Click for next articleOn July 29, 1982, the Salyut 6 space station fell out of space and safely burned up in Earth's atmosphere along the way. Salyut 6 was the eighth space station the Soviet Union had built for its Salyut program . (Image credit: Rosccosmos)Why it matteredLaunched in 1977, Salyut 6 marked an evolution of space station design for the then-Soviet Union. (Image credit: Roscosmos)Salyut 6 also had an airlock for spacewalks and has been hailed as the first "second generation" space station . The advancements demonstrated on Salyut 6 can be seen in routine use on the International Space Station today.