The first manned ships "Vostok" and "Sunrise". Gagarin and Leonov ships

The first person in space. The first group flight into orbit. The first woman-cosmonaut. The first exit to the outer space. All these breakthroughs of the USSR took place thanks to the piloted spaceships "Vostok" and "Sunrise".

Today we are no longer quite aware of what scientific feat these first orbital flights were and with what colossal risk were associated: 10-fold overloads and temperatures up to 3,500 degrees Celsius, the insufficiently studied consequences of zero gravity and cosmic radiation. The trajectory of the ballistic descent, the angles of attack and the temperature regime began to count on manual electromechanical arithmometers, and only three of the seven test launches that preceded the triumph of Yuri Gagarin were successful. No wonder many years later the famous academician Boris Chertok admitted that “today he would never sign a guarantee of security” to the start of the first astronaut and that “having received vast experience, I realized how much we risked then...”

In the book of the leading historian of astronautics, you will find comprehensive information about the first manned spacecraft of the USSR and the preparation of the first astronauts.