Who Hold The Record For The Longest Manned Space Flight?

The record till date of the longest ever manned space flight mission is held by the team commanded by Kenneth D. Cockrell with Kent V. Rominger as the pilot and Tamara E. Jerniganas, Thomas and D, F. Story Musgrave Jones as the mission specialists. The mission was launched on November 19, 1996 at Cape Canaveral. The shuttle landed back on December 07 1996 at Kennedy Space Center. The whole journey lasted for 17 days 15 hours 53 minutes 18 seconds. The landing was postponed by a couple of days due to bad weather, but after the 279th orbit they were safely able to land, in the process setting a new record. This journey was the 80th space shuttle mission and the 21st flight of the Columbia.

The Russians, known in those days as the Soviets, achieved many firsts when it came to space until the Americans beat them to the moon. Amongst the many achievements in the field of space is the record held by the Russian cosmonaut Valeriy Polyakov, who between 1994 and 1995 spent over 437 days in space. This is a record when it comes to manned space flights in one stretch and totals precisely 437 days, 17 hours, 58 minutes and 16 seconds.  Valeriy Polyakov, a medical doctor, left the third rock on the 8th of January 1994 for deep space and returned to good old earth on the 22nd of March 1995.   

The Russians also have some other achievements when it comes to space, namely the first animal to orbit the Earth was Laika the bitch, or the first astronaut Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin or the cosmonaut Sergei Avdeyev, who has spent 747 days 14 hours and 22 minutes in space over a period of 5 years.