First Man in Space

Although this has nothing to do with Buenos Aires, my attention was caught by today's Google drawing; a video picture of a rocket blasting off into space with a astronaut in the foreground. At first I thought it was Neil Armstrong or somebody but i was wrong. It is celebrating the achievements of Yuri Gagarin, the first man who successfully entered space and came back alive.





Before Gagarin, no-one knew for sure if a human could withstand the conditions in space, says the BBC's Steve Rosenberg in Moscow; some believed weightlessness would induce madness, that the G-forces on take off and re-entry would crush the body, and there was concern over the effects of radiation.

On 12 April 1961, to the cry of "Let's go!", Yuri Gagarin embarked on a voyage lasting 108 minutes in a tiny two-metre-wide (6ft) capsule, then ejected and parachuted down into a field in central Russia.

But when Gagarin's face and voice were beamed down from space, the world saw that the cosmos was not to be feared - it was to be explored.

"The most emotional moment was when we heard he was walking and waving; his arms and legs were whole. We understood in one sigh that our five to six years of hard work had paid off and we had achieved something huge," said veteran cosmonaut Georgy Grechko, now 79, who worked as an engineer on Gagarin's space capsule. (BBC News)




Gagarin was hailed as a hero around the world, except prolly in the U.S. back then because of Cold War tensions, and was feted wherever he visited. Unfortunately for the world, he died in 1968 in a plane crash. Even the famous U.S. astronauts and NASA have realized his important contribution to the world of space travel. (see plaque above) Many say that if it wasn't for Gagarin's successful space travel, the U.S. would have lacked the impetus to send a man to the moon in only a decade.

So today i am commemorating this very important day in world history, one that everyone should celebrate.