Yuri Gagarin - First Man in Space (50th Anniversary)

[JRS]

This April 12th 2011 marks the 50th Anniversary of the historic space flight of Yuri Gagarin on Vostok 1
This was the time when man took his first steps to outer space

"I see Earth! It is so beautiful!"
- Yuri Gagarin

Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin March 1934 – 27 March 1968, was a Soviet pilot and cosmonaut. He was the first human to journey into outer space when his Vostok spacecraft completed an orbit of the Earth on April 12, 1961. Gagarin became an international celebrity, and was awarded many medals and honours, including Hero of the Soviet Union. Vostok 1 marked his only spaceflight, but he served as backup to the Soyuz 1 mission, which ended in a fatal crash. Gagarin later became deputy training director of the Cosmonaut Training Centre outside Moscow, which was later named after him. Gagarin died when a training jet he was piloting crashed in 1968.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yuri_Gagarin

Yuri Gagarin's single orbit of Earth 50 years ago this month ushered in the era of human spaceflight:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12380744

April 12th 1961 – Yuri Gagarin is about to see what no other person has seen in the history of humanity – the Earth from space. In the next 108 minutes he'll see more than most people do in a lifetime. What sights awaited the first cosmonaut silently gliding over the world below? What was it like to view the oceans and continents sailing by from such a height?
In a unique collaboration with the European Space Agency, and the Expedition 26/27 crew of the International Space Station, we have created a new film of what Gagarin first witnessed fifty years ago.

http://www.firstorbit.org/

"Orbiting Earth in the spaceship, I saw how beautiful our planet is. People, let us preserve and increase this beauty, not destroy it!" - Yuri Gagarin

[JRS]

Could somebody moves this thread to Miscellaneous, please?
Thank you

[Davros]

JRS wrote:

---

Could somebody moves this thread to Miscellaneous, please?
Thank you

We can make this TNZ material if we can just find some way to blame this on somebody.

[Caliburn24]

Curse you stupid environmentalists and silly Cold War treaties for keeping nuclear material out of orbit! We could have colonized Mars by now if we had put a few reactors up there!

Yuri would have wanted it that way!

[Davros]

Caliburn24 wrote:

---

Curse you stupid environmentalists and silly Cold War treaties for keeping nuclear material out of orbit! We could have colonized Mars by now if we had put a few reactors up there!

Yuri would have wanted it that way!

Don't you remember the 1999 Alpha Base disaster?

[farmkid]

Cracked had an article a few days ago about the Soviet space program. It's entertaining. If it's at least more-or-less accurate, the Soviet space program was not exactly up to OSHA standards.

[Goliath]

JRS wrote:

---

Could somebody moves this thread to Miscellaneous, please?
Thank you

Whoops!

[Gep Malakai]

Hey, if we curse out the OP, do we have the power to stop the thread from leaving TNZ? Because that would be kind of awesome.

[Borgminister]

As requested by OP, before it is too late...

[Tora Ziyal]

Wow, that's making me feel kind of historic -- or perhaps just old -- myself. I remember Gagarin's flight; I was eleven years old.

[Mutai Sho-Rin]

Tora Ziyal wrote:

---

Wow, that's making me feel kind of historic -- or perhaps just old -- myself. I remember Gagarin's flight; I was eleven years old.

I was just a tad older at 14 and remember this as well as the launch of Sputnik in 1957. A lot has happened in these 50 years, hasn't it?!?!

[Candlelight]

I was negative-17 years old. Man... what a time that was...

[6079SmithW]

Candlelight wrote:

---

I was negative-17 years old. Man... what a time that was...

-17? Sheesh, you're old. I was -26 and had some truly crazy times.

Anyway, go humanity! I wonder where we'll be at in another 50 years. Probably still just puttering around in orbit. I want to see humanity on mars before I die, dammit!

[Candlelight]

6079SmithW wrote:

---

I want to see humanity on mars before I die, dammit!

I want to be on Mars before I die!!

[Myasishchev]

Davros wrote:

---

Don't you remember the 1999 Alpha Base disaster?