Miroslaw Hermaszewski

Mirosław Hermaszewski
Intercosmos Cosmonaut
Nationality	Polish
Born	(1941-09-15) 15 September 1941 (age 75) Lipniki in German-occupied Poland (then part of Reichskommissariat Ukraine), now Ukraine
Other occupation	Pilot
Rank	Brigadier General, Polish Air Force
Time in space	7d 22h 02m
Selection	1976 Intercosmos Group
Missions	Soyuz 30
Mission insignia

Mirosław Hermaszewski (born September 15, 1941) is a retired Polish Air Force officer and cosmonaut. He became the first (and to this day remains the only) Polish national in space, when he flew aboard the Soviet Soyuz 30 spacecraft in 1978.

Mirosław Hermaszewski was born into a Polish family in Lipniki, formerly in the Wołyń Voivodeship of Poland, but at the time part of Reichskommissariat Ukraine, and since the end of the Second World War in Ukraine. He is a survivor of the Volhynian massacres during which Ukrainian nationalists murdered 19 members of his family, including his father. Hermaszewski narrowly escaped death himself when the Ukrainian Insurgent Army attacked Lipniki on the night of 26–27 March 1943. After the incorporation of former Polish territory into the Ukrainian SSR at the end of the war, what was left of Hermaszewski's family were deported to Wołów near Wrocław, where he completed elementary and high school.

In 1965, he graduated from the military pilot school in Dęblin. In 1978, he was chosen from almost 500 Polish pilots to take part in the Intercosmos space program. Together with Pyotr Klimuk, he spent almost eight days on board the Salyut 6 space station (from 17:27 on 27 June to 16:31 on 5 July 1978). During their time in orbit, they carried out various geoscience experiments and photographed the Earth.