Cosmonautics Day
On April 12, 1961, the world's first spacecraft, the Vostok satellite with a man on board, was launched into Earth orbit
А citizen of the Soviet Union, communist, pilot, senior lieutenant Yuri Alexeyevich Gagarin, became the cosmonaut pilot of the spacecraft. The launch of the space multistage rocket took place from the Soviet Baikonur Cosmodrome (the 5th research test site of the USSR Ministry of Defense) at 9:07 a.m. Moscow time, and after gaining speed and separating from the last stage of the carrier rocket, the spacecraft began free flight in orbit around the Earth.
After circling the Earth, 108 minutes after the launch, the braking propulsion system was switched on and the satellite spacecraft began to descend from the orbit for landing. At 10:55 a.m. Moscow time, the cosmonaut landed in the specified area on arable land near the bank of the Volga River near the village of Smelovka, Ternovsky District, Saratov Region.
The launch of the world's first manned spacecraft was supervised by:
Sergei Pavlovich Korolev - Chief Designer of Experimental Design Bureau-1
Soviet scientist, designer of space rocket systems, twice Hero of Socialist Labor, Academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences (1958). Corresponding member of the Academy of Artillery Sciences. Chairman of the USSR Council of Chief Designers (1946-1966). Winner of the Lenin Prize. Colonel
Anatoly Semyonovich Kirillov - Head of the 1st Department of NIIP-5, colonel engineer, one of the main leaders of the flight development of the launch vehicle and the Vostok spacecraft (on the photo - to the right of Y. A. Gagarin)
The head of the launch team ("firing") during the launch of the world's first cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin on April 12, 1961, gave commands on the stages of the rocket launch and controlled their implementation, watching the rocket in the periscope from the command bunker. His understudy at the second periscope was L. A. Voskresensky, deputy chief designer S. P. Korolev for testing.
Leonid Alexandrovich Voskresensky - Deputy Chief Designer of OKB-1 S. P. Korolev
Engineer-researcher and tester of domestic rocket and space technology, Hero of Socialist Labor, Doctor of Technical Sciences, Professor, holder of two Orders of Lenin and the Order of the Red Star
The initiative to establish Cosmonautics Day in the Soviet Union was initiated by the understudy of Yuri Gagarin during the first human space flight, cosmonaut German Titov. He also proposed, on behalf of the USSR government, to apply to the UN with the idea of organizing a World Cosmonautics Day.
In the years since the first flight of Yuri Gagarin, about 500 people from more than 40 countries have traveled into space.
Space exploration continues to the present day.