Soyuz 8 was part of a joint mission with Soyuz 6 and Soyuz 7 that saw three Soyuz spacecraft in orbit together at the same time, carrying seven cosmonauts. October 13 is the 286th day of the year (287th in leap years). ... 1969 was a common year starting on Wednesday (the link is to a full 1969 calendar). ... UTC also stands for the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga Coordinated Universal Time or UTC, also sometimes referred to as Zulu time, the basis for civil time, differs by an integral number of seconds from atomic time and a fractional number of seconds from UT1. ... The Baikonur Cosmodrome (Russian: Космодром Байконур, Kosmodrom Baykonur), also called Tyuratam, is the worlds oldest and largest working space launch facility. ... October 18 is the 291st day of the year (292nd in Leap years). ... 1969 was a common year starting on Wednesday (the link is to a full 1969 calendar). ... The Soyuz human spaceflight programme was initiated in the early 1960s as part of the manned lunar programme that was intended to put a Soviet cosmonaut on the Moon. ... Soyuz 6 was part of a joint mission with Soyuz 7 and Soyuz 8 that saw three Soyuz spacecraft in orbit together at the same time, carrying seven cosmonauts. ... Soyuz 7 was part of a joint mission with Soyuz 6 and Soyuz 8 that saw three Soyuz spacecraft in orbit together at the same time, carrying seven cosmonauts. ... U.S. Space Shuttle astronaut Bruce McCandless II using a manned maneuvering unit. ...

The crew consisted of commander Vladimir Shatalov and flight-engineer Aleksei Yeliseyev, whose mission was to dock with Soyuz 7 and transfer crew, as the Soyuz 4 and 5 missions did. Soyuz 6 was to film the operation from nearby. Vladimir Shatalov Vladimir Aleksandrovich Shatalov (Russian: Владимир Александрович Шаталов; born December 8, 1927 in Petropavlovsk) was a Soviet cosmonaut who flew three space missions of the Soyuz programme: Soyuz 4, Soyuz 8, and Soyuz 10. ... Aleksei Yeliseyev Aleksei Stanislavovich Yeliseyev (Russian: Алексей Станиславович Елисеев; born July 13, 1934 in Zhizdra) was a Soviet cosmonaut who flew on three missions in the Soyuz programme as a flight engineer: Soyuz 5, Soyuz 8, and Soyuz 10. ... Soyuz 4 launched January 14, 1969. ... The Soyuz 5 was a Soyuz spacecraft launched by the Soviet Union on January 15, 1969 that docked with Soyuz 4 in orbit. ...

However, this objective was not achieved due to equipment failures. Soviet sources were later to claim that no docking had been intended, but this seems unlikely, given the docking adapters carried by the spacecraft, and the fact that both Shatalov and Yeliseyev were veterans of the previous successful docking mission. This was the last time that the Soviet crewed Moon landing hardware was tested in orbit, and the failure seems to have been one of the final nails in the coffin of the programme.

The radio call sign of the spacecraft was Granit, meaning 'Granite'. This word is apparently used as the name of a reactive or defensive squadron in Soviet military training, and, just like the Soyuz 5, it was constructed and its crew was trained to be the responsive (not entirely passive) or female spacecraft in its docking. Giving military names to the spacecraft was probably a response to an outcry that the commander of the Soyuz 5 made. Further, the word was probably chosen as it begins with a letter following that which starts the call sign of the Soyuz 7; it is the third letter at least of the Greek alphabet, though neither the Russian or Latin alphabets. The Soyuz 5 was a Soyuz spacecraft launched by the Soviet Union on January 15, 1969 that docked with Soyuz 4 in orbit. ... The Soyuz 5 was a Soyuz spacecraft launched by the Soviet Union on January 15, 1969 that docked with Soyuz 4 in orbit. ... Soyuz 7 was part of a joint mission with Soyuz 6 and Soyuz 8 that saw three Soyuz spacecraft in orbit together at the same time, carrying seven cosmonauts. ...

Crew

• Vladimir Shatalov (2)
• Aleksei Yeliseyev (2)

Vladimir Shatalov Vladimir Aleksandrovich Shatalov (Russian: Владимир Александрович Шаталов; born December 8, 1927 in Petropavlovsk) was a Soviet cosmonaut who flew three space missions of the Soyuz programme: Soyuz 4, Soyuz 8, and Soyuz 10. ... Aleksei Yeliseyev Aleksei Stanislavovich Yeliseyev (Russian: Алексей Станиславович Елисеев; born July 13, 1934 in Zhizdra) was a Soviet cosmonaut who flew on three missions in the Soyuz programme as a flight engineer: Soyuz 5, Soyuz 8, and Soyuz 10. ...

Mission Parameters

• Mass: 6646 kg
• Perigee: 201 km
• Apogee: 227 km
• Inclination: 51.7°
• Period: 88.7 min

Soyuz 7 was part of a joint mission with Soyuz 6 and Soyuz 8 that saw three Soyuz spacecraft in orbit together at the same time, carrying seven cosmonauts. ... The Soyuz human spaceflight programme was initiated in the early 1960s as part of the manned lunar programme that was intended to put a Soviet cosmonaut on the Moon. ... Soyuz 9 paved the way for the Salyut space station missions, investigating the effects of long-term weightlessness on crew, and evaluating the work that the cosmonauts could do in orbit, individually and as a team. ...