Valery Polyakov looks out of Mir as space shuttle Discovery approaches the space station in 1995. (credit: NASA)
When Scott Kelly and Mikhail Kornienko returned from space last week after 340 days, they showed few outward signs of fatigue. Moreover, they had the self-satisfaction of putting in nearly a year of very hard work on the International Space Station. Their efforts, along with those of hundreds of scientists on Earth, will undoubtedly advance our knowledge of the effect of long-duration spaceflight on human health.
But to call Kelly and Kornienko pioneers in the truest sense of the word, as those who ventured into the truly unknown, would be a disservice to the Russian cosmonauts who did so much more than two decades ago in more cramped, less comfortable conditions aboard the Mir space station.
Before NASA’s one-year mission, four Russian cosmonauts had spent a year or more in space, beginning with Vladimir Titov and Musa Manarov in 1987. Russian and Kazakh space officials were quick to remind Kelly and Kornienko of this last week after they landed in a remote area of Kazakhstan.
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