Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, the first human to enter into space, and the first to orbit the Earth, would have been 80 years old at the weekend. I say would have been, because on 27 March 1968, he was killed when his routine training flight crashed just outside Moscow. He was just 34 years old.
Gagarin’s life may have been brief, but it burned bright.
Born in a small village near Gzhatsk (renamed Gagarin after his death) in western Russia, his obsession with flight was apparent even in his youth. As a teenager studying agricultural technology at a technical school, he not only worked as a part-time docker, he also spent his weekends training as a Soviet air cadet at a local flying club.
Aged 21, Gagarin was drafted by the Red Army, and, thanks to a special recommendation, he was sent to the First Chkalov Air Force Pilot’s School in Orenburg where he quickly ascended the ranks, becoming a senior lieutenant in 1959. The following year, he was chosen, alongside 19 other pilots, for the Soviet space programme, an area of human endeavour in which the USSR, following the successful launch of the Sputnik I satellite in 1957, was leading the world.
The 20 recruits were whittled down to an elite six from whom the first cosmonauts for what was known as the Vostok programme would be chosen. Beside his mental and other physical attributes, Gagarin had a big advantage over his peers. He was short. Five foot two, in fact. This meant he could actually fit in the small capsule that was to be fired into space. And so it was that Gagarin was selected to be the Vostok programme’s first space pilot.