The legendary Soviet cosmonaut has died

Kazakh cosmonaut Talgat Musabayev died at the age of 75, reports Radio Azattyk.

The cause of death has not been reported.

Talgat Musabayev flew to space three times - in 1994, 1998, and 2001. In total, he spent 43 hours and 46 minutes in open space, making 8 spacewalks.

In the early 2000s, he was the head of combat training for the Army Aviation Directorate and deputy head of the Zhukovsky Military Air Engineering Academy. In the mid-2000s, he was the general director of the joint Russian-Kazakh enterprise "Baiterek" and chairman of the Aerospace Committee of the Ministry of Education and Science of Kazakhstan.

He was also the chairman of the National Space Agency of Kazakhstan. He left his leadership position at this agency after his name appeared in the scandalous Airbus case. In 2016, the French publication Mediapart published an investigation into the sale of Airbus helicopters to Kazakhstan in 2010. According to the investigation, Kazakh officials allegedly received 12 million euros. Cosmonaut Talgat Musabayev was mentioned among the main Kazakh figures in the scandal. No investigation was conducted in Kazakhstan itself regarding this matter.