Editing Tupolev Tu-144 (section)

===Personal factors===
{{ill|Leonid Selyakov|ru|Селяков, Леонид Леонидович}}, a notable Soviet aircraft designer,<ref name="AyzatullovaSudakov2020" />{{rp|page=88}} considered the primary reason for ending the Soviet Supersonic Transport project to be the personal factor—the role of the Chief Designer, who failed to show due courage and defend his Bureau's brainchild following the [[1978 Yegoryevsk Tu-144 crash|tragic event near Yegoryevsk]]. "Cowardice and progress are incompatible," Selyakov sternly summarized.<ref name="AyzatullovaSudakov2020" />{{rp|page=91}}

G.A. Cheryomukhin identified several major "blows" to the Tu-144 project. The first three were the death of [[Andrei Tupolev]] in 1972, the [[1973 Paris Air Show Tu-144 crash|disaster at the Air Show in 1973]], and the death of the active and authoritative Minister of the USSR's Aviation Industry {{ill|Pyotr Vasilievich Dementyev|ru|Дементьев, Пётр Васильевич}} (1907–1977). Dementyev had been at the helm of the domestic aviation industry for many years and was one of the champions of the SST program. The fourth blow came with [[Aleksey Tupolev]]'s direction on 30 May 1978, to cancel the SST flight and temporarily halt aircraft operations. Cheryomukhin bitterly noted, "...our own leader – A.A. Tupolev – personally stopped the operation of the Tu-144, depriving the world of a source of evidence of the rationality of supersonic flight over land..."<ref name="AyzatullovaSudakov2020" />{{rp|page=91}}