Ignoring that the Soyuz is a more traditional capsule that does land on land, with timed rockets to slow their descent just before impact.
Let’s just say landing on water is better, based on the medical injuries different astronauts have suffered riding home on the Soyuz. Several American astronauts have experienced bruising and joint/back pain from the hard “bone-jarring” landing.
That’s true. Honestly I remember being a kid, learning about the Soyuz recovery system and being shocked. A 20mph collision with the ground (without the braking SRs, 5mph with them) doesn’t sound like much, but it can still ring your bell pretty good.
While the USSR has a history of ignoring human safety, I suspect a large factor for landing on, well, land is the fact they had very few ports open year-round, unlike the US
Another commenter said that capsules are primarily designed for their abort landings. The US launches crewed missions from Florida, so the abort landing options are mostly in the Atlantic (on water landing). Russia launches from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, so their abort landing options are mostly over Northern Asia (on land landing)
Yeah, I saw that comment after writing this one and I agree that that’s moreblikely then mine. That being said, I think my previous comment is at least a tertiary benefit, so I’ll leave it up
Also
We did land on land
For like forty years we did that exclusively
It’s called the Space Shuttle and it’s pretty cool
Ignoring that the Soyuz is a more traditional capsule that does land on land, with timed rockets to slow their descent just before impact.
Let’s just say landing on water is better, based on the medical injuries different astronauts have suffered riding home on the Soyuz. Several American astronauts have experienced bruising and joint/back pain from the hard “bone-jarring” landing.
That’s true. Honestly I remember being a kid, learning about the Soyuz recovery system and being shocked. A 20mph collision with the ground (without the braking SRs, 5mph with them) doesn’t sound like much, but it can still ring your bell pretty good.
True.
While the USSR has a history of ignoring human safety, I suspect a large factor for landing on, well, land is the fact they had very few ports open year-round, unlike the US
Another commenter said that capsules are primarily designed for their abort landings. The US launches crewed missions from Florida, so the abort landing options are mostly in the Atlantic (on water landing). Russia launches from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, so their abort landing options are mostly over Northern Asia (on land landing)
Yeah, I saw that comment after writing this one and I agree that that’s moreblikely then mine. That being said, I think my previous comment is at least a tertiary benefit, so I’ll leave it up