Vladimir Chelomey

Vladimir Nikolayevich Chelomey (also transliterated Chelomei) was a Soviet missile and spacecraft designer, born on 30 June 1914 in Sedlets, Ukraine, and died in December 1984. He was a precocious engineer who published his first book, Vector Analysis, at 22 and finished his doctoral dissertation in 1941. In 1942 he independently invented a pulse jet engine, and after the Soviet Union obtained a V-1 in 1944 his group duplicated it as the 10-Kh cruise missile. From 1955 until his death he was Chief Designer, later General Designer, of the design bureau OKB-52, which developed naval cruise missiles, the UR-100 and UR-200 intercontinental ballistic missiles, and the Proton launch vehicle. He also pushed for a leading role in Soviet manned spaceflight, proposing the Raketoplan, the Almaz military space station and the TKS manned ferry spacecraft, and he competed with Sergei Korolev for state support. He died after an accident at his dacha, where his car slipped into gear and crushed him.