* 1961 – The Russian ( Soviet ) cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin becomes the first human to travel into outer space and perform the first manned orbital flight, in Vostok 3KA-2 ( Vostok 1 ).

Averaging at least 1. 6 km thick, the ice is so massive that it has depressed the continental bedrock in some areas more than 2. 5 km below sea level ; subglacial lakes of liquid water also occur ( e. g., Lake Vostok ).

Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first human to orbit the Earth aboard Vostok 1 manned spacecraft on 12 April 1961.

Columbia was successfully launched on April 12, 1981, the 20th anniversary of the first human spaceflight ( Vostok 1 ), and returned on April 14, 1981, after orbiting the Earth 36 times, landing on the dry lakebed runway at Edwards Air Force Base in California.

The Soviet space program achieved many of the first milestones, including the first living being in orbit in 1957, the first human spaceflight ( Yuri Gagarin aboard Vostok 1 ) in 1961, the first spacewalk ( by Aleksei Leonov ) in 1965, the first automatic landing on another celestial body in 1966, and the launch of the first space station ( Salyut 1 ) in 1971.

Vostok 1 (, East 1 or Orient 1 ) was the first spaceflight in the Vostok program and the first human spaceflight in history.

27-year-old Yuri Gagarin was the only crew member of Vostok 1.

" Kamanin was referring to the second mission, Vostok 2, which would last a full day, compared to the relatively short single-orbit mission of Vostok 1.

Gagarin entered the Vostok 1 spacecraft, and at 7: 10 am local time ( 04: 10 UT ), the radio communication system was turned on.

Once Gagarin was in the Vostok 1 spacecraft, his picture appeared on television screens in the launch control room from an onboard camera.

* 06: 10 UT The payload shroud covering Vostok 1 is released.

* 06: 13 UT The rocket is still firing, pushing Vostok 1 toward orbit.

Yuri Gagarin in Vostok 1

I'm continuing the flight ..." Vostok 1 is moving further downrange from the Baikonur Cosmodrome.

* 06: 17 UT The Vostok rocket final stage shuts down, ten seconds later the spacecraft separates and Vostok 1 reaches orbit.

However, the Soviet Union was fiercely competitive in holding the early lead it had gained in manned spaceflight, so the Soviet Communist Party, led by Nikita Khrushchev, ordered the hasty conversion of its single-pilot Vostok capsule into a two-or three-person craft named Voskhod, in order to compete with Gemini and Apollo.

The first human spaceflight in history was accomplished on a derivative of R-7, Vostok, on 12 April 1961, by Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin.

The Vostok 3KA spacecraft was launched on April 12, 1961.

The Soviet programme for doing this was the Vostok programme.

At 07: 55 UT, when Vostok 1 was still 7 km from the ground, the hatch of the spacecraft was released, and two seconds later Gagarin was ejected.

At altitude, the main parachute was deployed from the Vostok spacecraft.

Two schoolgirls witnessed the Vostok landing and described the scene: " It was a huge ball, about two or three metres high.

When Soviet officials filled out the FAI papers to register the flight of Vostok 1, they stated that the launch site was Baykonur at.

The coldest recorded average annual temperature was at Vostok Station, Antarctica.

He was the first human to journey into outer space, when his Vostok spacecraft completed an orbit of the Earth on 12 April 1961.

Gagarin was further selected for an elite training group known as the Sochi Six, from which the first cosmonauts of the Vostok programme would be chosen.

Out of the twenty selected, the eventual choices for the first launch were Gagarin and Gherman Titov due to their performance during training sessions as well as their physical characteristics — space was limited in the small Vostok cockpit, and both men were rather short.

The first manned spacecraft was Vostok 1, which carried Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin into space in 1961, and completed a full Earth orbit.

Prior to a manned spaceflight, the Soviets launched several precursor unmanned missions between May 1960 and March 1961, to test and develop the Vostok rocket and Vostok spacecraft technology.

In modified form, it launched Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite, into orbit, and became the basis for the R7 family which includes Sputnik, Luna, Molniya, Vostok, and Voskhod space launchers, as well as later Soyuz / L / U / U2 / FG / 2 variants.

Vostok 1, the first manned spacecraft in human history, was launched from one of Baikonur's launch pads, which is presently known as Gagarin's Start.

Tereshkova, Solovyova and Ponomaryova were the leading candidates, and a joint mission profile was developed that would see two women launched into space, on solo Vostok flights on consecutive days in March or April 1963.

After a two-hour countdown, Vostok 6 launched faultlessly, and Tereshkova became the first woman in space.

Vostok 6 was the final Vostok flight and was launched two days after Vostok 5 which carried Valery Bykovsky into a similar orbit for five days, landing three hours after Tereshkova.

Gherman Titov launched from Gagarin's Start at Baikonur Cosmodrome on 6 August 1961 at 0600 UTC aboard the Vostok 2 spacecraft.

Vostok 3 and Vostok 4 were launched a day apart on trajectories that brought the spacecraft within approximately of one another.

Nikolayev's orbital companion Popovich launched the next day aboard Vostok 4.

It was launched a day after Vostok 3 with cosmonaut Pavel Popovich on board — the first time that more than one manned spacecraft were in orbit at the same time.

The Soviet Union then launched Vostok 1 carrying the first human, Yuri Gagarin, into Earth orbit during 1961.

Although the Soviet Union had twice previously launched simultaneous pairs of Vostok spacecraft, these established radio contact with, but came no closer than several kilometers of each other, while the Gemini 6 and 7 spacecraft came as close as one foot ( 30 cm ) and could have docked had they been so equipped.

The Soviet Union had launched the first civilian, Valentina Tereshkova ( also the first woman ) aboard Vostok 6 on June 16, 1963.

They were launched from Baikonur Cosmodrome using Vostok 8K72K launch vehicles.

By November 1961, the Soviets had launched Yuri Gagarin and Gherman Titov into orbit during the Vostok 1 and Vostok 2 manned orbital flights.

In this approach, MA-10 and a new MA-11 flight, the latter using the MA-10 backup capsule, would be launched in close proximity, and fly a loosely co-ordinated mission, similar to the Soviet Vostok 3 and Vostok 4.