Gagarin, Yuri

Date of birth: March 9, 1934.

Place of birth: Gzhatsk, Soviet Union.

Died: March 27, 1968.

Major contributions: First person to fly in space; first person to orbit Earth. Awards: Order of Lenin; Hero of the Soviet Union.

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uri Gagarin was born on a farm in a region west of Moscow in the Soviet Union (now Russia). He learned how to fly as a teen and
began training as a military pilot at the age of twenty-two. Just two years after Gagarin graduated from flight school, the Soviets began looking for candidates to become cosmonauts (the Soviet term for astronauts). Out of 3,000 applicants, they chose twenty men. Gagarin was one of them.

Training in the program was intense. It involved not only technical study and flight training but also physical and psy­chological tests. In January 1961, Gagarin was one of six candidates cho­sen for final testing. As the hopeful cos­monauts prepared for the tests, tragedy touched the Soviet space program. One of the candidates died when fire broke out during a training session. Gagarin and the other four candidates continued with their training.

On April 8, 1961, Soviet offi­cials chose Gagarin to be the first cosmonaut in space. His warm personality was a deciding factor. Officials thought Gagarin would make a good impression in his ensuing wave of public appear­ances as the first person in space. The next day, Gagarin was told of the decision.

On April 12, 1961, Gagarin entered a Vostok spacecraft to fly

О Like many American astronauts, the Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin trained first as a military pilot.

He returned to aviation after his famous journey into space.

on his mission, named Vostok 1. At 9:07 a. m., the command to ignite the booster rocket was given. Over the radio Gagarin said, “Poyekhali!” (“Here we go!”). The rocket began to rise and the booster was ejected. Gagarin and his capsule were in orbit.

Gagarin orbited Earth once, complet­ing the trip in a little less than an hour – and-a-half. Radio communication was lost briefly between tracking stations, and the lack of contact worried officials. However, communication was soon resumed-to everyone’s great relief.

Gagarin did not actually fly the spacecraft during his trip. Soviet officials worried that the first cosmo­naut might do something wrong, and they locked the controls. He did have a code to unlock them if anything went wrong.

The spacecraft’s reentry into Earth’s atmosphere was difficult. The last set of booster rockets was discarded just before reentry, but they did not completely sep­arate. That caused the spacecraft to jos­tle as it headed back to the ground.

As the spacecraft neared Earth, Gagarin opened a hatch and ejected from the capsule. He opened a parachute and reached the ground in a gentle descent. The historic first spaceflight by humans had been achieved.

After the successful landing, Soviet leaders rushed Gagarin to Moscow. On May 1, 1961, he stood on a platform next to the Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev as thousands of people paraded on the streets below.

TRIBUTE TO A COMRADE

In 1969, Americans Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first humans to set foot on the Moon. They carried tokens with them to honor three U. S. astronauts and two cosmonauts who had died during the early days of spaceflight. One of those symbols-a medal-honored Yuri Gagarin. The medal is still on the Moon today.

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Fearing losing Gagarin in a fatal space accident, Soviet officials banned him from any more spaceflights. He remained in the space program, helping to train new cosmonauts. In the middle 1960s, Gagarin was promised he could go into space once more, and he began flying planes again to regain his status as a pilot. He died in a training flight in 1968 when his airplane crashed.

The people of the Soviet Union mourned the death of their hero. The Soviet training center for cosmonauts was named for him, and the town of his birth, Gzhatsk, was renamed Gagarin in his honor.

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SEE ALSO:

• Apollo Program • Astronaut

• Spaceflight • Space Race

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