The Star Garden
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It has now been over fifty years since Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first person to travel to space. On 12th April 1961, he spent one hundred and eight minutes orbiting the Earth in the Vostok 1 spacecraft before safely landing. Gagarin's flight was an early victory for the Soviet Union in the Space Race but, more importantly, it marked the first step in man's exploration of the universe and highlighted the fragility of the Earth. Although there is no footage of Gagarin's journey, it has since been recreated in real time by the crew of the International Space Station.
After the flight, Gagarin continued to progress within the Soviet Air Force, becoming a Colonel in 1963. Unfortunately, his life was cut short in 1968 when he was killed in a jet crash, aged only thirty four.
Over five hundred people have visited space since Gagarin's pioneering mission, twelve of which walked on the Moon. Although it is more cost effective to explore space using robots, we will need to learn how humans can live in such environments if we ever want to colonise the Solar System. Russia, Europe, Japan, China and India have all stated that they would like to complete a manned mission to the Moon within the next century and the European Space Agency aims to complete a manned mission to Mars by 2030.
Related articles; Earth and Moon and Exploration of the Moon (1900s).
14th April 2011 0 Comments