posted 08-07-2013 09:24 AM               

This suit belonged to Aleksandru Lazutkinu. He was Flight Engineer on Expedition EO-23 to the orbital complex "Mir" in in 1997, which launched on 10 February 1997 on Soyuz TM-25. I believe he wore this suit on-board MIR but have no provenance to prove it.

posted 09-03-2013 03:03 AM               

Updated information on the suit:

The Moscow Industrial-Trading Sewing Association (Moskovskoe Proizvodstennoe-Topgovoe Shvejnoe Obedinenie - MPTShO) 'Vimpel' ('Pennant') was involved in the Soviet/Russian space program since the late 1960's, early 1970's. Vimpel produced the "Diamond" exercise package for the Soyuz-9 mission and the Salyut missions. This package included the TNK-1 and TNK-"Athlet" suits, both for use with the onboard treadmill. Also, Vimpel produced the colorful TK-2 (Earth bound) training suits, which were introduced for the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project in 1975 and were still used during the Mir program. All these equipment was decorated with the Vimpel "Diamond" patch - not showing the company name, but a rocket with 'CCCP'. The patch itself did not make it into the late 1990's: it was still seen during training for Soyuz TM-7 (1988), but disappeared shortly thereafter from the TK-2 suits.