The space tragedy that shocked the world: Remembering the mission that landed with a dead crew as Soyuz MS-29 prepares to fly |
On 30 June 1971, recovery teams in Kazakhstan approached a Soyuz capsule that appeared to have completed a flawless return from space. The spacecraft had undocked from the world’s first space station, survived re-entry, deployed its parachutes, and landed exactly as planned. Yet when the hatch was opened, commanders found all three cosmonauts dead. The…