The Complete Book of Spaceflight: From Apollo 1 to Zero Gravity

grams for space settlement and long-term flights should
pay attention to ...social-psychological problems, such
as communications between people on Earth and those
working in space.” He becomes weary of the tedium:
“October 13: Five months of flight. I cannot believe
that we have flown for so long. We don’t feel time anymore.
It’s getting more difficult now. I begin to count
the days ...I think our fatigue grows because our interest
in work is fading. I don’t even want to look out the
porthole anymore.” And he offers a frank account of his
return to Earth: “December 10: It was dark outside. The
air smelled fresh. The snow fell lightly on my face. But
all I felt was sick to my stomach ...I asked for a napkin
and threw up into it. After I threw up a few more times,
I felt better.” There are some lighter moments, too,
among them the tale of the constipated French visitor
to the station, the sunbathing sessions at the porthole,
the laborious bathing procedure, and the admission
that extended weightlessness left the cosmonauts much
“furrier.”
LEO (low Earth orbit)
Definitions vary. According to some, LEO includes
orbits having apogees (high points) and perigees (low
points) between about 100 km and 1,500 km. Others
extend that range up to 2,000 or 3,000 km. In some cases,
the distinction between LEO and MEO (medium Earth
orbit) is dropped, and LEO is considered to be any orbit
below geosynchronous altitude. The majority of all satellites,
as well as the Space Shuttle and International Space
Station, operate from LEO, so that this region of space is
getting very crowded. According to the U.S. Space Command,
which keeps track of the various items in Earth
orbit, there are now more than 8,000 objects larger than
a softball in LEO.
LES Spacecraft
LES (Lincoln Experimental Satellite) 235
Leonov, Alexei Archipovich (1934–)
A Soviet cosmonaut who, on March 18, 1965, during the
flight of Voskod 2, became the first person to go on a
spacewalk. He also served as the Soviet capsule commander
during the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project (ASTP).
Leonov graduated with honors from Chuguyev Higher
Air Force School in 1957, then joined the Soviet Air
Force as a fighter pilot before being selected as one of the
original group of 20 cosmonauts on March 7, 1960. Following
the Voskhod 2 mission, he attended the
Zhukovsky Air Force Engineering Academy, graduating
in 1968. For various reasons, his return to space was
much delayed. He was assigned to the secret manned
Soviet lunar project, but this was canceled. Later he was
put on the flight crew of Soyuz 11, but a few days before
launch, another crew member became ill, and the backup
crew was sent instead. All three backup crew members
died due to a malfunction during reentry. As a result, the
flight that Leonov had been reassigned to, Soyuz 12a,
was canceled. His next scheduled flight, aboard Soyuz
12b, was also canceled because of the in-orbit failure of
Cosmos 557. Finally, Leonov returned to space as commander
of Soyuz 19 on the ASTP. While in orbit, he
made sketches, including one of the American astronaut
Thomas Stafford, using a set of colored pencils attached
to his wrist with a makeshift bracelet. Leonov was subsequently
promoted to major-general, and served as commander
of the cosmonaut team (March 1976 to January
1982) and as deputy director of the Gagarin Cosmonaut
Training Center, until his retirement in 1991.
LES (Lincoln Experimental Satellite)
Spacecraft that were designed and built in the 1960s and
1970s by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Lincoln
Laboratory as part of the Lab’s Air Force–sponsored
Launch site: Cape Canaveral
Launch
Spacecraft Date Vehicle Orbit Mass (kg)
LES 1 Feb. 11, 1965 Titan IIIA 2,783 × 2,809 km × 32.1° 31
LES 2 May 6, 1965 Titan IIIA 2,771 × 14,810 km × 32.2° 37
LES 3 Dec. 21, 1965 Titan IIIC 267 × 4,829 km × 26.5° 16
LES 4 Dec. 21, 1965 Titan IIIC 189 × 33,632 km × 26.6° 52
LES 5 Jul. 1, 1967 Titan IIIC 33,188 × 33,618 km × 11.6° 194
LES 6 Sep. 26, 1968 Titan IIIC 35,771 × 35,847 km × 13.0° 163
LES 8 Mar. 15, 1976 Titan IIIC 35,687 × 35,886 km × 17.0° 454
LES 9 Mar. 15, 1976 Titan IIIC 35,745 × 35,825 km × 17.0° 454