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What Had to Be Done to Send a Human Into Space and Take Him Back Safely:

01 To build a spacecraft
02 To find a way to return the cosmonaut to Earth and create a vehicle for this purpose
03 To make sure that a human can survive in space
04 To minimize the risk of flight
05 To pick out future cosmonauts and get them duly trained

The most important thing, a rocket capable of delivering a manned spacecraft into orbit, was not on the list. Korolev had already built such a rocket.

Work began in May 1958, six months after the successful launch of the Sputnik. Thousands of devices, mechanisms and systems that had never existed before had to be conceived and designed from scratch.

Spacecraft

The R-7 was a two-stage rocket and was only just powerful enough to put into orbit a limited payload of about 100 kg.

The spacecraft with a human on board was estimated to weigh about 5 tons, so a third stage with its own engines had to be added to the rocket to make an orbital flight possible.

The rocket got its all too familiar elongated shape and a new name —

VOSTOK

The spacecraft was designed to carry a single cosmonaut.

3D reconstruction

Vostok rocket

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Luna rocket being installed on the launch pad. The Luna, the predecessor of the Vostok, was a three-stage version of the R-7 rocket designed for delivering a payload into lunar orbit. 1959

Progress Rocket and Space Center in Samara. May 2021

How to Return Safely

The cosmonaut was to return to Earth in a reentry capsule, a metal sphere with an escape hatch.

The spherical shape was chosen by Korolev from a variety of options proposed by designers — cylinders, cones, and the like.

The reentry capsule contained a cosmonaut couch and an instrument panel with a small clockwork globe to display the location of the spacecraft above the surface of Earth.

Rocket module assembling facility at the Progress production site in Samara. 1960s

Deceleration Technique

Deceleration was performed by a retrorocket engine that was activated automatically. Upon engine firing, the reentry module began its descent to Earth. Had the engine failed, it would have taken the module ten days to work its way down due to natural orbital decay. Gagarin’s mission could have taken much longer than planned, so the spacecraft carried ten days of provisions to allow for survival.

In case of emergency, the cosmonaut could unlock the controls and fire the retro-engine himself by using a code that was placed in the onboard envelope. The code consisted of three digits that had to be punched in on a nine-button keypad in a set order. It was a safeguard measure to ensure that the cosmonaut acted rationally, not under stress or influence of weightlessness, isolation and loneliness. The cosmonaut was not supposed to know the code in advance, but Gagarin was told the code before the launch, presumably, by order of Korolev.

The reentry capsule had two small viewports, as well as two onboard cameras that filmed the cosmonaut throughout the flight.

Vostok spacecraft launch. 1960

Gagarin’s cabin in the Vostok reentry capsule

Gagarin’s reentry capsule after landing. 1961

Gagarin in the cabin of the Vostok during exams. 1960

Life in Space

In August 1960, the Vostok boost vehicle launched into orbit a spacecraft with a pressurized cabin on board that carried two dogs,

Belka («squirrel») and Strelka («little arrow»). The flight lasted more than 25 hours. Belka and Strelka completed 17 orbits and were recovered unharmed.

The flight got a huge amount of media publicity, and the dogs instantly became Soviet pop-stars. The day after the landing they participated in a press conference; their pictures featured on stamps, badges, postcards, and all sorts of products.

The successful flight and return of Belka and Strelka showed that a living being, meaning a human too, could stay long enough in space, as weightlessness, cosmic radiation, and gravity load appeared not to have an adverse effect on the main life functions.

Space dogs Belka and Strelka

Belka and Strelka in the space cabin

Return of Belka and Strelka. 1960

Belka and Strelka at a press conference. 1960

It was not a smooth ride

What the Odds Were

Out of 14 launches of the first version Vostok rocket, a half ended in accidents, one of those cost the lives of Chaika and Lisichka.

The second, improved version of the Vostok rocket performed three flights; the first ended in a crash, the other two went well. The probability of success for the fourth flight, the one with Gagarin on board, was about

50:50

That was the minimum possible risk at the time.

Sad Fate of Ivan Ivanovich

Emergency Escape

After the death of the dogs in the rocket explosion, Korolev concluded that it was necessary to develop an emergency escape system that could save the life of the crew at any moment of the flight.

A bailout system was introduced, but it was not expected to be fully effective until after 20 seconds into the flight. Much to the dismay of Korolev, it was not possible to save the crew in the first 19 seconds after liftoff, as the altitude would still be too low for the escape capsule parachute to be deployed. Proper launch escape systems were developed some time later.

The emergency escape system never got to be used during Korolev’s lifetime.

If it were necessary to bail out in case of an accident, the capsule with the cosmonaut would be ejected from the spacecraft through a hatch in the frame.

How the First Cosmonauts Were Picked Out, and How They Were Trained

Korolev believed that the best candidates for a spaceflight would be experienced fighter pilots of impeccable health and mental stability, not older than 30 years old, and no taller than 170 cm.

The selection commission chose

352 candidates

The interviewed pilots were told that they were being selected to perform test flights of newest airplanes.

By the end of 1959, the group was down to

20 PEOPLE

That was the first Cosmonaut Team.

Training was very demanding. In addition to vigorous physical exercises, future cosmonauts were taught classes on a wide variety of topics such as medicine, biology, astronomy, geophysics, rocket space systems, and much more. The candidates went through exhaustive parachute training, experienced zero gravity in a free-falling plane, endured g-forces in a centrifuge, underwent oxygen starvation tests, stayed in a pressure chamber, trained the vestibular system, and the like.

Gagarin during training. 1960

Gagarin at a medical check-up. 1960

Yuri Gagarin became a cosmonaut in 15 months. Today it can take 15 years.

INTERVIEW WITH COSMONAUT MIKHAIL KORNIENKO

In June 1960, Korolev brought members of the Cosmonaut Team to the assembly plant where they first saw the spacecraft in which one of them was to fly.

We stood there like under a spell,

Gagarin said later

When Korolev invited them to get inside the spacecraft, Gagarin was the first to come forward. Korolev was pleasantly impressed to see Gagarin take off his shoes before climbing the ladder into the spacecraft.

Cosmonauts getting acquainted with the Vostok spaceship

Cosmonauts at the «Korolev’s» production plant in Podlipki. 1960

Progress Rocket and Space Center in Samara. May 2021

Why Gagarin Was Chosen

Gagarin Gagarin scored good results in training and tests, but not the best. However, his personality traits noticeably distinguished him from the rest of the Team.

Gagarin was very outgoing, equally at ease with peers and superiors, courteous, considerate, and notably hard-working. He plainly radiated optimism, and his sense of humor never failed him.

After examinations in January 1961, the State Commission ranked the candidates and announced the order of flights. Gagarin was named the first.

The first cosmonaut candidate had to be approved by Khrushchev. However, everyone knew that the first to go would be the one chosen by Korolev.

Gagarin during mold casting for a custom contour couch in the Vostok spacecraft. 1960

Korolev and Gagarin during exams. 1960

Gagarin during preparation of the capsule and spacesuit adjustment. 1960

Gagarin and Korolev

Everything Is Ready. The Mission Is a Go

3D reconstruction

Vostok module

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