The first Bulgarian flight in the open space

The first Bulgarian to fly in the open space was Georgi Ivanov. His flight was made on 10 April 1979, and lasted two days – until 12 April 1979. Through this flight, Bulgaria became the first nation on the planet to send its representative in outer space. The second Bulgarian-Russian cosmic flight started on June 7 1988, when the Soyuz-TM-5 went into orbit. The second Bulgarian cosmonaut – Alexander Alexandrov, was on the board of the spacecraft. Georgi Ivanov was born in Lovech, Georgi Kakalov attended the Military Air-force School in Dolna Mitropolia. After completing the 5-year education, he served in the Bulgarian National Army as a military pilot. A few years later he became an instructor and head of a division. He, along with Soviet cosmonaut Nikolai Rukavishnikov, was launched into space as part of the Soyuz 33 mission from Baikonur Cosmodrome on April 10, 1979, at 17:34 (GMT). Though take-off was smooth, the mission was a disaster, with severe damage of the engine preventing docking in orbit to Salyut 6 orbital station as it was initially planned. A premature return to Earth became the only possible decision for Ivanov and Rukavishnikov. Due to some additional technical problems landing was difficult to endure — more than 9Gs. When Soyuz 33 finally landed, it was 320 km southeast of Dzhezkazgan. It completed 31 orbits, and was in space for 1 day, 23 hours and 1 minute.