Astronomy Picture of the Day
Posted By admin On April 11, 2011 @ 11:01 pm In Photo Essays | Comments Disabled
[1]50 Years Ago: Yuri’s Planet
Credit: ISS Expedition 7 [2] Crew, EOL [3], NASA [4]
Explanation: On April 12th, 1961, Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Alexseyevich Gagarin [5] became the first human in space. His remotely controlled Vostok 1 spacecraft [6] lofted him to an altitude of 200 miles and carried him [7] once around planet Earth. Commenting on the first view from space [3] he reported, “The sky is very dark; the Earth is bluish. Everything is seen very clearly”. His view could have resembled this image [8] taken in 2003 from the International Space [9] Station. Alan Shepard [10], the first US astronaut, would not be launched until almost a month later and then on a comparatively short suborbital flight. Born on March 9, 1934, Gagarin [11] was a military pilot before being chosen for the first group of cosmonauts in 1960. As a result of his historic flight [12] he became an international hero [13] and legend. Killed when his MIG jet [14] crashed during a training flight in 1968, Gagarin was given a hero’s funeral, his ashes interred in the Kremlin Wall [15]. Twenty years later, on yet another April 12th, in 1981, NASA launched the first space shuttle [16].
Visit the NASA/JPL website to view more Astronomy Pictures of the Day [17]
Article printed from Recorder Online: http://www.berthoudrecorder.com
URL to article: http://www.berthoudrecorder.com/2011/04/11/astronomy-picture-of-the-day-55/
URLs in this post:
[1] Image: http://www.berthoudrecorder.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/yuriearth_iss_1516.jpg
[2] Expedition 7: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/station/crew/exp7/
[3] EOL: http://eol.jsc.nasa.gov/
[4] NASA: http://www.nasa.gov/
[5] Yuri Alexseyevich Gagarin: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yuri_Gagarin
[6] Vostok 1 spacecraft: http://www.svengrahn.pp.se/histind/Vostok1/Vostok1X.htm
[7] carried him: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J2C1FkPz5vU
[8] this image: http://eol.jsc.nasa.gov/scripts/sseop/photo.pl?mission=ISS007&roll=E&frame=10807
[9] International Space: http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110309.html
[10] Alan Shepard: http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap010505.html
[11] Gagarin: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umY92y25DrA
[12] historic flight: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/sts1/gagarin_anniversary.html
[13] international hero: http://www.time.com/time/europe/hero2006/gagarin.html
[14] MIG jet: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikoyan
[15] Kremlin Wall: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kremlin_Wall
[16] first space shuttle: http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap010412.html
[17] Astronomy Pictures of the Day: http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/
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