#museum of cosmonautics

[newpuritan]

I made a design of a Soviet monument I saw in the Ukrainian town of Zhytomyr, fairly close to the Museum of Cosmonautics. It celebrates achievements in deep space communication ("Earth Space Connection") and has two cosmonauts holding up a banner for world peace. I put the design on my website so you can get it on a t-shirt or bag or something if you are that way inclined. It's available with either Ukrainian or English text.

[na77ator]

Berkut Space Suit Scale model 1:1 PLANT PO BOX №1052 GKAT (ZVEZDA RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT PRODUCTION ENTERPRISE) BEGINNING OF DEVELOPMENT: 1964. WEIGHT: 20 KG (INCLUDING LIFE-SUPPORT SYSTEM: 41.5 KG) The Berkut was the first space suit designed for extravehicular activity. It was in this suit that on March 18, 1965, Alexey Leonov became the first person in history who did a spacewalk. The cosmonaut spent 12 minutes and 9 seconds outside of the Voskhod-2 spacecraft. The space suit was used not only for extravehicular activity, but also as a protective suit during launch and landing. The estimated operating time of the space suit in a depressurised cabin was 4 hours. During spacewalk it could operate 45 minutes

Museum of Cosmonautics (Moscow)

[apurbopulok]

Thousands of tons of cosmic dust are estimated to reach the Earth's surface every year, with most grains having a mass between 10−16 kg (0.1 pg) and 10−4 kg (0.1 g). The density of the dust cloud through which the Earth is traveling is approximately 10−6 dust grains/m3.

The best spots to look for and find the extra-terrestrial dust particles are surfaces with little vegetation and erosion, where, once landed, they remain collectable for a long time: for example on ice surfaces in the Antarctic or on the seabed. Researchers from the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin and the Freie Universität Berlin now want to tap a new source of the scientifically very valuable material. They are counting on the active support of Berlin citizens.

Cosmic crumbs

“We want to collect micrometeorites, they are usually less than one millimetre in size, from Berlin roofs,” says project manager Lutz Hecht. The idea has already proven successful: The researchers extracted 63 micrometeorites from many kilogrammes of dust from a roof area of around 5000 square metres. They are now identifying further roofs, which could be good places to find more due to their location and nature.

At the selected locations, the material is swept together and the particles from 0.1 to 0.8 millimetres in size are sifted out. Magnetically reacting particles are then extracted from these. The yield is washed, light particles discarded and the remaining material is dried and examined under microscopes. “This is a very time-consuming task that requires the help of volunteers who help us picking out the interesting objects,” says Hecht.

Whether the interesting objects actually are micrometeorites will be checked with an electron microscope. The museum’ geochemical and microanalytical laboratories are equipped for analysis

[omgellendean]

The space dogs' suits were so tiny 😭🤏🐕

[tmblristhefuckingworst]

The Motherland Meets a Hero by Mikhailo Khmelko (1961)

[moonwatchuniverse]

45 years Omega Alaska Project in space Baikonour 1977, October 9, as  Soyuz 25 cosmonauts Vladimir Kovalyonok and Valeri Ruymin boarded their launch vehicle, they clearly wore the Alaska II Project Speedmaster chronographs with large red distinctive outer cases strapped over the left forearm of their Sokol KV01 space suits. Designed and tested by NASA for use on the Lunar Rover vehicle in the harsh radiation filled, dusty lunar surface outer space environment, these ultimate space watches were not used by American astronauts. After finding out how 50 years ago, Omega contacted the Russian Space program, and how these ultimate space watches in their distinctive red outer cases were ordered via fax from Moscow to Bienne, we now bring the complete story of the ex-Alaska II Speedmaster chronographs behind the Iron Curtain. Via the BIS, in September 2018 at the 31st planetary ASE congress (Association of Space Explorers) in Minsk - Belarus, MoonwatchUniverse contacted two cosmonauts, Vladimir Kovalyonok (Soyuz 25) and later to Yuri Romanenko (Soyuz 26) about the ex-Alaska II Speedmaster chronographs used onboard the Salyut-6 space station in 1977 & 1978. References: Time Peace – How Omega watches got into the Soviet-Russian space programme. To Russia with Love - The Most Famous Speedmaster To Never Go To Space, Actually Did. (Photo: TASS/Roscosmos)

[parasitoidism]

my dad knows what yuri is because at a museum he used to work at he was trying to organize some event about Yuri Gagarin and im still not over the mental image of my 50 year old father sitting down at his computer at work and googling "yuri images" fully expecting to see black and white photos of the russian cosmonaut and just seeing anime girls kissing instead

[jube-art]

Hi I love your art and I'd love to hear more about you Night at the Museum AU!!!!

Tim, rather notoriously, didn’t have a family. He was the only living exhibit in Space section, the lone cosmonaut among the turning planets and the swirling galaxies. In the day, he hung suspended, an almost weightless figure among the stars. 

He could just imagine Tim trapped in there with no one else. The doors close. The room becoming as dark as the space Tim was made to symbolise. The beautiful exhibit turning into something sinister. Space becoming confined. A prison. 

-@salparadiselost, Kindling, night at the museum au

[ddagent]

F4

"Time and Space" Margo/Sergei | Future Fic | FR15 | 1,241 words     Margo Madison, descendant of her NASA Director namesake, welcomes a Russian envoy aboard the International Space Station. Anonymous requested: F4. Margo & Sergei's future descendants are able to make it work. Happy reading!

"Director Madison?" Margo looked up from her desk. "The Russian engineering team have arrived."

"Great.” She looked down at her work, reluctant to leave it unfinished. “Just give me a minute and I'll go meet them."

Margo used her pencil to scribble the last few alterations to the design schematics. There was something comforting working with traditional materials, paper and pen, rather than off of a tablet. She’d heard all the jokes – Director Madison would be better off in the Jamestown Museum – but she enjoyed it. Enjoyed the weight of a pencil in hand. Enjoyed the slide rule that her mentor, Alma Rosales, had given her when she'd been promoted. Wasn't much for vinyl, though. The micro-Walkman she used to listen to jazz was a huge space saver, especially on the International Space Station.

Finished with her alterations, Margo headed out. She threaded her way through the corridors of the station located in orbit around Ganymede, straightening her jacket as she passed astronauts from NASA, Brazil, the M-7 space programs. All but one, of course; they were waiting for her in the docking bay. Their last envoy from Roscosmos had left a month ago; Margo had been glad to see the back of them. One of them, who boasted a long history of cosmonauts on his family tree, had drawn offence at Margo's own lineage and position. Asshole. Despite it being over a hundred and forty years since Alexei Leonov had walked on the Moon, there was still a bitter rivalry between their two space programs.

Continue Reading at the AO3

[sovietpostcards]

I love seeing everything you share, it's such a great glimpse into the past. But I see some things for sale too, and it's made me wonder, do you mostly collect for yourself, or to sell onwards to others to spread the joy? Or is your home like an amazing museum of the Russian/Soviet past? And what's your favourite thing that you've ever stumbled across?

(If those questions are too personal, no offense meant. Thanks for this blog though, it's one of my favs!)

Thank you for the question! :D Always nice to talk about one's obsessions. So, this blog intitially started many years ago as a way to show off my collection of Soviet New Year postcards. A few years later I tried to sell some of my excess postcards and to my surprise, people actually bought them! In 2014-2022 I did the Etsy shop full time. I realized something about myself along the way. While I adore vintage things and I enjoy touching them and looking at them and researching them, I do not need to own them indefinitely. So this shop thing is perfect for me because it gives me a chance to have so many different things and hold them and cherish them, and then I sell them and make money and room to have other things.

So, ever since the 2014, I was only buying things to sell them (and to hold and enjoy them in the process). I do of course sometimes keep things for myself, but probably fewer than you imagine. Some of the things I kept are a vintage Earth globe, a small table, a crystal vase, a bunch of kitchen stuff like cups and bowls and cutlery, a bunch of photography books, a few pins, some towels and linens, and many records and Christmas tree ornaments!

Some of the most memorable things I've come across are this huge wooden cutout of Lenin (sourced from a local school, donated to a local museum), a large and heavy folder of Andrei Sokolov space art prints (sold to the US during the pandemic and nearly gave me a heart attack with how long it travelled), this cartonage cosmonaut ornament (bought at a thrift store in St Petersburg, super expensive, but I've never seen another one), a Yuri Gagarin souvenir plate, a whole bunch of stationery (I love writing letters, I gave some of them to my penpals). The memorability, for me, is often about the process of finding it, not the item itself. Or having it - like the time I put a bunch of flags on the clothesline outside to take a picture. Neighbourhood grandmas sure were surprised. :)

[arabriddler]

Books I got ! One is from the museum of Cosmonautics and two are used books I found!

[thevaultoftheatomicspaceage]

Alexei-Leonov-Over-the-Black-Sea-1973.-c.-The-Memorial-Museum-of-Cosmonautics

[na77ator]

Count Zeppelin and the first airships

The name of Count Zeppelin became a common one, thanks to his invention of airship. He built the first rigid-framed LZ-1 in 1900. Eight years later, Zeppelin made a successful 12-hour flight over Switzerland on the LZ-4, starting the era of rigid airship. In 1928 the passenger LZ-127 with the largest gondola in history was introduced to the public and in 1936 the inter-atlantic LZ-129 appeared, becoming the largest aircraft of its time. Its crash due to a hydrogen leak ended the use of airships for passenger transportation

Airship LZ-1 Scale model: 1:200

Airship LZ-129 Scale model: 1:200

Airship LZ-4 Scale model: 1:200

Airship LZ-127 Scale model: 1:200

Museum of cosmonautics, Moscow

[ladamedusoif]

Hi Rose!

In your list of 5 topics you could speak for an hour on with no preparation, one stands out to me as quite different from the rest…

Apollo 11

How did that fascination start? What about the Apollo 11 mission interests you most? Any fun facts I may not know? (I will warn you that I have spent family vacations the past three years at various air and space museums lol)

*stretches, flexes fingers*

KAT. What a great ask. And yes, my love of the Apollo 11 mission - and the entire space race in general - is probably a little at odds with most of my special interests. I'm also very aware of the inherent problems in the space program, as Gil Scott Heron so beautifully articulated at the time in 'Whitey On The Moon'. But it absolutely fascinates me. Warning: nerding out incoming.

I was always aware of little things about the race for space - I share a birthday with poor Laika's ill-fated launch, so all the 'on this day' stuff I devoured as a kid on my birthday involved a poor little Russian dog going off into space and not returning. Definitely not traumatising or weird. (I have a Laika brooch and fridge magnet, though, as a little nod to this.) And I saw Apollo 13 in cinemas, and was always fascinated by the aesthetic of the program.

With the fiftieth anniversary of the Moon landing in 2019 the BBC launched an utterly brilliant podcast series called Thirteen Minutes to the Moon, which had me hooked. (They did a sequel about Apollo 13, too - highly recommended). I found the narrative fascinating and compelling - not a straightforward tale of heroism and American triumph, nor of absolute loathing of their Soviet cosmonaut rivals and colleagues. (A favourite Apollo 11 detail is that Armstrong and Aldrin left a commemorative medal on the surface of the moon for Yuri Gagarin, first man in space, and Vladimir Komarov, another Soviet space pioneer who died tragically young. Hardly the actions of hardcore Cold Warriors...)

After that I read everything I could lay my hands on about the mission and the space program in general. Michael Collins's extraordinary memoir Carrying the Fire confirmed him as my absolute favourite astronaut: erudite, a Francophile, utterly hilarious (he had a tendency to use slang terms like "that cat" and "baby" casually in his communications during the mission) and with a really insightful understanding of his colleagues. He also designed the initial concept for their mission badge - notably refusing the inclusion of their names, as this would have erased the contribution of so many others, and insisting on the olive branch in the eagle's claws as a sign of peace and goodwill for all mankind.

I also adore Andrew Chaikin's A Man on the Moon, which covers the entirety of the Apollo missions. The Smithsonian/Air and Space Museum (of which Collins was the first director!) also made available countless digitised and scanned items linked to the missions, including these natty purses in the shape of the command module from Apollo 11 that were gifted to the wives of the crew. (Yes, I want one.)

The final thing that hooked me? Todd Douglas Miller's beautiful, powerful Apollo 11 documentary, with a score by Matt Morton that is still on my go-to writing soundtracks list. I can't recommend it enough if you haven't seen it. It's an extraordinary piece of work, one that blends the humanity of the people involved with the epic scale of what was being undertaken.

And I think that's what appeals or interests me about it: the risks, the fears, the hopes, the criticisms, the sense of a world waiting and watching to see how this would play out. And that's why I've got a full Saturn V rocket Lego model on top of one of my bookshelves and a Lunar Lander set waiting to be built...

Thank you so much for asking - and apologies for all this nerding out! (I'm guessing you've seen For All Mankind on Apple + - if not, it's a great counterfactual telling of the story.)

[berrypass-de-murdler]

6. Murder in the Alley

HMMM ANGRY MAGNIFYING GLASS BRINGS ME JOY. I think I will kidnap him. ^w^

GENERAL COFFEE: Bro I don't know what this boi is. My brain is calling him a turkey but... no Anyway, yet another 6-foot character shrunken down to being a short man (not as bad as Logico though). He is one of the only people that Logi knew before the series takes place in the cartoon version. He is SCARILY polite and never breaks the act, even when he decides to (politely) kill people for NO reason. He's a clinical sociopath, but makes it hard to tell...

Cosmonaut Bluski is going over to Fletch and he's obviously another astronaut-suit guy but he's PROBABLY not going to resemble Captain Slate. He's so chill in this version all the time that it's sad

DON'T READ THE EPISODES UNTIL YOU'VE FINISHED THE FIRST BOOK!!

As Logi goes home, he sees a shadow in the woods. He perks up when he hears the word ‘Obsidian’. The shadow tells him that Auree was framed, then is immediately murdered. General Coffee, Midnight III, and Cosmonaut Bluski appear out of nowhere. 

MIDNIGHT: Alright, too much murder stuff… come back to the movies…  LOGICO: Are you kidding? NO!!

Some weird shit happens. Midnight is squished into a chain-link pattern and looks super goofy.

LOGICO: Did you fall asleep?? MIDNIGHT: No 

Logico is distracted by some graffiti because it's 'better' than the art museum from a few episodes ago.

LOGICO: Now THIS is art I can get behind! 

He finally figures out that Coffee strangled the dude for some reason because that relates to war and coffee. 

COFFEE: Don’t worry about it! The government told me to do it, and I did. End of story. Besides, I was trying to PROTECT you! 

Logico ignores him and finds a note in the dead guy’s pocket. ‘The body was moved in the Hollywood mansion.’ Logi starts to regret his bastard actions towards Auree.

The end!

Smoke boi fires short king and is ALREADY begging for him to come back. Midnight is so good at business!!

Unrelated I'm going to order my Irratino plushie soon. The very first plush irratino in existence will be MINE!!! >:)

The power of Goat Lord compels you!

See you next time murdlers!

[jnyfmg]

just came across your blog & was reminded of my favourite exhibition i ever saw at the science museum when i lived in london —

Cosmonauts: Birth of the Space Age

link to a lot of bits from the exhibition

link to a special edition of the science museum group journal

anyway, awakened a really nice memory to see your lovely work

Wowww this is awesome :-) I have been doing a lot of research on cosmonauts to the point that I started studying Russian over the summer LOL... It's difficult to find some of the more detailed history translated into English so it's always cool to see. Thanks!