@The Master of Speed Interesting to see these Speedmaster chronographs given to Russian cosmonauts, at least the lower one to Yuri Romanenko who flew his first spaceflight mission in December 1977... bringing the ex-Alaska II project Speedmaster time pieces to the Salyut-6 space station ( an anniversary we celebrate in a separate topic ) The upper Speedmaster flew with cosmonaut Gennadi Strekalov to the Mir space station in August 1990 ( 130 days 20 hours mission ) Do You have more info on these documents with ASE - Association of Space Explorers logo stamp ?
Cosmonaut Gennadi Strekalov wore the Omega Speedmaster chronograph in this 1990 official RKA/TASS Soyuz TM-10 crew photo .
Anatoli Nikolayevich Berezovoi, 1942 - 2014. Wearing Poljot chronograph. With Valentin Vitalyevich Lebedev, aboard the Salyut 7 station, 1982. the 1990s model:
With the upcoming, July 29th 1978, 40th anniversary of the first EVA - spacewalk during which an Omega Alaska Project Speedmaster in red distinctive outer case was worn by two cosmonauts, I have to share a nice colour image of the Soyuz 26 crew who brought these time pieces aboard the Salyut-6 space station in December 1977... You cannot look past the red outer cases on their left forearm As these ex-Alaska II Project watches stayed aboard Salyut-6 until May 1981, these might have space-flown for almost 900 days... in fact 899 days to be precise if these remarkable chronographs were brought back by the Soyuz T-4 crew, the fifth and final resident crew aboard the Salyut-6 space station .
Earlier contributions in this topic showed that in 1974 we saw the Omega Speedmaster Mark III at the wrist of cosmonaut Gennadi Sarafanov (Soyuz 15) and in 1977 at the wrist of cosmonaut Viktor Gorbatko (Soyuz 24)... Preparing the upcoming anniversary of the first Bulgarian cosmonaut in space, Georgi Ivanov on Soyuz 33 (unable to dock with Salyut-6 so Alex Aleksandrov did another Bulgaria - Intercosmos mission in June 1988 to dock with the Mir space station) I've noticed that Russian cosmonaut Nikolai Rukavishnikov wore, what looks like an Omega Speedmaster Mark III Big Blue during training for the Soyuz 33 mission... Can someone chime in please ? .
That Soyuz 33 photo dates from March 1979, the cosmonaut on the right is Bulgarian Georgi Ivanov... But what about the possible Omega Speedmaster Mark III Big Blue on the wrist of Nikolai Rukavishnikov, looks like the thicker case with 3 pushers, a clear white subdial at 6 o'clock but there's a subdial at 12 as well ???
Thanks for thinking along as all help is appreciated... Via a Russian colleague we talked to several cosmonauts and these men are almost 80 years old and some unfortunately in bad health. But they remember the stories of wrist watches, as often they were gifted these after their Soyuz or long-duration flights. Moreover, on their turn they gifted these to family members or to Russian museums... Here's an interesting story how an onboard clock was salvaged out of Salyut-6 space station and ended up on display: http://clock.angarsk.ru/publication/37-kosmicheskie-chasy.html
As usual Omega Speedmaster chronographs were worn on the left forearm of the Russian Sokol space suit... Soyuz MS10 crewmember American astronaut Nick Hague wore additional watches on each wrist... .
Thanks for the video! I saw that they had to abort but was not sure why and I wanted to see the clip!
What straps do they use? I always assumed they had some sort of "official" strap, and that the one that comes with the modern Speedy big black box was just some sort of Omega branded copy they included. But in this picture below it looks a lot like the velcro strap that is included in the box. It looks like it has the Omega logo with the part number below it. Is it actually the same strap?
That is a very good spot. It certainly looks like the Omega OEM Velcro strap from where I am sitting...