Aleksandr Ivanovich Laveykin
Aleksandr Ivanovich Laveykin is a retired Soviet cosmonaut and whose single mission helped turn Mir from a newly launched station into an expanding orbital complex. He flew during Mir EO-2, the first long-duration mission to use the Soyuz-TM spacecraft.
- Born
- April 21, 1951
- Died
- N/A
- Birthplace
- Moscow,Soviet Union
Flights
1
Spacewalks
3
EVA time
8 hours, 48 minutes
In space
174 days, 3 hours, 25 minutes
Bio
Laveykin came from the Soviet engineering and cosmonaut-training pipeline of the late Salyut and early Mir era. Selected in 1978, he trained for the new station program at a moment when Mir was intended to grow through add-on modules and longer stays than earlier Salyut missions had supported.
He launched on Soyuz TM-2 with Yuri Romanenko in February 1987. During the mission, the crew handled the difficult arrival of Kvant-1, Mir's first expansion module; Laveykin joined Romanenko on an emergency that helped clear debris preventing Kvant from docking fully.
Laveykin completed three EVAs and spent 174 days in space before returning earlier than planned after ground doctors detected minor heart rhythm irregularities. His mission still stands as a major early Mir construction and operations flight.