Levset Darchev - Burnt by shuttle

The plane steeply went down and, not reaching out to the ground security strip, fell on the open field and several times rolled over. He saw then the wreckage of the plane -part of the twisted fuselage, where the cabin was located, lay far from the place where the plane crashed. It was difficult imagine how you could survive with numerous fractures of the thoracic spine and nose and not to remain disabled for life.

He at the hospital asked the doctor not to report it wife: “Let them say that I took a business trip.” But not it happened: his wife ran in a jiffy. He then for the first time thought about the fact that his love has two completely opposite sides: love of the family and love of the skay. Like the two wings of aircraft – if there is not one of them, then it will fall just as the plane fell.

After the accident, he fell into depression, finding no answers, why it happened, and was looking forward to the results of the state commission. A month later he was informed that the fault was engine wear, which also increases the risk of nipness of surging. Because of the overflow on the endings due to deterioration of the sealing layer compression ratio of the compressor. With a sharp increase in the ma excess capacity on the turbine exceeds the required and, For this reason, the growth of turnover is faster than the estimated turnover -There are no prerequisites for the occurrence of surging. And so It happened.

A month in the hospital, then grueling exercises for recovery of the body. Otherwise it could be written off.

Another flight accident. In 1977 in the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Ministry of Defense finally drew attention to the high aviation accidents in combat units in peacetime, dozens of class pilots lost their lifes. It was adopted a special “Decree on reducing accident rates” One of the events in the 5th army stuffy had a demonstrative bailout for pilots. In front of me is a catapult chair with a modified fitsirovannoy construction. The commander stands nearby and looks at me.

“Well, Magomed, will we do it?” He asks, to understand that this is not an order, but a request. “By the way,

do you know who was the first to experience a catapult in our country. – he looks at me, wanting to say something nice. I think that it should be someone of my acquaintances. I shake my head – “This is your fellow countryman…” I begin to guess who we will talk about Ametkhan Sultan. It is a legend of the Soviet aviation. Ametkhan Sultan. I feel pride.

“Very well, Comrade Colonel,” I say, “I’ll jump whatever happens”.

“Not at once, Magomed,” the commander replies. – First you need to examine and test the operation of all mechanisms.

The following days the chair was dismantled and collected several times, and the jump was postponed. As a result, because of the increasing stress and fuss, the technician, after another analysis of the device, forgot one small detail-he did not twist one nut.

“I fly up to a small height, so that the pilots on the ground could clearly see the whole process, I click on the button catapult, I hear the clapper click. At the same time instantly I realize that the automatic machine from the chair is not botal. The height is six hundred meters. Below, looking up at the sky, the pilots are waiting for an exemplary master ejection of the experienced pilot. Nothing happens. I feverishly start manually undocking the chair – it takes precious time with loss of height. As a result, before the eyes of the

glare my parachute opens at an altitude of twenty meters.The blow to the ground was so strong that my eyes flashed sparks. For a slight omission I paid dearly my health – compression fracture: eight to twelve departments of the spine. Lying in the hospital, I thought about the regiments and Ametkhan Sultan.”

To the aerodrome, he arrived on time, as promised to Scheffer half an hour before the flight to Baikonur. In the shirt undone on her breast. with a helmet in his hand, he went to a cafe and sat down at the table near the window, not noticing how the two from the far corner began to drill his eyes. One of them was his colleague by cosmonaut Yuri Shaffer, originally from Chelyabinsk, who got into the detachment of the second set with Magomed

The selection was problematic, because after a series of deaths, which the media called “a curse of Buran”, many pilots, especially superstitious, refused.

The first selection was 500 people for eight seats, and the second was weaker: only the most confident in themselves, the most purposeful, gave consent. But they were not of the weak.

Schaeffer

Scheffer flew on a heavy supersonic bombardment a chisel with a variable geometry of the Tu-22M2 wing. He once upon landing of this aircraft at the White military base under Irkutsk broke the mechanism of release of slats and flaps. At the command post, panic and order -to be tapped: the aircraft with such a malfunction can not sit down. The psychology of the Soviet pilot – how much the country looses, and Schaeffer as a real person takes decision to land the aircraft, despite the danger for life. As a result, he successfully landed an unguided aircraft on the runway. Specialists began to study the method of landing and recognized. that the Sheffer opened a new page in the piloting of high-speed bombers

A young girl with a white apron with a large pocket took coffee for Magomed and began to return to the counter. Yuri In a low voice, putting a finger to his lips, called out:

– Nastya!

Nastya deviated from the route and went to the table were was sitting Yuri.

– I listen to you, Yuri Petrovich, – with elegant movement her hands removed the hanging hair on the forehead behind her ear.

“For fun, dear,” Yuri said. – Take a cup of coffee from that young man and bring it here.

The girl smiled and glanced at Magomed, who pressed his lips slowly to the cup. She returned smiling face to Yuri, appreciating the preaction of the host of the cup.

“It’s not proper,” said Nastya, still smiling.

– Oh please. He is some kind of sad and unlike himself – he does not see his friends. Let’s move him.

The girl got courage and walked to the table of Magomed. She apologized and under a dumbfounded look of Magomed picked up the cup with the coffee and carried away in the other direction, on the line of which he sought Scheffer, who smiled, his mouth wide.

Magomed laughed too, the first time since morning, stood up and,

came to him.

– If Magomed does not go to the mountain, then the mountain should go to Magomed, “said Yuri, rising from his chair to greet. – Meet him, this is a journalist from the ‘Red Star’” – Victor. On his own initiative he conducts an investigation of the series of disasters in our detachment.

– Tolboyev! – Victor exclaimed, holding out his hand to

say hello again. – I’ve heard a lot about you: a professional

on landing aircrafts without an engine!

“Not only,” -Yura put in, “the conqueror of the sky.” When he flies the aerodynamics is silent…

On the table, a pack of cigarettes, a pen, papers and two glasses, on the bottom which gleams the rest of the vodka.

“Do not judge, brother,” said Yuri, when he saw that the eyes of Magomed stopped at the glasses. “I’m tired as hell.” Just flew from distant foreign shores.

Magomed raised his left hand and turned to him to look at the clock – before departure for Baikonur, is still left half an hour.

“What do you need from me, Yuri?” Asked Magomed. – I just understand that if an investigation is conducted, it must be carried out special services.

Generous wrinkles around Yura’s eyes thickened. He exchanged a glance with Victor-

– Only listen to me, I will speak, – reported Yura. “There’s something unclean, Magomed.” Someone wants to derail -our program for which is spent thirteen years of a huge team. You forgot the poem of Chugovets after Kononenko’s death: “Who’s next?..”. You and I have families – I do not want to perish. – Yuri nervly hit the table with his finger twice.