A Great Typo, And Fantastic Pictures...(But TMA-11 had 16 crew ?)

Soyuz TMA-11 with a crew of 16 members returned to the on April 19, 2008 after spending about six month in the open space. It landed 420 kilometers far from where it was planned to land,

englishrussia.com...

I don't think 16 people have ever been off world at any given time. That would be a shuttle, the crew of ISS, plus you'd need three more to make it sixteen.
As a college prank you might get that many in a Volkswagen Beatle, but I wouldn't want to go for a drive.

The link above is worth clicking on just for the great pictures of the landing site, but here's the true story of TMA 11 that only had the normal crew of three. One Russian, one American, and a tourist........
en.wikipedia.org...

The typo probably had its genesis in the fact that two of the three on board -- Peggy Whitson and Yuri Malenchenko -- were part of the International Space Station's crew named Expdedition 16.

...but forget 16 people -- My big question is how the hell do THREE people fit in that thing.

Those were some amazing pictures - I was surprised to see how vast the tundra was - just nothing but grass, as far as you can see. The people looked so weak. Must be tough to try to walk after 6 months of weightlessness.

I think maybe the English translation was done by a computer.

This strange looking piece of kit was used to help cosmonauts re-adjust after several months in orbit.



Its on display in the Russian space museum, loads more cool pictures from the museum can be found here.
Russian Space Museum Pictures


[edit on 15/8/09 by refuse_orders]

Good Lord! I looked at this picture and read the caption after it....

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/0f61bbb19e8c.jpg[/atsimg]

That’s a piece of Siberian tundra burning, but why? That’s no forest fire but what you see here is a landing site of Russian Soyuz spaceship.

That looks more like a crash site than a landing site. I'm surprised anyone survived.

Yeah, it does look like a crash site. This one came down hot and fast on a ballistic re-entry, and it is fortunate that the crew survived.

Check out the few pics with major scorching on the side, and this one that shows dirt clods stuck to the bottom from the impact.

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/3925d9f0666a.jpg[/atsimg]

I think I'd rather take the smooth ride of a Shuttle touching down on a nice runway during re-entry over slamming into the Siberian tundra. That had to be a rough ride down.

One of their orbital drops spent 3 days out in the wilds before the recovery crews could find them.

I'd like to see the Shuttles keep flying if they had the money for it.
Even if the Russians have a very reliable craft, the USA needs to keep their own ability to get to and from space.

Originally posted by anxietydisorder
Yeah, it does look like a crash site. This one came down hot and fast on a ballistic re-entry, and it is fortunate that the crew survived...

I'm not sure if the grass fire started because the capsule "came down hot" or because of the landing engines -- or "retro-rockets" -- that turn on immediately before the capsule touches down.

You can see the engines at the 12:00 and 6:00 position on the underside in that picture in your post.

Here's a description of the landing engines from NASA.gov:

- Landing engines

The main chute slows the Soyuz to a descent rate of only 24 feet per second, which is still too fast for a comfortable landing. One second before touchdown, two sets of three small engines on the bottom of the vehicle fire, slowing the vehicle to soften the landing.

Source: NASA.gov

[edit on 8/16/2009 by Soylent Green Is People]