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Aviation History
1962
1962 - 0669.PDF
CLIGHT International, 26 April 1962 667 Missiles and Spaceflight At a Kremlin rally on April 12, now designated Cosmonautics Day in the SoWet Union, the speakers included Herman Titov, here addressing the assembly, and Yuri Gagarin (between Mr Khrushchev and Deputy Premier Frol Kozlov) i Cosmonautics Day: Gagarin Flight Celebrated THE first anniversary of the orbital flight by Maj Yuri Gagarin on April 12, 1961 was marked by special comment, inter views and feature articles in the Soviet Press and in Moscow Radio broadcasts. April 12 has now been designated Cosmonautics Day in the Soviet Union, and the following are extracts from this year's special coverage:— Soviet space programme "The USSR's success in space exploration is the result of hard, painstaking work in rocketry which began 30 years ago. A group for studying jet propulsion was set up in Moscow at the beginning of April 1932 ... The first rocket specialists put a lot of work and effort into a liquid-fuel rocket engine. These engines broke down during the early tests because the temperature in the internal combustion chamber was as high as 5,400°F. At that time ... no one knew how to cool an engine that was hot. We were pioneers in this field and had to just keep on trying after failures ... From 1932 to 1941 ... the USSR developed 118 different rocket engines working on liquid fuel. Even before we had ballistic rockets, sputniks and spaceships ... the USSR was working on trajectories of future interplanetary flights. Our scientists calculated the take-off time and the duration of space flights. Thirty years ago we worked on the problem of soft-landing spaceships back to Earth .... "Soviet scientists have already calculated and published numerous trajectories which guarantee a direct hit on the Moon or flights around it. They even have projects for placing a manned satellite into orbit around the Moon. However ... the first spaceships will fly to the Moon unmanned. Most probably small mobile labora tories will be planted on our silent neighbour ... After that, it may be possible to send a manned spaceship around the Moon. Then a man will be put on the Moon and finally a research centre may be set up. . .."—Moscow Radio. "The preparation for the flight of a cosmonaut into space was begun in the Soviet Union almost at the same time as the develop ment and experimental launches of automatic space vehicles. However, the practical problem of a manned flight now entered the immediate plans and this predetermined the direction of all work. "Great attention was paid to the final stage of the flight—the landing of the cosmonaut. Landing on the Earth could be carried out either with the spaceship, or separately on an ejection seat with a parachute, in which latter event the spaceship itself could still land successfully. Landing of the spaceship was repeatedly verified with the spaceship satellites. On these flights the experimental animals Chernushka and Zvyezdochka successfully landed in the spaceship. The variants of landing in the spaceship or by catapulting the seat with the cosmonaut out of the spaceship's cabin were - "iplementary to one another, and were carefully perfected with experimental flights. ... 'From a description of the Vostok 1 launch) "And now separation of the first stage has occurred. The protective fairing has been jettisoned from the spaceship. Separation of the following stages is well marked. At last comes news that the engine of the last stage has ignited, and finally the spaceship goes into orbit"— Test engineer L. Maryanin in Pravda. "By 1956 Soviet scientists already had all the technical and medico-biological data to effect a manned rocket flight such as those carried out by the American fliers Shepard and Grissom during 1961. In such a short flight the effect of weightlessness, lasting less than ten minutes, coincides with the after-effects of acceleration on a man. For this reason Soviet scientists did not plan such manned flights in the upper layers of the atmosphere"— Prof V. Yazdovskii in Pravda. Cosmonaut training "Our cosmonauts are intensively preparing themselves for new flights ... The pressing need for more know ledge has led Y. Gagarin and H. Titov to the Zhukov Military Aviation Engineering Academy. For forthcoming flights, in addi tion to excellent health, great knowledge will be required. The cosmonaut must be pilot, navigator, engineer and researcher"— N. Kamanin, Lt-Gen of Aviation, in Pravda. A Tass report on April 11 stated that Col Evgeniy Petrov, "one of the leaders of the group of Soviet cosmonauts," had reported that the cosmonauts were studying hard. Their programme con sisted of medical-biological tests, theoretical studies, flying, para chute training and "the working-out of special Skills"—knowledge of the equipment in the cabin of the ship and the ability to use this equipment. This programme was designed to make each candidate not only a pilot-cosmonaut but also an engineer. The study pro gramme of the cosmonauts was a heavy one, Petrov noted, but the time allotted for study was strictly determined. Some of the cos monauts, perhaps, would like to spend more time with their books, but this was not permitted since it would affect the students' physical condition. Describing Cosmonaut No 3, Petrov said that he was a charming person who saw good in everyone. Everybody liked him, and he treated everybody with kindness and respect. He was, in fact, an exceptionally good-natured person. Despite his youth, this man had passed through the stern school of life, and was now a member of the bureau of the cosmonauts' Party organization. Before joining the air force he was a forestry worker and lived in the north under severe conditions: this, said the colonel, explained his enthusiasm for skiing and skating. Speaking of the prospects for the development of cosmonautics, Petrov said that spaceships would soon carry complete crews con sisting of pilots, navigators, radio operators and also scientists, engineers and doctors. What would be their destination? Perhaps the Moon or maybe Mars or Venus. Future spaceflights "Soviet spaceships will fly further and further. Spaceship satellites will become the Earth's fastest means of com munication. In less than an hour man will be able to fly to any place on the Earth's surface ... scientific laboratories will be established
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