The First Soviet Cosmonaut Team: Their Lives and Legacies (Springer Praxis Books)
Colin Burgess
Language: English
Pages: 356
ISBN: 0387848231
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
The First Soviet Cosmonaut Team will relate who these men were and offer far more extensive background stories, in addition to those of the more familiar names of early Soviet space explorers from that group. Many previously-unpublished photographs of these “missing” candidates will also be included for the first time in this book. It will be a detailed, but highly readable and balanced account of the history, training and experiences of the first group of twenty cosmonauts of the USSR. A covert recruitment and selection process was set in motion throughout the Soviet military in August 1959, just prior to the naming of America’s Mercury astronauts. Those selected were ordered to report for training at a special camp outside of Moscow in the spring of 1960. Just a year later, Senior Lieutenant Yuri Gagarin of the Soviet Air Force (promoted in flight to the rank of major) was launched aboard a Vostok spacecraft and became the first person ever to achieve space flight and orbit the Earth.
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prime crew for Voskhod 2 was Pavel Belyayev and Alexei Leonov. Belyayev and Leonov trying on the suits they would wear on their flight. As author Rex Hall and his co-author David Shayler noted in their book, The Rocket Men: "Leonov recalled that he first saw the airlock chamber in the summer of 1964 at OKB-1, where it was attached to the side of a Vostok spacecraft. At the same visit to the design bureau, he was to participate in a strenuous two-hour simulation in an altitude chamber, while
(hygiene systems, spacesuits, survival clothing), A.V. Nikitin (therapist, attached to the cosmonauts for constant medical monitoring), A.V. Beregovkin and others. The two senior trainers were Colonel Mark L. Gallai and Colonel Leonid I. Goreglyad, both Heroes of the Soviet Union. The criteria the selection committee worked to were formidable; these included locating a large and secluded area near an established military air base, with roads and a railway in reasonable proximity. It also had
1958, while he was still studying at the academy, Valentina gave birth to their second child -a daughter they named Irma. Gagarin and Komarov enjoyed hunting together. The years of study were paying off: on 31 August 1959 Komarov's rank became that of senior engineer-lieutenant. Following his graduation from the academy he took on work, beginning 3 September 1959, as an assistant leading engineer at the Central Scientific Research Institute of the U.S.S.R. Ministry of Defence, in the town
their bread easily.' It is not simple to become a pilot. Experienced and clever pilots can transform a young flier into a real aviator. I shall remain thankful throughout my life to Senior Lieutenant Polyakov, who taught me to understand aviation and flying." Sometime in this period, Shonin married Lydia Fedorovna Shumilova, and their first child, a daughter Nina, was born on 9 September 1955. On 2 February 1957, Shonin was awarded his lieutenant's wings after graduating from the naval aviation
several years to come. As he descended to the ground, Titov reflected, "I took in vast fields spreading below, stacks of hay; I saw a railway and a train that appeared as though stuck on the rails, a river and two big cities in the distance. The ground comes nearer and nearer. It seems that I am going to land close to the railway. I touched the ground safely two hundred metres from it, on the field. The flight was accomplished." He had landed at 10:18 AM, Moscow time, near the settlement of
