Portal:Spaceflight/Selected article/Week 31 2008

Salyut 6 (Russian: Салют-6; lit. Salute 6) was a Soviet orbital station. Launched on 29 September 1977, the station was the first of the 'second-generation' type of space station, possessing several revolutionary advances over the earlier Soviet space stations, which it resembled in overall design. The most notable upgrade was a second docking port which allowed for crew handovers and for station resupply by unmanned Progress freighters. The launch of Salyut 6 allowed the Soviet space station programme to evolve from short-duration to long-duration expeditions, and marked the beginning of the transition to multi-modular, long-term research stations in space.

From 1977 until 1982 Salyut 6 was visited by five long-duration crews and 11 short-term crews, including cosmonauts from Warsaw Pact countries. The very first long-duration crew on Salyut 6 broke a long-standing endurance record set on board the American Skylab station, staying 96 days in orbit. The longest flight on board Salyut 6 lasted 185 days. After Salyut 6 manned operations were discontinued in 1981, a heavy unmanned TKS spacecraft, derived from hardware left over from the cancelled Almaz military space station programme and flown under the designation Kosmos 1267, was docked to the station as part of a hardware test. Salyut 6 was deorbited on 29 July 1982, almost five years after her launch.

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