Yuri Gagarin’s high school mathematics teacher piloted a fighter plane for the former Soviet Union in World War II. Perhaps Gagarin’s enthu- siasm for flying was inspired by that teacher, because Gagarin started training to become a pilot in the Soviet air force in 1955. Bold, coura- geous, and hard working, Gagarin was one of twenty-one pilots who were selected five years later as the first cosmonauts. Even among other skilled pilots, Gagarin had an excellent reputation and was voted by his comrade cosmonauts as the best choice to be- come the first human being in outer space. It also helped that he was 5 feet, 2 inches (158 cm) tall, because there was not much room in the Vostok spacecraft. Standing at the launch pad just before climbing into Vostok 1, Gagarin said to the scientists and workers,“In a few minutes a powerful space vehicle will carry me into the distant realm of space. Could one dream of anything greater? It is a res ponsibility toward all mankind, toward its present and future.” Engineers locked his controls so that he couldn’t push a wrong button in space, but he reported that being weightless didn’t cause him any difficulty. On re-entry, he parachuted out of the capsule and landed in a field where a lady was planting potatoes.“Have you come from outer space?” she asked him, and indeed he had.
When his fellow cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov was killed in Soyuz 1, Gagarin wrote:“Nothing will stop us.The road to the stars is steep and dangerous.” Gagarin himself was killed in a fighter jet crash in bad weather on March 27, 1968. He was only 44 years old.
No comments:
Post a Comment