The main feat of Yuri Gagarin is that he participated in a risky mission, whose outcome was not known to the end, despite the automatic flights carried out before him. However, he himself did not control the flight, as modern astronauts do. About this “Lente.ru” said academician RAS and Deputy Chairman of the Union of Machine Builders of Russia Boris Aleshin.
According to Aleshina, the first flight of a person in space and the creation of such a branch as cosmonautics has become possible due to the great work of scientists and military, as well as the accumulation of all resources of the Soviet Union. Until Gagarin had automatic launches with animals on board, but the heroic act of the first cosmonaut still difficult to overestimate. And the flight, and Hagarin himself, according to the scientist, deservedly became the symbols of the cosmic era.
“In fact, he did nothing in this flight, did not perform the mission that astronauts perform today, did not conduct experiments and research. Its flight and was that mission,” says academician.
Earlier, the Director General of the State Museum-Reserve “Moscow Kremlin” Elena Gagarin said that the risks of the first cosmonaut perished in space were more than 50 percent. Such a point of view, according to her, adhered to the chief designer of rocket and space technology Sergey Korolev.
The first flight of a person in space took place 60 years ago, April 12, 1961. It lasted 108 minutes. The carrier rocket “East” brought the ship “East-1” to orbit with Yuri Gagarin on board. East-1 made a turn around the Earth and landed in the Saratov region.