CREWING FOR SOVIET PILOTED SPACE MISSIONS

1960-1974

VOSTOK

Vostok in 1960

The original Vostok training group was established in May 1960 and comprised:

Kartashov and Varlamov were replaced in the training group by Bykovskiy and Nelyubov in June 1960.

Vostok in 1961-62

After Vostok-2, by October 1961, six cosmonauts were training for future Vostok missions. They were:

On 20 February 1962, the group was reduced to four men:

By May 1962, Nelyubov was removed from the group and replaced by Komarov and Volynov.

Vostok in 1963

By January 1963, there were two teams training for future Vostok missions:

After Vostok-5/6, a new training group was established on 17 September 1963 and comprised:

By 25 January 1964, this group comprised:

Vostok training was terminated in February-April 1964 upon the initiation of the Voskhod program.

The final crewing schedule for Vostok was as follows:

Mission	Prime Crew	Backup Crew	2nd Backup
Vostok	Gagarin	Titov	Nelyubov
Vostok-2	Titov	Nikolayev	Nelyubov
Vostok-3	Nikolayev	Bykovskiy	Volynov
Vostok-4	Popovich	Komarov	Volynov
Vostok-5	Bykovskiy	Volynov	Leonov
Vostok-6	Tereshkova	Solovyeva	Ponomareva

VOSKHOD

Voskhod in 1964

On 1 April 1964, the original candidates for the Commander position of the first Voskhod mission were:

By 21 May 1964, the Commander candidates were:

By 6 July 1964, the initial crew complements were:

The final crew compositions for the first Voskhod, shown in the table below, were confirmed on 24 September 1964.

For the EVA mission, four cosmonauts were in training by July 1964:

Voskhod in 1965-66

The initial Voskhod-3 group began training in March 1965 and comprised:

By 2 April 1965, three crews were proposed for Voskhod-3:

In April 1965, three crews were also proposed for a female EVA flight:

Voskhod crewing changed continuously through 1965. The listings below in the table for Voskhod-3, -4, and -5 refer only to the plans as they stood in January 1966. The pairings would have probably remained the same had the Voskhod program not been terminated in September-October 1966.

In addition to the above listed missions in the table, three other flights were proposed at various times including the female EVA flight whose final crew pairings in January 1966 were:

There were tentative plans to fly the UPMK on a Voskhod mission with the following tentative crews in early 1966:

There were also tentative plans to fly a doctor on a Voskhod mission, but crews were never assigned.

Mission	Prime Crew	Backup Crew	2nd Backup Crew
Voskhod	Komarov Feoktistov Yegorov	Volynov Katys Lazarev	- - Sorokin
Voskhod-2	Belyayev Leonov	Zaykin Khrunov	Gorbatko Kolodin
Voskhod-3	Volynov Shonin	Beregovoy Shatalov
Voskhod-4	Beregovoy Katys	Shatalov Demin
Voskhod-5	Shatalov Demin	Gorbatko Kolodin

Voskhod-3, -4, and -5 were never flown.

SOYUZ (7K-OK)

Soyuz in 1964

The very first Soyuz crews were established on 23 January 1964:

Soyuz-1:

Nikolayev (prime)

Bykovskiy (backup)

Popovich

Titov

Soyuz-2:

Shonin/Demin/Kugno (prime)

Zaykin/Artyukhin/Gulyayev (backup)

Gorbatko/Ponomareva/Kolodin

Shatalov/Solovyeva/Zholobov

 

Soyuz in 1965

By August-September 1965, the candidates for the first Soyuz docking mission were:

From October 1965, six crews trained for Soyuz missions:

The first two of these crews were considered the prime candidates for the first Soyuz docking mission.

By July 1966, there were eight cosmonauts training for the first Soyuz docking mission:

These crews changed almost monthly until 16 November 1966 when the final Soyuz-1/2 crews were firmly fixed. These are shown in the table below.

Soyuz in 1967

At the time of the Soyuz-1 accident, the Soyuz-3/4 crews comprised:

Soyuz-3

Soyuz-4

Soyuz-5 would have been a two-man solo mission with:

Soyuz in 1968

On 6 May 1968, the crews for the planned Soyuz-3/4 were:

Soyuz-3

Soyuz-4

The backup crews would repeat the mission on Soyuz-5/6.

On 3 July 1968, the sequence of missions for Soyuz-3, -4, and -5 was finally changed to that shown in the table below. At the time, Soyuz-6/7 would have also been a docking mission with the following crews:

Soyuz in 1969

By February 1969, the Soyuz-6/7/8 crews were:

Soyuz-6

Soyuz-7

Soyuz-8

These crews were changed in April 1969 to:

Soyuz-6

Soyuz-7

Soyuz-8

Khrunov briefly replaced Kuklin on all three crews until July 1969 when the crews were:

Soyuz-6

Soyuz-7

Soyuz-8

Finally on 18 August 1969, the final crews for Soyuz-6/7/8, listed in the table below, were paired together.

Despite original plans, Soyuz-2 was not flown as a piloted mission. It was eventually flown as an automated mission as a rendezvous target for Soyuz-3.

ZVEZDA (7K-VI)

On 2 September 1966, the original 7K-VI training group was established:

This group was soon reinforced by Voronov and Zaykin.

On 18 January 1967, Artyukhin, Popovich, and Voronov left the team to join the L1 group. In July 1967, Gulyayev left the group, on 16 December 1967 Kolesnikov left, and on 25 December 1967 Belousev left. At various times through 1966-1967, apart from the original members, Gubarev and Shatalov also served in the 7K-VI training group.

In April 1967, Alekseyev, Burdayev, and Porvatkin joined the 7K-VI training group.

Only Gubarev and Zaykin remained in the training group by early 1968 at the time of the project's cancelation.

No 7K-VI missions were ever flown.

SOYUZ-VI

No firm crews for Soyuz-VI were ever established.

The training group for the program in 1968-69 included:

UR-500K-L1

L1 in 1966

On 2 September 1966, the original 7K-L1 training group was proposed:

On 7 December 1966 a new team was proposed:

They were joined in January 1967 by Rukavishnikov and Sevastyanov.

L1 in 1967

After the Soyuz-1 accident, a new 7K-L1 group was established in May-June 1967:

This was the final group of trainees for the project.

L1 in 1968

On 6 February 1968, the choice for candidates for Commanders was finalized:

By 24 September 1968, the prime crew complements for the initial flights were:

Three days later, on 27 September 1968, the final L1 crew pairings were named. They are shown in the table below.

L1 training effectively ceased by April 1969.

Mission	Prime Crew	Backup Crew	2nd Backup Crew
1	Leonov Makarov	Kuklin
2	Bykovskiy Rukavishnikov	Klimuk
3	Popovich Sevastyanov	Voloshin

N1-L3

No formal crews were established for the N1-L3 program.

L3 in 1966

On 2 September 1966, the first L3 training group was proposed:

This group disbanded following the Soyuz-1 accident.

L3 in 1967-68

On 15 December 1967, a new L3 training group of 20 cosmonauts was proposed:

Prior to formal approval by the VVS and the MOM, Nikitskiy and Voloshin were dropped from the group, leaving a team of 18 cosmonauts.

In January 1968, these 18 cosmonauts began training for the L3 program. They were joined soon after by Bugrov (replacing Nikitskiy) and Klimuk (replacing Voloshin).

The 20-member group were augmented by various cosmonauts in 1968. By February 1968, Popovich, Artyukhin, Voloshin, Voronov, and Yershov had joined the team, making a total of 25 cosmonauts.

L3 in 1969

Most of the cosmonauts left for other programs by early 1969.

On 18 June 1969, a new group was established:

L3 training continued sporadically until September-October 1972.

SOYUZ KONTAKT (7K-OK)

The first Kontakt crews were established in February 1969. By April 1969, two separate docking missions were planned (to be executed after the triple Soyuz-6/7/8 mission):

By December 1970, there were four crews in training, with missions to be flown after the DOS-1 space station missions:

All dedicated training for Kontakt was terminated in October 1971. The crews in the table below were the final crews in January 1971 for the Kontakt docking mission in Earth orbit (to test lunar docking hardware).

DOS-1/SALYUT

On 13 May 1970, the original crews for the two DOS-1 missions were finalized as:

On 12 February 1971, after Shonin's illness, the crews were reshuffled as:

Soyuz-11

Soyuz-12

On 4 June 1971, two days before the Soyuz-11 launch, the crews were changed to those listed in the table below.

These were the final crewing arrangements. Soyuz-12 was canceled in early July 1971 and was never flown.

DOS-2

In July 1971, the original crews for DOS-2 were:

Klimuk and Grechko were also in the training group although they were not formally part of a crew. The crew pairings were switched to those listed in the table below in August 1971.

Mission	Crew	Backup Crew	2nd Backup Crew
Soyuz-12	Leonov Kubasov	Lazarev Makarov	Gubarev Grechko
Soyuz-13	Lazarev Makarov	Gubarev Grechko	Klimuk Sevastyanov

Neither of these missions were flown after DOS-2 was destroyed on launch in July 1972.

DOS-3/KOSMOS-557

Mission	Crew	Backup Crew	2nd Backup Crew
Soyuz-12	Leonov Kubasov	Lazarev Makarov	Gubarev Grechko
Soyuz-13	Lazarev Makarov	Gubarev Grechko	Klimuk Sevastyanov

These missions were never flown after the loss of Kosmos-557. They were the exact same crews who had trained for DOS-2.

SOYUZ (7K-T)

Two of the crews who had trained for DOS-2 and DOS-3 trained for the first solo Soyuz mission, Soyuz-12.

Crews for the second solo mission, Soyuz-13, were established in July 1973:

They changed in August 1973 to:

They changed in September 1973 to:

Before the launch of Soyuz-13, the crews changed to those shown in the table.

Mission	Crew	Backup Crew	2nd Backup Crew
Soyuz-12	Lazarev Makarov	Gubarev Grechko	Klimuk Sevastyanov
Soyuz-13	Klimuk Lebedev	Vorobyev Yazdovskiy	Kovalenok Ponomarev

ALMAZ-1/SALYUT-2

Almaz in 1966

On 2 September 1966, the original Almaz training group was established:

Almaz in 1968

The first crews may have been formed as early as January 1968:

Almaz in 1970

At the time of the decision to build DOS in January-February 1970, there were three crews in training for the first Almaz:

Almaz in 1971

In January 1971, the crews were:

These changed in July 1971 to:

After several more reshuffles, the crews were in their final pairings by June 1972, as listed in the table below.

Mission	Crew	Backup Crew	2nd Backup Crew
Soyuz-12	Popovich Artyukhin	Volynov Zholobov
Soyuz-13	Sarafanov Demin	Zudov Rozhdestvenskiy

These missions were not flown after the loss of Salyut-2.

SPIRAL

No crews were ever selected for Spiral.

In July 1965, the first training group for Spiral was established:

On 2 September 1965, the following training group was proposed:

A new group was formed in December 1967:

Titov left in July 1970. Filipchenko was in the team between January 1971 and November 1972. When he left, he was replaced by Khrunov.

As of December 1973, the Spiral team consisted of:

SELECTED SOURCES