1939-

Russian astronaut who served as flight director of the Salyut-7 and Mir space stations from 1981-89. Ryumin spent a total of 362 days in space, primarily on two missions to the Salyut-6 space station—175 days in 1977 and 185 days in 1980. In 1998 Ryumin was selected by NASA as a crew member of STS-91, the final Shuttle-Mir docking mission and the last phase of the U.S.-Russian joint space program, to be supplanted by the construction of the International Space Station.