed a television camera. After that, they planted an American flag in the field of view of the camera and held a communication session with President Nixon. The astronauts left a commemorative plaque on the Moon with the words: "Here, people from the planet Earth first set foot on the Moon. July 1969 of the new era. We came in peace on behalf of all Humanity."

Aldrin was on the moon for about an hour and a half, Armstrong for two hours and ten minutes. At the 125th hour of the mission and the 22nd hour of stay on the Moon, the lunar module was launched from the surface of the Earth's satellite. The crew splashed down on the blue planet about 195 hours after the start of the mission, soon the astronauts were picked up by the aircraft carrier that came to the rescue.

July 3, 1969, Baikonur Cosmodrome. In the foreground is the Soviet lunar rocket N-1 (product No. 5L). In the background is a fitting rocket for testing ground launch systems (note that there is no emergency rescue system on the fitting rocket).

The closure of the Soviet manned program of flights to the moon occurred in June 1974, at the same time the entire cosmonaut detachment was disbanded. The following month, rockets ready for launch were cut into pieces. The destruction of the technological backlog led to a 15-year lag in the development of astronautics. What is to blame? Why did they stop trying to get to the moon?

It is often said that the industry of the USSR could not create spacecraft for the flight to the moon, that there was no appropriate technological base. They also say that it was simply impossible to compete with the United States. But the main reason for the failure of the project, which cost 4 billion rubles at 1974 prices. rub., was the inability of various departments to agree among themselves and the personal aspirations of some leaders.

The United States started the lunar program with the sole purpose of surpassing the USSR after the Russians launched the world's first satellite, took pictures reverse side The moons were the first to launch man into space. Landing a man on the moon was the last chance. To achieve this goal, the best representatives of science were gathered, orders were given to the most suitable corporations in the absence of competition. The USSR usually followed this path.

The Soviet lunar program was just a response to the United States. The Moon itself was not of interest to the leaders of OKB-1 Korolev. But the United States challenged and the USSR accepted it. The N-1 missile project was a continuation of the existing project, which was developed as a delivery vehicle hydrogen bomb and the launch into orbit of large-sized complexes, many times larger than the later Soyuz, Salyut and Mir.

The implementation of the lunar program was not economically feasible. But the Central Committee of the CPSU did not refuse it. According to the Decree of the Government, issued in 1960, it was planned to create a new rocket system for launching into orbit a heavy spacecraft weighing up to 60-80 tons, to create new rocket engines, control systems and space radio communications. In 1964, a new goal was set - a manned flight to the moon and landing on its surface before the Americans.

The L-1 lunar project became the cause of a fierce struggle between the design bureaus of Korolev and Chelomey. The existing Proton launch vehicle could theoretically make a manned flight around the Moon, but the memories of the participants in the events indicate that Korolev refused to put astronauts on a poisonous rocket. The fact is that heptyl served as fuel for the Proton, oxidizer - Nitric acid. In Kazakhstan, many poisonings were recorded among local residents who used the first stages of Protons in their household. Official information claimed that the use of the Proton was abandoned due to too high overloads that the astronauts could not withstand.

A difficult test for the project was the conflict between Korolev and Glushko, as a result of which the latter abandoned the development of an engine for a rocket. The work was transferred to the Kuznetsov design bureau.

It was planned that two astronauts would participate in the lunar project, and only one would descend to the surface of the moon, while the second was supposed to remain in orbit. A.A. was supposed to be the first person to walk on the moon. Leonov, Yu.A. was supposed to act as an understudy. Gagarin. The N-1 launch vehicle was designed to deliver the Soyuz spacecraft with a manned lunar module into the lunar orbit.

So why didn't it happen? One of the reasons was austerity. Four H-1 launches were unsuccessful due to the first stage for which no testbed was built. Since all the first stage engines were tested separately, it was impossible to determine the cause of the stage failure.

When it became known that the Americans were about to go to the moon, Leonov was eager to fly, but they did not let him in, which saved his life. H-1 launched on February 21, 1969 without a crew, six months before the launch of Apollo 11. The rocket exploded shortly after the start of the flight. The second attempt was made on July 3, 1969. The rocket exploded right on the launch pad, almost completely destroying the launch complex. Even then it became clear that we would not be the first to get to the moon.

Korolev and Gagarin pass away. These two deaths were tantamount to the death of Russian astronautics. And it's not that there were no other talented designers and trained cosmonauts. Korolev and Gagarin were well received in the Kremlin, their opinion was listened to. Korolev not only argued with anyone, regardless of rank, he knew how to present his project in such a way that the military advocated the need for its implementation. The first satellite was a beacon for ballistic missiles. He also convinced the military that the construction of a base on the moon would allow the whole world to be held at gunpoint. He kept silent about the practically unbearable cost of the project for the country. The military seized on the idea. In addition, the N-1 rocket could launch stations weighing over 100 tons into orbit, such as the Zvezda station, which was conceived for military purposes.

Korolev knew how to use the needs and desires of the military for his own purposes, knocking out funds for the implementation of his projects. For Korolev himself, the flight to the Moon was only the first step towards a flight to Mars.

The change of leadership in the design office did not bring anything good. Funding decreased significantly, the test bench was not built. The launch complex was restored, but the next attempts to launch the rocket were not successful due to the same reason for the failure of the first stage. And the Americans have already accepted congratulations on the successful landing on the moon. The Soviet lunar program was curtailed, Mars was also forgotten.

However, another attempt was made. The hopes of the domestic cosmonautics were associated with the Energia rocket. The tests were successful. But the rocket was buried under the collapsed roof of the assembly and test building at Baikonur. This put the final end to Russia's plans. The United States has become a leader in space exploration. There is no point in trying to compete with them by spending hundreds of billions on flights.

Russia's leadership in space is a thing of the past due to the curtailment of the lunar program and a change in leadership in astronautics. Today's undisputed leader is the United States. But if the country's leadership had not forgotten Tsiolkovsky's words that he who conquered space would own the world, the situation could have turned out differently.

Who can become the leader tomorrow? Most likely China. Its space program is quite fantastic, the moon landing project should be completed with the construction of a lunar base by 2021. Many do not believe in the feasibility of this project, but China has already proved that it is capable of very unexpected things, at least the super-fast growth of its economy speaks of this.

Photo of the secret lunar program of the USSR

These photographic materials are one of the remaining evidence to date that the USSR also tried to land a man on the moon - obviously, after they could not, or, more precisely, did not have time to do it, they forgot about the program.

However, fortunately, little disappears forever and without a trace. The images we can see show one of the laboratories of the Moscow Aviation Institute, as well as aerospace equipment, including a spacecraft and a lunar lander.

The history of the Moon Race is well known to many contemporaries: before US President John F. Kennedy initiated the launch of the Apollo program, the Soviet Union was noticeably ahead of the United States in matters of lunar exploration. In particular, in 1959 the Luna-2 automatic interplanetary station was delivered to the surface of the Moon, and in 1966 a Soviet satellite entered its orbit.

Like the Americans, Soviet scientists developed a multi-step approach to the task at hand. They also had two separate modules for orbiting and landing.

While the Apollo 11 crew consisted of three members, the entire burden of the Soviet lunar program had to lie on the shoulders of one cosmonaut - thus, the weight of the equipment was significantly reduced. In addition, there were other differences that made the Soviet apparatus lighter. First of all, these include the relative simplicity of the design, the use of the same engine for landing and takeoff, as well as the lack of a direct connection between the orbital and lunar module. This meant that the astronaut would need to go to outer space, to climb into the lander before landing and, later, to climb back into the orbiter after returning from the Moon. After that, the lunar module was disconnected, and the spacecraft went to Earth without it.

The main reason that prevented the Soviet side from landing a man on the moon was the failures with launch vehicles. Despite the fact that the first two test launches were successful, the rocket crashed during the third. In the fourth test, conducted in 1971, a test spacecraft returned to Earth along an incorrect trajectory, hitting Australian airspace, as a result of which an international scandal could arise: Soviet diplomats allegedly had to convince the Australians that the object falling on them was a test spacecraft. Kosmos-434 module, not a nuclear warhead.

After several failures, the program became too expensive, and after the Americans presented the world with documentary evidence of the success of the Apollo 11 mission, it completely lost its meaning. As a result, space equipment has become something of a museum piece.

It was not the Americans who conquered the moon - we were the first. A chrome-plated Soviet rocket took off from a secret cosmodrome, now abandoned and filled with concrete, on August 29, 1937.

On board was Ivan Kharlamov, a broad-shouldered, handsome, calm man of unprecedented strength. The space pilot (as they were then called) was packed in a lead suit - in the conditions of terrestrial gravity, one could only lie in it.
But this start was hushed up for a long time. Even on takeoff, the rocket was torn off part of the skin, communication was soon lost, the designer fled abroad, and the project participants (including three understudy space pilots) were eliminated by the NKVD.

This incredible story collected literally piece by piece - in the archives of the FSB and Gosfilmofond, from the chronicle of SovKino and SoyuzKinozhurnal, as well as from eyewitness interviews made today. Amazing, often incomprehensibly how they were filmed (it was recorded almost every day of the preparation and collapse of the project), these shots are classified as "secret". Some of them were made back in the 1930s with the SK-29 hand-held silent movie camera, designed for secret surveillance: one could put it in a suitcase and calmly monitor the object. Therefore, as the head of the FSB archives explains: "Everything that was could be filmed, and if it was filmed, then it was."

First on the Moon. Frame from the film.

Why did the sensation get into the competition of the Kinotavr festival as a film called "First on the Moon", and not in prime-time television? Everything is very simple: in fact ... there was nothing. There was no rocket, Kharlamov, launch, and backup pilots were not gassed after an unsuccessful launch; there were no silent cameras SK-29; there was no landing on the moon. The feature film "First on the Moon" used newsreel footage, but 99- is a falsification, painstakingly, bit by bit, filmed in Sverdlovsk for two years.

Debutant director Alexei Fedorchenko is not a pioneer of the hoax genre. For example, in America and Canada in the 1990s, the Alien Autopsy, an allegedly documentary report on an alien autopsy made in field conditions US intelligence agencies. The camera in this "chronicle" was shaking, the alien's body fell out of focus, the doctors were completely masked, and there was nothing to catch on at all. But the viewer believed - even despite the final credit, explaining that everything shown is a circus.

The public will be able to see "First on the Moon", most likely not in the cinema, but only on video or DVD. Showing such an unformatted film in cinemas, they say, is unprofitable. However, at the festival, the reviewers gave the tape maximum marks - almost everyone liked the Soviet space program.

Artem ARTEMOV, based on materials from the Utro.ru website.
http://www.sm-k.narod.ru/archives/2005/jun/82/25.htm

So were or weren't the Americans on the moon?

Where did the rumors come from?

Why was studio photography used?

Where Truth Begins and Editing Ends

Why did the American flag fly in the airless space of the moon?

What did the "lunar race" lead to two space superpowers

In fact, it was the peak of the Cold War, and in this situation, after the success of Yuri Gagarin, the Americans simply had to win the "moon race". The USSR then had its own lunar program, and we also implemented it. By 1968, it had already existed for two years, and even the crews of our cosmonauts were formed for a flight to the Moon.

On censorship of the achievements of mankind

According to him, a limited group of Soviet space specialists watched these launches through a closed channel.

How was the implementation of the Soviet lunar program

Korolev and Glushko: the antipathy of two geniuses

A small step for a man, but a giant leap for all mankind

The so-called "American moon landing in 1969" was a huge fake! Or, in Russian, a grandiose deception! Western politicians have this rule: "if you can't win in a fair competition, achieve victory by deceit or meanness!"

Surprisingly, not only American astronauts, but also Soviet astronauts made an effort to deceive the entire world community, who declared that “only absolutely ignorant people can seriously believe that the Americans were not on the moon!”. In particular, this opinion was expressed more than once by the Soviet cosmonaut Alexei Leonov, when many citizens of the USSR, who carefully studied all the materials on the "American lunar epic", found obvious mistakes and inconsistencies in it.

And only now, after almost half a century, it becomes clear that all this information, entered by historians in various encyclopedias, is actually misinformation!

"Apollo 11" ("Apollo-11") - a manned spacecraft of the Apollo series, during the flight of which on July 16-24, 1969, the inhabitants of the Earth for the first time in history landed on the surface of another celestial body- Moon.

On July 20, 1969, at 20:17:39 UTC, crew commander Neil Armstrong and pilot Edwin Aldrin landed the ship's lunar module in the southwestern area of the Sea of Tranquility. They remained on the surface of the moon for 21 hours 36 minutes and 21 seconds. All this time, Command Module Pilot Michael Collins was waiting for them in lunar orbit. The astronauts made one exit to the lunar surface, which lasted 2 hours 31 minutes 40 seconds. The first person to walk on the moon was Neil Armstrong. This happened on July 21 at 02:56:15 UTC. Aldrin joined him 15 minutes later.
The astronauts planted a US flag at the landing site, placed a set of scientific instruments and collected 21.55 kg of lunar soil samples, which were delivered to Earth. After the flight, the crew members and lunar rock samples underwent strict quarantine, which did not reveal any lunar microorganisms.

The successful completion of the Apollo 11 flight program meant the achievement of the national goal set by US President John F. Kennedy in May 1961 - to land on the moon before the end of the decade, and marked the victory of the United States in the lunar race with the USSR. Source

Surprisingly, John F. Kennedy, the president of the United States, who approved the program of "landing a man on the moon before 1970", was publicly shot dead in front of a crowd of millions of Americans back in 1963. And what is even more amazing, the entire film archive, on which in July 1969 the landing of American astronauts on the moon was faked, subsequently disappeared from NASA storage! It's supposed to have been stolen!

The Russians have a very good proverb about this: "Chickens are counted in the fall!" Its literal meaning is this: in peasant farms, not all chickens born in summer survive until autumn. Some will be carried away by birds of prey, and the weak simply will not survive. Therefore, they say that you need to count the chickens in the fall, when it is clear how many of them survived, survived. The allegorical meaning of this proverb is this: one must judge something by the final results. Premature joy from the first result, especially if it was obtained dishonestly, can then be replaced by bitter disappointment!

Absolutely in the context of this Russian proverb, today it turns out that the Americans still do not have a reliable and powerful rocket engine that could drive their American spacecraft to the Moon and return it back to Earth.

Below is the story of a Soviet and Russian scientist about the leadership of Russian science and the space industry in the field of creating rocket engines.

Academician Boris Katorgin, creator of the world's best liquid rocket engines, explains why the Americans still cannot repeat our achievements in this area, and how to keep the Soviet head start in the future.

On June 21, 2012, at the St. Petersburg Economic Forum, the winners of the Global Energy Prize were awarded. An authoritative commission of industry experts from different countries chose three applications from 639 submitted and named the winners of the award of the year, which is already commonly called the "Nobel Prize for Energy". As a result, 33 million bonus rubles were shared this year by a well-known British inventor, Professor Rodney John Allam, and two of our outstanding scientists, Academicians of the Russian Academy of Sciences Boris Katorgin and Valery Kostyuk.

All three are related to the creation of cryogenic technology, the study of the properties of cryogenic products and their application in various power plants. Academician Boris Katorgin was awarded "for the development of high-performance liquid-propellant rocket engines on cryogenic fuels, which ensure, at high energy parameters, the reliable operation of space systems for the peaceful use of space." With the direct participation of Katorgin, who devoted more than fifty years to the OKB-456 enterprise, now known as NPO Energomash, liquid-propellant rocket engines (LRE) were created, the performance of which is now considered the best in the world. Katorgin himself was engaged in the development of schemes for organizing the working process in engines, the mixture formation of fuel components and the elimination of pulsation in the combustion chamber. Also known are his fundamental works on nuclear rocket engines (NRE) with a high specific impulse and developments in the field of creating powerful continuous chemical lasers.

In the most difficult times for Russian science-intensive organizations, from 1991 to 2009, Boris Katorgin headed NPO Energomash, combining the positions of general director and general designer, and managed not only to save the company, but also to create a number of new engines. The absence of an internal order for engines forced Katorgin to look for a customer in the foreign market. One of the new engines was the RD-180, developed in 1995 specifically for participation in a tender organized by the American corporation Lockheed Martin, which chose a liquid-propellant rocket engine for the then upgraded Atlas launch vehicle. As a result, NPO Energomash signed a contract for the supply of 101 engines and by the beginning of 2012 had already delivered more than 60 LREs to the United States, 35 of which successfully worked on the Atlas during the launch of satellites for various purposes.

Before the presentation of the "Expert" award, I talked with academician Boris Katorgin about the state and prospects for the development of liquid rocket engines and found out why engines based on forty-year-old developments are still considered innovative, and the RD-180 could not be recreated at American factories.

Boris Ivanovich, what exactly is your merit in the creation of domestic liquid-propellant jet engines, which are now considered the best in the world?

To explain this to a non-specialist, you probably need a special skill. For LRE, I developed combustion chambers, gas generators; in general, he led the creation of the engines themselves for the peaceful exploration of outer space. (In the combustion chambers, the fuel and oxidizer are mixed and burned and a volume of hot gases is formed, which, then ejected through the nozzles, create the actual jet thrust; the fuel mixture is also burned in gas generators, but already for the operation of turbopumps, which pump fuel and oxidizer under enormous pressure into the same combustion chamber. - "Expert".)

You are talking about the peaceful exploration of outer space, although it is obvious that all the engines with thrust from several tens to 800 tons, which were created at NPO Energomash, were intended primarily for military needs.

We didn't have to drop a single atomic bomb, we did not deliver a single nuclear charge to the target on our missiles, and thank God. All military developments went into peaceful space. We can be proud of the huge contribution of our rocket and space technology to the development of human civilization. Thanks to astronautics, entire technological clusters were born: space navigation, telecommunications, satellite television, sounding systems.

The engine for the R-9 intercontinental ballistic missile, which you worked on, then formed the basis of almost our entire manned program.

Back in the late 1950s, I carried out computational and experimental work to improve mixture formation in the combustion chambers of the RD-111 engine, which was intended for that same rocket. The results of the work are still being used in modified RD-107 and RD-108 engines for the same Soyuz rocket; about two thousand space flights were made on them, including all manned programs.

Two years ago, I interviewed your colleague, Global Energy laureate Academician Alexander Leontiev. In a conversation about specialists closed to the general public, whom Leontiev himself once was, he mentioned Vitaly Ievlev, who also did a lot for our space industry.

Many academicians who worked for the defense industry were classified - this is a fact. Now much has been declassified - this is also a fact. I know Alexander Ivanovich very well: he worked on the creation of methods for calculating and cooling the combustion chambers of various rocket engines. Solving this technological problem was not easy, especially when we began to squeeze out the chemical energy of the fuel mixture to the maximum to obtain the maximum specific impulse, increasing the pressure in the combustion chambers to 250 atmospheres, among other measures.

Let's take our most powerful engine - RD-170. Fuel consumption with an oxidizer - kerosene with liquid oxygen going through the engine - 2.5 tons per second. Heat flows in it reach 50 megawatts per square meter - this is a huge energy. The temperature in the combustion chamber is 3.5 thousand degrees Celsius!

It was necessary to come up with a special cooling for the combustion chamber, so that it could work calculated and withstand the heat pressure. Alexander Ivanovich did just that, and, I must say, he did a great job. Vitaly Mikhailovich Ievlev - Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Doctor of Technical Sciences, professor, unfortunately, who died quite early - was a scientist of the broadest profile, possessed encyclopedic erudition. Like Leontiev, he worked a lot on the methodology for calculating high-stress thermal structures. Their work intersected somewhere, integrated somewhere, and as a result, an excellent technique was obtained by which it is possible to calculate the heat density of any combustion chambers; now, perhaps, using it, any student can do it. In addition, Vitaly Mikhailovich took an active part in the development of nuclear, plasma rocket engines. Here our interests intersected in those years when Energomash was doing the same.

In our conversation with Leontiev, we touched upon the sale of RD-180 Energomash engines in the USA, and Alexander Ivanovich said that in many ways this engine is the result of developments that were made just when the RD-170 was created, and in a sense, its half . What is it - really the result of inverse scaling?

Any engine in a new dimension is, of course, a new apparatus. The RD-180 with a thrust of 400 tons is actually half the size of the RD-170 with a thrust of 800 tons.

The RD-191, designed for our new Angara rocket, has a thrust of 200 tons. What do these engines have in common? All of them have one turbopump, but the RD-170 has four combustion chambers, the "American" RD-180 has two, and the RD-191 has one. Each engine needs its own turbopump unit - after all, if a four-chamber RD-170 consumes about 2.5 tons of fuel per second, for which a turbopump with a capacity of 180 thousand kilowatts was developed, which is more than two times greater, for example, than the power of the reactor of the nuclear icebreaker Arktika , then the two-chamber RD-180 is only half, 1,2 tons. I participated directly in the development of turbopumps for the RD-180 and RD-191 and at the same time supervised the creation of these engines as a whole.

The combustion chamber, then, is the same on all these engines, only their number is different?

Yes, and this is our main achievement. In one such chamber with a diameter of only 380 millimeters, a little more than 0.6 tons of fuel per second burns. Without exaggeration, this chamber is a unique high-heat-stressed equipment with special protection belts against powerful heat flows. Protection is carried out not only due to external cooling of the chamber walls, but also due to the ingenious way of “lining” a film of fuel on them, which, evaporating, cools the wall.

On the basis of this outstanding chamber, which has no equal in the world, we manufacture our best engines: RD-170 and RD-171 for Energia and Zenit, RD-180 for the American Atlas and RD-191 for the new Russian rocket "Angara".

- Angara was supposed to replace Proton-M a few years ago, but the creators of the rocket faced serious problems, the first flight tests were repeatedly postponed, and the project seems to continue to slip.

There were indeed problems. A decision has now been made to launch the rocket in 2013. The peculiarity of the Angara is that on the basis of its universal rocket modules it is possible to create a whole family of launch vehicles with a payload capacity of 2.5 to 25 tons for launching cargo into low Earth orbit based on the same universal oxygen-kerosene engine RD-191. Angara-1 has one engine, Angara-3 - three with a total thrust of 600 tons, Angara-5 will have 1000 tons of thrust, that is, it will be able to put more cargo into orbit than Proton. In addition, instead of the very toxic heptyl that is burned in the Proton engines, we use environmentally friendly fuel, after the combustion of which only water and carbon dioxide remain.

How did it happen that the same RD-170, which was created back in the mid-1970s, still remains, in fact, an innovative product, and its technologies are used as the basis for new rocket engines?

A similar story happened to the aircraft created after the Second World War by Vladimir Mikhailovich Myasishchev (long-range strategic bomber of the M series, developed by the Moscow OKB-23 of the 1950s. - "Expert"). In many respects, the aircraft was ahead of its time by about thirty years, and then other aircraft manufacturers borrowed elements of its design. So it is here: in the RD-170 there are a lot of new elements, materials, design solutions. According to my estimates, they will not become obsolete for several decades. This is primarily the merit of the founder of NPO Energomash and its general designer, Valentin Petrovich Glushko, and Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences Vitaly Petrovich Radovsky, who headed the company after Glushko's death. (Note that the world's best energy and performance characteristics of the RD-170 are largely due to Katorgin's solution to the problem of suppressing high-frequency combustion instability by developing anti-pulsation baffles in the same combustion chamber. - "Expert".) And the RD-253 engine of the first stage for rocket carrier "Proton"? Adopted back in 1965, it is so perfect that it has not been surpassed by anyone so far! This is exactly how Glushko taught to design - at the limit of the possible and necessarily above the world average.

It is important to remember something else: the country has invested in its technological future. How was it in the Soviet Union? The Ministry of General Engineering, which was in charge, in particular, of space and rockets, spent 22 percent of its huge budget on R&D alone - in all areas, including propulsion. Today, the amount of funding for research is much less, and this says a lot.

Doesn’t the achievement of certain perfect qualities by these LREs, and this happened half a century ago, does not mean that a rocket engine with a chemical energy source is, in a sense, becoming obsolete: the main discoveries have been made in new generations of LREs, now we are talking more about the so-called supporting innovations?

Certainly not. Liquid rocket engines are in demand and will be in demand for a very long time, because no other technology is able to more reliably and economically lift cargo from the Earth and put it into low Earth orbit. They are environmentally friendly, especially those that run on liquid oxygen and kerosene. But for flights to stars and other galaxies, rocket engines, of course, are completely unsuitable. The mass of the entire metagalaxy is 10 to the 56th power of grams. In order to accelerate on a liquid-propellant rocket engine to at least a quarter of the speed of light, an absolutely incredible amount of fuel is required - 10 to 3200 grams, so even thinking about it is stupid. LRE has its own niche - sustainer engines. On liquid engines, you can accelerate the carrier to the second space velocity, fly to Mars, and that's it.

Next step - nuclear rocket engines?

Of course. Whether we will live to see some stages is unknown, and much has been done to develop the nuclear rocket engine already in Soviet times. Now, under the leadership of the Keldysh Center, headed by Academician Anatoly Sazonovich Koroteev, a so-called transport and energy module is being developed. The designers came to the conclusion that it is possible to create a gas-cooled nuclear reactor that is less stressful than it was in the USSR, which will work both as a power plant and as a source of energy for plasma engines when moving in space. Such a reactor is currently being designed at NIKIET named after N. A. Dollezhal under the guidance of Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences Yuri Grigorievich Dragunov. The Kaliningrad Design Bureau "Fakel" also participates in the project, where electric jet engines are being created. As in Soviet times, the Voronezh Chemical Automation Design Bureau will not do without it, where gas turbines and compressors will be manufactured in order to drive a coolant - a gas mixture - through a closed circuit.

In the meantime, let's fly on a rocket engine?

Of course, and we clearly see the prospects for further development of these engines. There are tactical, long-term tasks, there is no limit: the introduction of new, more heat-resistant coatings, new composite materials, reducing the mass of engines, increasing their reliability, and simplifying the control scheme. A number of elements can be introduced to more closely control the wear of parts and other processes occurring in the engine. There are strategic tasks: for example, the development of liquefied methane and acetylene together with ammonia as a fuel or a three-component fuel. NPO Energomash is developing a three-component engine. Such an LRE could be used as an engine for both the first and second stages. At the first stage, it uses well-developed components: oxygen, liquid kerosene, and if you add about another five percent of hydrogen, then the specific impulse will increase significantly - one of the main energy characteristics of the engine, which means that more payload can be sent into space. At the first stage, all kerosene with the addition of hydrogen is produced, and at the second stage, the same engine switches from running on a three-component fuel to a two-component one - hydrogen and oxygen.

We have already created an experimental engine, however, of small dimensions and a thrust of only about 7 tons, conducted 44 tests, made full-scale mixing elements in nozzles, in a gas generator, in a combustion chamber and found out that it is possible to work first on three components, and then smoothly switch to two. Everything works out, a high combustion efficiency is achieved, but to go further, we need a larger sample, we need to refine the stands to launch the components that we are going to use in a real engine into the combustion chamber: liquid hydrogen and oxygen, as well as kerosene. I think this is a very promising direction and a big step forward. And I hope to do something in my lifetime.

- Why the Americans, having received the right to reproduce the RD-180, cannot make it for many years?

Americans are very pragmatic. In the 1990s, at the very beginning of working with us, they realized that in the energy field we were far ahead of them and we needed to adopt these technologies from us. For example, our RD-170 engine in one launch, due to its higher specific impulse, could take out two tons more payload than their most powerful F-1, which at that time meant a win of 20 million dollars. They announced a competition for a 400-ton engine for their Atlases, which was won by our RD-180. Then the Americans thought that they would start working with us, and in four years they would take our technologies and reproduce them themselves. I immediately told them: you will spend more than a billion dollars and ten years. Four years have passed, and they say: yes, six years are needed. More years have passed, they say: no, we need eight more years. Seventeen years have passed, and they have not reproduced a single engine!

They now need billions of dollars just for bench equipment. We have stands at Energomash where you can test the same RD-170 engine in a pressure chamber, the jet power of which reaches 27 million kilowatts.

I heard right - 27 gigawatts? This is more than the installed capacity of all nuclear power plants of Rosatom.

Twenty-seven gigawatts is the power of the jet, which develops in a relatively short time. When tested on a stand, the jet energy is first extinguished in a special pool, then in a dispersion pipe with a diameter of 16 meters and a height of 100 meters. To build such a stand, in which an engine is placed that creates such power, you need to invest a lot of money. The Americans have now abandoned this and are taking the finished product. As a result, we are not selling raw materials, but a product with a huge added value, in which highly intellectual labor has been invested. Unfortunately, in Russia this is a rare example of high-tech sales abroad in such a large volume. But this proves that correct staging question we are capable of much.

Boris Ivanovich, what should be done in order not to lose the head start gained by the Soviet rocket engine building? Probably, in addition to the lack of funding for R&D, another problem is also very painful - personnel?

To stay on the world market, we must constantly move forward and create new products. Apparently, until we were completely pressed down and the thunder struck. But the state needs to realize that without new developments it will find itself on the margins of the world market, and today, in this transitional period, while we have not yet grown to normal capitalism, it should first of all invest in the new - the state. Then you can transfer the development for the release of a series of private companies on terms that are beneficial to both the state and business...
Source.

And here's what's amazing! In this story of Academician Boris Katorgin, the creator of the best rocket engines in the world, there is not a word about the fact that "the Americans did not fly to the moon"! However, he does not need to shout about it. After all, it is enough to say and prove that only Russia today has an RD-170 rocket engine with a thrust of 800 tons, created in 1987-1988, the characteristics of which alone can ensure the flight of a spacecraft to the Moon and back. Americans don’t even have such an engine today!

Worse, they cannot even organize the production of the Soviet RD-180 engine, twice as weak in power, the license for the manufacture of which Russia kindly sold them ...

But what about the American rocket Saturn-5, the launch of which was observed in July 1969 by millions of people who followed the "lunar program"? - maybe someone will say now.

Yes, there was such a rocket. And she even took off from the spaceport! Only her task was not to fly to the moon, but only to show everyone that the takeoff had taken place. And this should have been recorded by television cameras, as well as the eyes of all kinds of witnesses. Then the Saturn-5 rocket fell into the Atlantic Ocean. Her first stage fell there, and her head part, and the descent module, in which there were no astronauts ...

As for the engines of the Saturn V rocket...

For a "fake flight" the rocket did not need to have any outstanding rocket engines with particularly high power! It was quite possible to get by with those engines that the Americans had been able to develop by that time!

The launch of the "lunar rocket" Saturn-5, as you know, took place on July 16, 1969. On July 20 and 21, the American astronauts allegedly were able to walk on the Moon and even hoist the American flag on it, and on July 24, 1969, on the ninth day of the expedition, they returned very cheerful in the descent capsule to Earth.

The cheerfulness of the US astronauts immediately caught the eye of all specialists. She couldn't help but be confused. Well, how is it?! It can not be!..

Here is the testimony of Russian professionals from the cosmonaut search and rescue group. The picture after landing is as follows: “The approximate state of the astronaut is as if a person ran a thirty-kilometer cross-country race, and then rode a carousel for several more hours. Coordination is disturbed, the vestibular apparatus is disturbed. Therefore, a mobile hospital is necessarily deployed next to the landed descent vehicle. Immediately upon landing, we check the condition of the astronauts' heart system, pressure, pulse, the amount of oxygen in the blood. The astronauts are transported in the prone position."

In other words, if the astronauts were on earth orbit for at least a few days, then in the first hours after their return they are in a state of extreme fatigue and are practically unable to move independently. A stretcher and a hospital bed are their fate for the coming days.

This is how real astronauts return from shaving:

And here is how the Americans returned, who allegedly visited the moon and spent almost 9 days in weightlessness. They themselves famously got out of the descent capsule, and already without spacesuits!

And just 50 minutes later, Neil Armstrong, Edwin Aldrin and Michael Collins took part in a rally dedicated to their return to Earth! (But then they used diapers as a colostomy bag and a urinal! In 9 days it should have turned out 5 kg of shit and 10 liters of urine for each, at least! How quickly did they wash themselves?!)

Let us return, however, to the engines of the Saturn-5 rocket.

In 2013, the news spread around the world: “At the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, it was possible to find and raise parts of the F-1 liquid rocket engine that fell along with the spent first stage S-IC-506 of the Saturn V launch vehicle, which was launched on July 16, 1969! It was this combination of five F-1 engines that propelled the launch vehicle and the Apollo 11 spacecraft, crewed by astronauts Neil Armstrong, Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin, and Michael Collins, off Launch Pad 39A on their historic flight. the combustion chamber of one of the two discovered F-1 engines, from a depth of ~3 miles.In addition to the engines, parts of the first stage structure were found, destroyed after falling at the moment of impact on the water.

The first stage of the S-IC separated after 150 seconds from the start of the F-1 engines, informed the launch vehicle and space ship speed of 2.756 km / s, and raised the bundle to a height of 68 kilometers. After separation, the first stage moved along a ballistic trajectory, rising at apogee to a height of about 109 kilometers, and falling at a distance of about 560 kilometers from the launch site in Atlantic Ocean.

S-IC-506 crash site coordinates in the Atlantic Ocean: 30°13"N, 74°2"W.

Source.

How the engines of the Saturn-5 rocket were raised:

It is alleged that fragments of this liquid-propellant rocket engine have been raised from the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, which the United States for some reason does not see any point in producing further today, and therefore they prefer to buy Russian-made rocket engines for their needs - RD-180!

Model of the F-1 engine, on which the Saturn-5 "lunar rocket" allegedly flew.

Here is our famous Russian engine that Russia is selling today to US missile manufacturers. Don't you find anything strange in this?!

It remains for me to tell you about one more discovery, which was made in the Atlantic Ocean back in 1970. Then Russian fishermen discovered the descent capsule of the Apollo spacecraft drifting in the sea without astronauts inside. Naturally, the discovery was reported to Moscow, and there they decided to transfer it to the American side.

Translation of the article into Russian:

Russia says it has found and will return the Apollo capsule

MOSCOW (UPI) - The Soviets have pulled a US space capsule out of the ocean, which they describe as part of the Apollo moon missions, and they are going to return it to US officials this weekend, the state news agency TASS said.

Checking this information with US embassy officials showed that the Soviets had at least two weeks to study this space equipment, and American officials knew about it, but the decision to return it now came as a surprise.

A US embassy spokesman said officials inspected the site on Friday and were unable to confirm whether it was a component of the Apollo program. But he added that "I got the impression from their message that this complete piece of equipment, not its fragment.

The Soviets have explicitly stated that they intend to load the capsule aboard the American icebreaker Southwind, which on Saturday called at the Barents Sea port of Murmansk for three days. Subsequently, U.S. officials said they had requested permission from Washington for the transfer.

A three-paragraph statement by TASS on Friday afternoon gave the first suspicion that the Russians had some kind of American spacecraft.

"An experimental space capsule launched under the Apollo program and found in the Bay of Biscay by Soviet fishermen will be handed over to US representatives," it says.

"The US icebreaker Southwind will call at Murmansk on Saturday to pick up the capsule."

Prior to the TASS announcement, the embassy had announced that Southwind would call at Murmansk and stay there from Saturday to Monday to give the crew an opportunity for "rest and entertainment". It described the goodwill prospects of the visit and nothing else.

Asked about the TASS report, an embassy spokesman said the Soviets made the decision without notifying US officials.

"Southwind is going to Murmansk for the stated reasons - recreation and entertainment, and I think you can be pretty sure that the ship's commander knows nothing about it," he said.

Source.

Of course, the Americans did not admit that the descent capsule found by Soviet fishermen was from the same "lunar rocket" that launched on July 14, 1969 and allegedly headed for the Earth's satellite. NASA, as if nothing had happened, said that the Russians had discovered an "experimental space capsule."

At the same time in the book "We have never been to the moon"(Cornville, Az.: Desert Publications, 1981, at p. 75) B. Caseing relates: “During one of my talk shows, a commercial plane pilot called and said he saw an Apollo capsule being dropped from a large aircraft around the time when the astronauts were supposed to "come back" from the moon. Seven passengers - the Japanese also observed this case ... ".

Here is this book, which talks about a completely different Apollo descent capsule, which was dropped from an airplane by parachute to simulate the return of astronauts to Earth:

Source.

And one more touch to continue this topic, which further reveals the American deception:

"This old photograph shows the Bulgarian cosmonaut G. Ivanov and the Soviet cosmonaut N. Rukavishnikov discussing the scheme for the entry of the Soyuz descent vehicle into the dense layers of the atmosphere. The capsule enters the dense layers of the atmosphere at a speed many times greater than the speed of sound. All the energy of the oncoming the air flow turns into heat and the temperature in the hottest place (near the bottom of the apparatus) reaches several thousand degrees!

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