On March 27th, 1968, Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin, the first human in space, died in a plane crash during what would be otherwise a very routine training flight. This in an of itself would be, and is, a tragedy in the history of humanities achievements in space, but the events surrounding this crash, and Gagarin’s life after his famous flight, make it incredibly mysterious.
On April 12th, 1961, Gagarin became world famous for his flight in Vostok 1, not only being the first human in space but also making the first orbit of the Earth. It was, and still is, one of the most important events in human history – certainly at that time the single most amazing accomplishment ever for the human race – and the Soviets were keen to capitalize on this by using Gagarin as a sort of living advertisement for the supremacy of the Soviet Union.
This of course included a tour of Europe, promotions in the Soviet Military, and him continuing to work in Star City, one of the main centers of Soviet (and now Russian) space logistics and engineering. Interestingly, during this time to keep him from risking an accidental death, he was barred from flying – or again, that’s so the story goes.
He was also slated as the back-up for the ill-fated Soyuz 1 mission in 1967, which ended in the death of cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov. Stories say that Komarov only agreed to pilot the vehicle, which he and Gagarin (among others) knew was a doomed machine, when his refusal to make the flight slated Gagarin to fly the mission – a flight that he knew would likely end in the death of not only his friend, but a national hero. Komarov chose to fly the doomed mission, so the story goes, to help save his friends life.
The remains of Soyuz 1
This would be a moot point just 11 months later when Gagarin, now able to train in active flight again, and his flight trainer would die in the mysterious crash of their MiG-15UTI. The first man in space was gone. Another tragedy for the Soviet Union, after the loss of Soyuz 1 and Komarov, but also a loss for humanity.
The circumstances around the crash have been a mystery – theories were proposed, varying from bad weather information being relayed to Gagarin to an air vent in the vehicle being open, causing Gagarin to pass out in flight and crash, to what may be the current most accepted theory – that another jet flew far too close to Gagarin’s at supersonic speed and the shock wave itself caused the vehicle to lose control and crash.
We may never know the true cause – it’s already been half a century – but the fact remains before we ever made it to the moon, we had already lost the first person to leave the Earth.
There is so much more to the story than this, but even in my own research I’ve only done a bit of scraping. Information is hard to find, sometimes conflicting, and I really only wanted to do a quick overview. As always, see what you can find out on your own!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yuri_Gagarin#Death
Ю́рий Алексе́евич Гага́рин
March 9th, 1934 – March 27th, 1968
