Forwarded from Russian MFA 🇷🇺
🚀 The Space Age began on April 12, 1961. Sixty-two years ago, mankind managed to overcome terrestrial gravitation and orbited the planet. We are particularly proud to recall that Soviet citizen and the first Soviet pilot-cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin accomplished this great breakthrough.
🧑🚀 Although Gagarin was only 27 on the eve of his space mission, he had come a long way from flying with the Saratov air club to joining the first Soviet cosmonaut squad. On that memorable morning in April 1961, he blasted off into the great unknown. A photographer snapped an image of Gagarin shortly before liftoff; the cosmonaut’s face had no sign of fear and showed the famous smile of Gagarin.
Yuri Gagarin spent 108 minutes in outer space and completed a full orbit around the Earth. Almost no one knew that history was being made on that morning. TASS news agency did not break the news until 10:13 am.
On April 14, Gagarin was riding in a convertible through the streets of the Soviet Union. Jubilant crowds cheerfully greeted him and showered his limousine with flowers. Every Soviet citizen felt that he or she was somehow a part of this historical event.
Gagarin was a representative of a county that had risen from the ashes of World War II not long before, and that had already plunged into a tense Space Race rivalry with the United States. Nevertheless, his feat belonged to all of mankind, not just the Soviet people. It served as a prologue to the glorious era of international cooperation in exploring outer space.
🌏 In the next two years, Gagarin visited more than 30 countries where he was given a hero’s welcome. The Soviet cosmonaut’s foreign tour was unofficially called a peace mission – people everywhere sincerely greeted the first man in space, regardless of their political views.
👉 Every year, on #CosmonauticsDay, a countdown begins at 9.07 am Moscow Time until Yuri Gagarin’s safe return home.
#Gagarin #Gagarin1961 #FirstInSpace
🧑🚀 Although Gagarin was only 27 on the eve of his space mission, he had come a long way from flying with the Saratov air club to joining the first Soviet cosmonaut squad. On that memorable morning in April 1961, he blasted off into the great unknown. A photographer snapped an image of Gagarin shortly before liftoff; the cosmonaut’s face had no sign of fear and showed the famous smile of Gagarin.
Yuri Gagarin spent 108 minutes in outer space and completed a full orbit around the Earth. Almost no one knew that history was being made on that morning. TASS news agency did not break the news until 10:13 am.
On April 14, Gagarin was riding in a convertible through the streets of the Soviet Union. Jubilant crowds cheerfully greeted him and showered his limousine with flowers. Every Soviet citizen felt that he or she was somehow a part of this historical event.
Gagarin was a representative of a county that had risen from the ashes of World War II not long before, and that had already plunged into a tense Space Race rivalry with the United States. Nevertheless, his feat belonged to all of mankind, not just the Soviet people. It served as a prologue to the glorious era of international cooperation in exploring outer space.
🌏 In the next two years, Gagarin visited more than 30 countries where he was given a hero’s welcome. The Soviet cosmonaut’s foreign tour was unofficially called a peace mission – people everywhere sincerely greeted the first man in space, regardless of their political views.
👉 Every year, on #CosmonauticsDay, a countdown begins at 9.07 am Moscow Time until Yuri Gagarin’s safe return home.
#Gagarin #Gagarin1961 #FirstInSpace
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Forwarded from Russian MFA 🇷🇺
🚀 Today marks the 9️⃣1️⃣st anniversary since the birth of Yuri Gagarin, the first cosmonaut on the Earth. His flight aboard the #Vostok spaceship went down in history as humanity’s greatest scientific and technological breakthrough and showcased the country’s intellectual and scientific power.
***
Yuri Gagarin was born in Klushino Village, Gzhatsky District, Smolensk Region. There in 1941, when the Great Patriotic War broke out, Yura first saw Soviet aircraft flying to defend the Motherland and began to dream of becoming a pilot.
In 1954, when Gagarin was a student of an industrial college, he joined the Saratov air club, where he decided to dedicate his life to aviation. After completing flight courses with honors, Yuri Gagarin enrolled into an aviation school in 1955 and started serving as a military pilot in the Northern Fleet Air Force of the USSR at the end of 1957.
In 1959, he found out that volunteers were recruited for the upcoming flight to space and wrote a report asking to be included in a cosmonaut group.
In 1959, a secret selection of candidates for cosmonauts began in the Soviet Air Forces: the commission reviewed the files of 3,461 fighter pilots. Out of them, only 20 volunteers were selected.
In 1959, Yuri Gagarin and 19 other pilots arrived at 'Star Town', located 25 km away from Moscow. There, he completed theoretical and practical flight training, including simulations of weightlessness and high-G forces in a centrifuge. In October 1960, a group of six people began training on the Vostok spacecraft simulator at a research institute in Zhukovsky.
Following a series of training sessions, exams and tests, it was decided that Yuri Gagarin would become cosmonaut №1.
***
Yuri Gagarin’s historic space flight, which marked the beginning of the era of manned spaceflight, took place on April 12, 1961. #OnThisDay in 1961, at 9:07 a.m. at the Baikonur Cosmodrome, Yuri pronounced his famous catchphrase, ‘Off we go!’. Vostok, the first spacecraft with a man aboard, was launched. Gagarin spent 1 hour and 48 minutes in space, making a full orbit around the Earth, and landed safely in the Saratov Region.
The news of the flight quickly swept across the globe. Thousands of people came to greet Gagarin in Moscow.
🌐 During two years after this milestone event, Yuri Gagarin travelled to over 30 countries where he was celebrated as a hero, including UK, France, Cuba, Japan, India, and Liberia. This tour was unofficially referred to as the 'Peace Mission'. Gagarin’s famous smile won over the entire world, earning respect for the Soviet people.
🕯 The life of the first cosmonaut was tragically cut short on March 27, 1968: he perished during a training flight on a Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15UTI jet. Gagarin’s death shocked people all over the world.
🎖 The pilot-cosmonaut, Hero of the Soviet Union Yuri Gagarin is immortalised in the names of settlements and space objects. The urn with his ashes is entombed in the Kremlin wall next to the ashes of engineer Sergei Korolev and other prominent and distinguished Soviet persons.
#FirstInSpace
***
Yuri Gagarin was born in Klushino Village, Gzhatsky District, Smolensk Region. There in 1941, when the Great Patriotic War broke out, Yura first saw Soviet aircraft flying to defend the Motherland and began to dream of becoming a pilot.
In 1954, when Gagarin was a student of an industrial college, he joined the Saratov air club, where he decided to dedicate his life to aviation. After completing flight courses with honors, Yuri Gagarin enrolled into an aviation school in 1955 and started serving as a military pilot in the Northern Fleet Air Force of the USSR at the end of 1957.
In 1959, he found out that volunteers were recruited for the upcoming flight to space and wrote a report asking to be included in a cosmonaut group.
In 1959, a secret selection of candidates for cosmonauts began in the Soviet Air Forces: the commission reviewed the files of 3,461 fighter pilots. Out of them, only 20 volunteers were selected.
In 1959, Yuri Gagarin and 19 other pilots arrived at 'Star Town', located 25 km away from Moscow. There, he completed theoretical and practical flight training, including simulations of weightlessness and high-G forces in a centrifuge. In October 1960, a group of six people began training on the Vostok spacecraft simulator at a research institute in Zhukovsky.
Following a series of training sessions, exams and tests, it was decided that Yuri Gagarin would become cosmonaut №1.
***
Yuri Gagarin’s historic space flight, which marked the beginning of the era of manned spaceflight, took place on April 12, 1961. #OnThisDay in 1961, at 9:07 a.m. at the Baikonur Cosmodrome, Yuri pronounced his famous catchphrase, ‘Off we go!’. Vostok, the first spacecraft with a man aboard, was launched. Gagarin spent 1 hour and 48 minutes in space, making a full orbit around the Earth, and landed safely in the Saratov Region.
The news of the flight quickly swept across the globe. Thousands of people came to greet Gagarin in Moscow.
🌐 During two years after this milestone event, Yuri Gagarin travelled to over 30 countries where he was celebrated as a hero, including UK, France, Cuba, Japan, India, and Liberia. This tour was unofficially referred to as the 'Peace Mission'. Gagarin’s famous smile won over the entire world, earning respect for the Soviet people.
🕯 The life of the first cosmonaut was tragically cut short on March 27, 1968: he perished during a training flight on a Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15UTI jet. Gagarin’s death shocked people all over the world.
🎖 The pilot-cosmonaut, Hero of the Soviet Union Yuri Gagarin is immortalised in the names of settlements and space objects. The urn with his ashes is entombed in the Kremlin wall next to the ashes of engineer Sergei Korolev and other prominent and distinguished Soviet persons.
#FirstInSpace
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Forwarded from Russian MFA 🇷🇺
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“Having orbited Earth in a spaceship, I saw for the first time how beautiful our planet is.
People, let us preserve and increase this beauty and not destroy it!”
— Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin
🚀 The world changed forever in those moments when Vostok-1 launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, and Yuri #Gagarin became the first person in history to enter Earth’s orbit and circle our planet. This collective feat of the entire Soviet Union, its scientists, and cosmonauts marked the beginning of the space era in human history.
🌏 Before the launch of the spacecraft, Yuri Gagarin addressed the people of the entire planet with these inspiring words:
#CosmonauticsDay #Gagarin #FirstInSpace
People, let us preserve and increase this beauty and not destroy it!”
— Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin
🚀 The world changed forever in those moments when Vostok-1 launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, and Yuri #Gagarin became the first person in history to enter Earth’s orbit and circle our planet. This collective feat of the entire Soviet Union, its scientists, and cosmonauts marked the beginning of the space era in human history.
🌏 Before the launch of the spacecraft, Yuri Gagarin addressed the people of the entire planet with these inspiring words:
“Dear friends, both familiar and unknown, compatriots, people of all countries and continents!
In just a few minutes, a mighty spacecraft will carry me into the vast expanses of the universe. What can I say to you in these final moments before the launch?
My entire life now seems to me like one beautiful moment. Everything I have lived through and accomplished was done for the sake of this moment.
Am I happy to be embarking on this spaceflight? Of course, I am! After all, throughout history, it has been the highest happiness for people to participate in new discoveries.
Now, only a few minutes remain until the launch. I want to say goodbye to you, my dear friends, as people always say to each other when setting off on a long journey. How I wish I could embrace you all — both those I know and those I don’t, those far away and those close by!
Until we meet again!”
#CosmonauticsDay #Gagarin #FirstInSpace
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Forwarded from Russian MFA 🇷🇺
6️⃣5️⃣ years since Yuri Gagarin’s historic space feat!
🚀 On April 12, 1961, the Vostok launch vehicle lifted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome. This momentous event marked the culmination of the efforts of millions of Soviet citizens – design engineers, scientists, military pilots, doctors, specialists across a wide range of fields, and entire branches of industry. Inside the cramped cabin of the crewed spacecraft was Senior Lieutenant Yuri Gagarin.
At 9:07 am, the four metal arms holding the 287-tonne rocket retracted, and Vostok began its lift-off. It was at that very moment that Gagarin’s famous “#POYEKHALI!” (*Let’s go!) rang out over the radio.
At 9:12 am, the spacecraft separated from the launch vehicle and entered the Earth's orbit. Its speed reached 28,260 kilometres per hour – nearly 8 kilometres per second. Never before had a human travelled so fast.
🎙 Just as the spacecraft reached Earth's orbit, Yuri Levitan – the USSR’s iconic radio announcer – solemnly declared to the world:
While in orbit, Gagarin recorded his observations and transmitted them back to Earth. Before him lay the planet as no one had ever seen it before: the curve of the horizon, the luminous blue edge of the atmosphere, coastlines, mountain ranges, vast landmasses – all set against the bottomless black void of space.
Almost 90 minutes into the flight, the spacecraft began its descent. At that moment, a highly dangerous emergency arose: the descent module failed to separate immediately from the equipment module. However, as the spacecraft re-entered the dense layers of the atmosphere, the connecting cables between the two sections burned through due to friction, and the descent continued.
At 10:42 am, at an altitude of 7 km, the cosmonaut ejected.
At 10:53 am, Yuri Gagarin landed safely in a field near the city of Engels, around 4 km from the present-day bank of the Volga.
On April 14, 1961, by Decree No. 251/22 of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, Yuri Gagarin was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union, together with the Order of Lenin and the Gold Star medal.
Two days later, the people of Moscow welcomed the space traveller to the Soviet capital with flowers and celebratory banners. By the end of April, Earth’s first cosmonaut embarked on an international tour to share what he had witnessed with people around the world. In the two years following this historic event, Yuri Gagarin visited more than 30 countries, where he was honoured as a true hero. The tour became unofficially known as the “Mission of Peace”.
***
1️⃣0️⃣6️⃣ minutes of Yuri Gagarin's flight changed the course of world history.
Just 16 years after the most devastating and bloodiest war in human history, the Soviet people achieved what had only recently seemed impossible – opening the way to space for all humankind.
***
💬 As President Vladimir Putin noted in his message to the participants in the first Russian Space Forum on April 9, 2026:
🇺🇳 Since 2011, April 12 has been observed as the International Day of Human Space Flight, proclaimed by the UN General Assembly under resolution A/RES/65/271 in honour of Yuri Gagarin’s legendary mission.
#Gagarin65 #FirstInSpace
🚀 On April 12, 1961, the Vostok launch vehicle lifted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome. This momentous event marked the culmination of the efforts of millions of Soviet citizens – design engineers, scientists, military pilots, doctors, specialists across a wide range of fields, and entire branches of industry. Inside the cramped cabin of the crewed spacecraft was Senior Lieutenant Yuri Gagarin.
At 9:07 am, the four metal arms holding the 287-tonne rocket retracted, and Vostok began its lift-off. It was at that very moment that Gagarin’s famous “#POYEKHALI!” (*Let’s go!) rang out over the radio.
At 9:12 am, the spacecraft separated from the launch vehicle and entered the Earth's orbit. Its speed reached 28,260 kilometres per hour – nearly 8 kilometres per second. Never before had a human travelled so fast.
🎙 Just as the spacecraft reached Earth's orbit, Yuri Levitan – the USSR’s iconic radio announcer – solemnly declared to the world:
This is Moscow speaking! The time in Moscow is 10:02 am. We are broadcasting a TASS report on the first human flight into outer space.
On April 12, 1961, the Soviet Union launched into orbit around the Earth the world’s first spacecraft-satellite, Vostok, with a man on board.
The pilot-cosmonaut is a citizen of the USSR, Air Force Major Yuri Gagarin (the extraordinary rank was conferred by Order No. 77 of the USSR Minister of Defence, dated April 12, 1961).
While in orbit, Gagarin recorded his observations and transmitted them back to Earth. Before him lay the planet as no one had ever seen it before: the curve of the horizon, the luminous blue edge of the atmosphere, coastlines, mountain ranges, vast landmasses – all set against the bottomless black void of space.
Almost 90 minutes into the flight, the spacecraft began its descent. At that moment, a highly dangerous emergency arose: the descent module failed to separate immediately from the equipment module. However, as the spacecraft re-entered the dense layers of the atmosphere, the connecting cables between the two sections burned through due to friction, and the descent continued.
At 10:42 am, at an altitude of 7 km, the cosmonaut ejected.
At 10:53 am, Yuri Gagarin landed safely in a field near the city of Engels, around 4 km from the present-day bank of the Volga.
On April 14, 1961, by Decree No. 251/22 of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, Yuri Gagarin was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union, together with the Order of Lenin and the Gold Star medal.
Two days later, the people of Moscow welcomed the space traveller to the Soviet capital with flowers and celebratory banners. By the end of April, Earth’s first cosmonaut embarked on an international tour to share what he had witnessed with people around the world. In the two years following this historic event, Yuri Gagarin visited more than 30 countries, where he was honoured as a true hero. The tour became unofficially known as the “Mission of Peace”.
***
1️⃣0️⃣6️⃣ minutes of Yuri Gagarin's flight changed the course of world history.
Just 16 years after the most devastating and bloodiest war in human history, the Soviet people achieved what had only recently seemed impossible – opening the way to space for all humankind.
***
💬 As President Vladimir Putin noted in his message to the participants in the first Russian Space Forum on April 9, 2026:
Yuri Gagarin's spaceflight became one of the great events of the 20th century and opened a new era in the history of human civilisation.
We are sincerely proud of several generations of talented scientists, designers, cosmonauts, military personnel and civilian specialists who stood at the origins of the national space programme and wrote bright, heroic pages in the chronicle of its victories and achievements.
🇺🇳 Since 2011, April 12 has been observed as the International Day of Human Space Flight, proclaimed by the UN General Assembly under resolution A/RES/65/271 in honour of Yuri Gagarin’s legendary mission.
#Gagarin65 #FirstInSpace
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