Day of cosmonautics - the first man in space Yuri Gagarin
Cosmonautics Day
Dear Friends, we are happy to congratulate all us with Cosmonautics Day!
Cosmonautics Day is an anniversary celebrated in Russia on April 12. This day is also celebrated as the World Aviation and Astronautics Day or International Day of Human Space Flight all over the World.
On this Day - April 12, 1961 the first manned space flight made on by the 27-year-old Russian Soviet cosmonaut (astronauts) Mr. Yuri Gagarin. Gagarin circled the Earth for 1 hour and 48 minutes aboard the spacecraft "Vostok 1".
Yuri Gagarin: "Dear friends, both known and unknown to me, fellow countrymen, and people of all countries and continents! In a few minutes a mighty spaceship will carry me into the far-away expanses of space. What can I say to you in these last minutes before the start? The whole of my life seems to be condensed into one wonderful moment. Everything I have experienced and done till now has been in preparation for this moment… You realize that it is hard to express my feeling now – when the moment for the test, for which we have been training long and passionately, is so close. I don't have to tell you what I felt when it was suggested that I should make this flight, the first in history. Joy? No, it was something more than that. Pride? No, it was not just pride. I felt great happiness. To be the first to enter the cosmos, to engage single handed in an unprecedented duel with nature - could anyone dream of anything greater than that? But immediately after that I thought of the tremendous responsibility I bore: to be the first to do what generations of people had dreamed of; to be the first to pave the way into space for mankind.
Am I happy as I set off on this space flight? Of course I'm happy. After all, in all times and epochs the greatest happiness for people was to take part in new discoveries.
I would like to devote this first space flight to the people of communism, a society into which our Soviet people is already entering and into which, I am sure, all people on Earth will enter.
It is a matter of minutes now before the start. I say to you, 'Until we meet again,' dear friends, just as people say to each other when setting out on a long journey. I would like very much to embrace you all, people known and unknown to me, close friends and strangers alike. See you soon!"
Gagarin's flight was a triumph for the entire world space program, and opened a new era in the history of space exploration. Gagarin became a national hero of the Soviet Union and a famous figure around the world. Major newspapers around the globe published his biography and details of his flight. Moscow and other cities in the USSR held mass demonstrations, the scale of which was second only to WWII Victory Parades.
Gagarin was escorted in a long motorcade of high-ranking officials through the streets of Moscow to the Kremlin where, in a lavish ceremony, he was awarded the highest Soviet honor.
Nowadays the commemoration ceremony on Cosmonautics Day starts in the city of Korolyov, near Gagarin's statue. Participants then proceed under solemn police escort to Red Square for a visit to Gagarin's grave in the Kremlin Wall Necropolis, and continue to Cosmonauts Alley, near the Monument to the Conquers of Space. Finally, the official events are concluded with a visit to the Novodevichy Cemetery, the burial place for many Russian cosmonauts and spacecraft engineers.
In the 1960s the song “14 минут до старта” ("14 minutes until launch") written by Oscar Feltsman and Vladimir Voynovich was considered the unofficial "anthem of cosmonautics" and regularly aired on this day in the USSR. Adapted into a march, it is played in all military parades as a sort of march past of the Russian Space Forces. In the 1980s it was eclipsed by the hit “Трава у дома” ("Grass by the Home") performed by the Russian VIA band Zemlyane ("The Earthlings"). The latter song was awarded the official status of the anthem of Russian Cosmonautics in 2009. Russian cosmonauts have traditionally taken this song with them getting assigned for orbital deployments.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia H.E. Mr. Sergey Lavrov:
For me, and for billions of people all over the world, Yuri Gagarin is cosmonaut number one. He glorified our motherland and embodied its achievements. Certainly, Gagarin's personality played a significant role in this nationwide inspiration derived from the man's first journey in space. I can vividly remember his smile, charisma, sincere friendliness, and openness.
I can [also] clearly remember the feeling of victory. Despite the Cold War that was going on at the time, with the relevant rhetoric, this feeling wasn't about a victory over someone. It was more about the joy that filled everyone with the recognition of new possibilities, the confidence that humanity would reach new heights together http://bit.ly/1Sd6dqe
