Georgy (Yegor) Alekseyevich Prokofiev (born August 17, 1902, in Teleshovo, Vyazma District – died April 23, 1939, in Moscow) was a Soviet Air Forces balloonist who coordinated a military stratospheric balloon program in 1931–1939.
[2] Born in a peasant family in the former Smolensk Governorate, Yegor Prokofiev received a basic education during World War I and worked in the Vyazma railroad yards starting at the age of fifteen.
[3] Prokofiev became an avid balloonist himself, soon assuming the command of the First Airship Division, and turned out to be an effective project manager for the early efforts of the Soviet stratospheric program.
Prokofiev, Konstantin Godunov and co-pilot Ernst Birnbaum lifted off at 8:40 Moscow Time and established radio contact with ground five minutes later.
[3] At 16:36 (8,000 meters) Prokofiev stopped recording flight data and concentrated on airspeed control; around 17:00 the aircraft softly landed on a field near the town of Kolomna, around 110 kilometers (68 mi) from the launch site.
[10] In May 1934 Prokofiev received a go-ahead to proceed with a new gigantic (300,000 cubic meters)[4][11] balloon, the USSR-2 designed by Chizhevsky and Godunov to reach 30 kilometers altitude.
[4][11] Launching a balloon of this size from Russian plains turned out to be a futile race against weather,[12] as even a slight wind prevented safe deployment of the gigantic gas bag.
American balloonists solved the wind challenge by launching from deep canyons (Stratobowl)[13] or mining pits (Crosby, Minnesota)[14] while Soviet Air Forces relied on the single airfield in Moscow suburbs.
[4] On September 18, 1937, the redesigned USSR-3 with Prokofiev, Krikun and Semyonov on board attempted liftoff from Kuntsevo field employing the double launch procedure.
[15] At about 1,200 meters altitude during the double launch sequence the valve was ripped open, again, and the balloon crashed in the woods halfway between Kuntsevo and downtown Moscow; the crew (Prokofiev, Semyonov, Prilutsky) survived with serious injuries.