How Russian astronauts trained for space
(Image credit: Universal History Archive / Getty Images)
While NASA’s Mercury Seven faces were scattered in the world’s media, cosmonauts in Russia trained in secret, hidden from public view.
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On April 13, 1961, the special correspondent of the Soviet newspaper Izvestia, Georgi Ostroumov, met the first man in space. One day after returning to Earth, the “space pilot”, Yuri Gagarin is, says Ostroumov, “with a high spirit, full of life and heart … a wonderful smile lights up his face”.
“From time to time pimples appear on his cheeks,” writes Ostroumov. “He appreciates the curiosity with which he is pressed for the details of what he saw and lived during the hours and a half he spent outside the Earth.”
In a pamphlet published to commemorate the flight, The Soviet Man in Space, the interview with Gagarin continues for several pages. The cosmonaut describes the experience: “The horizon presents a very unique and unusually beautiful view.” And he praises the Soviet Union: “I dedicate my flight to … all our people who march at the forefront of humanity and build a new society.”
In a political system in which journalism tends towards propaganda, rather than a realistic portrayal of events, it is easy to argue that Gagarin’s quotes are invented. But, although they could have been refined by censors, there is a good chance that they are the real words of the cosmonaut.
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A fighter pilot who had grown up in a small Russian village, Gagarin was a very pleasant family man. He was really handsome, sympathetic and, essentially, a loyal member of the Communist Party.
Although the drama of NASA’s early human space program appeared in public, it was only recently that the full story of how the Soviet Union selected and trained its cosmonauts appeared. The communist empire was eager to encourage the view that the selection was open to all and that these first men in space – and the first woman, Valentina Tereshkova – were volunteers. But this is not strictly true.
The Soviet Union poured vast resources into the space program, but it did not officially exist (Credit: Gamma Keystone / Getty Images)
After qualifying as a fighter pilot, Gagarin is stationed at a remote airfield off the Russian border with Norway flying MiG-15 fighter jets on the western border of the Cold War. At the end of the summer of 1959, two doctors arrive at the base to interview a pre-selected group of aviators. After starting with a list of about 3,500 potential candidates, doctors have already limited their search to about 300 pilots in western Russia.
“The boys interviewed have no idea why they are being interviewed,” says Stephen Walker, author of the book Beyond, which has spent years researching Russian archives to compose the full story of Gagarin’s mission.
The interview consists of a seemingly random discussion about career, aspirations and family. Some of the men are invited back for the second conversation. Although doctors suggest that they are looking for candidates for a new type of aircraft, at no time do they reveal their true motivation.
“We’re looking for military pilots, people who have already signed up for the possibility of committing suicide for their country, which is what we’re dealing with here, because the chances of coming back to life aren’t necessarily that high,” says Walker.
While NASA is recruiting military test pilots as its first astronauts to pilot the complex spacecraft Mercury, the Soviet capsule, Vostok is designed to be remotely controlled from the ground. Except in case of emergency, the pilots will not be able to make too many flights.
“He’s not looking for people with a lot of experience,” says Walker. “What he’s looking for is basically a human version of a dog – someone who can stand there and endure the mission, deal with the acceleration forces and come back to life.”
The first contribution of potential cosmonauts, reduced to 20, including Yuri Gagarin, the second from the left (Credit: Keystone / Hulton Archive / Getty Images)
And just like the space dogs that Soviet rocket scientists have been launching into space for more than a decade, cosmonauts will need to be fit, obedient and small enough to fit in the narrow capsule.
Finally, 134 selected individuals – all young pilots, all under 168 cm tall – have the opportunity to “volunteer” for this new secret mission. Some are told it will involve training to fly a spaceship, others believe it is a new helicopter model. None of the pilots are allowed to discuss the offer with their colleagues or consult their families.
Meanwhile, in April 1959, the United States announced the names of the first seven Mercury astronauts. Candidates underwent a series of grueling physical, medical and psychological tests – detailed in Tom Wolfe’s book (and his later film and recent TV series) The Right Stuff.
When asked at a press conference which of the tests they liked the least, astronaut candidate John Glenn replied: “It’s hard to choose one, because if you realize how many openings there are in the human body and how far you can go to any of them … answer which one would be the hardest for you. “
But with many questions left about how people will cope with the rigors of spaceflight – acceleration, weightlessness and isolation – there is every reason to choose the most physically and psychologically capable.
The man in charge of testing Soviet space candidates is Vladimir Yazdovsky, a professor at the Institute of Aviation and Space Medicine in Moscow. He has previously overseen the space dog program and is described by colleagues (in private) as a harsh and arrogant man.
“He’s kind of a terrible James Bond horror character,” says Walker, “and he’s brutal with these guys.”
Exhausting training had less emphasis than NASA’s piloting skills (Credit: TASS / AFP / Getty Images)
In almost all cases, Soviet tests are longer, tougher and more rigorous than those borne by US astronauts. In a month, the candidates are injected, investigated and shot. They are placed in rooms with temperatures high at 70C (158F), rooms in which they are progressively starved of oxygen and vibrating chairs to simulate the launch. Some of the candidates are collapsing, others are just leaving.
Throughout the process, men are forbidden to tell family or friends what they are doing. Even in that month of testing, there were still some people who don’t know why they were tested.
Eventually, 20 of these young people manage to train in a new cosmonaut center. It will be renamed Star City, but is originally just a few military huts in a forest near Moscow. There is no press conference or announcement. Officially, the Soviet space human flight program does not exist.
“If they leave the base, they’re told not to tell anyone what they’re doing, why they’re there, if anyone asks, they have to say they’re part of a sports team,” says Walker. “Everything is under control, everything is secret. Everything is behind closed doors.”
The training program itself is similar to that of the Americans, but with less emphasis on controlling the spacecraft. Like the space dogs that lead them, the men are spinning with dizzying acceleration on the centrifuges, sealed in soundproof rooms for days and subjected to an almost constant physical and psychological evaluation.
A significant difference with the American program is the amount of parachute training that Russians receive. This is because they will have to get out of their spaceship as they crash to the ground to avoid being seriously injured by the impact. The fact that the capsule and its pilot land separately is another secret that is not revealed until years later.
With several men failing to get the grade, an initial group of six cosmonauts is selected for the first flights. NASA publicly declares that it hopes to launch its first man in the spring of 1961, the head of the Soviet program, Sergei Korolev, knows that it has a narrow window of opportunity.
The cosmonauts had to follow many of the same routes that NASA astronauts did, such as weight training (Credit: Keystone Gamma / Getty Images)
On April 5, 1961, the cosmonauts arrive at what is now known as the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the Kazakh desert, where Korolev’s giant R7 rocket is being prepared. However, none of them know who will be the first in space. Finally, just a few days before the launch, Gagarin nods.
Only after an official broadcast when Gagarin is in orbit above Earth, anyone, except those closest to the space program, knows his name.
According to Izvestia’s special correspondent Ostroumov, on the morning of April 12, Gagarin gave “one last wave to his friends and comrades below. [the rocket] then stepped inside the spaceship, commanded a few seconds later … the giant ship rose from a cloud of fire to the stars. “
He will return to Earth the child poster for the Soviet Union – the space pilot with Russian Right Stuff.
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