Remembering the first man in space

April 12, 2008

On April 12 1961, Yuri Gagarin took off from Baikonur cosmodrome towards where no human had been before: the outer space. On board the spacecraft Vostok 1, he became the first person to see with his own eyes that the Earth is indeed round and mostly covered with water. During a short but intense 108 minutes flight, Gagarin orbited once around the Earth at 18,000 miles an hour. Eventually, he ejected from the capsule and landed by parachute on an agricultural area of Saratov region.

Although we will go deeper into Gagarin and first manned space flight stories in future posts, I would like to share with you some selected commemorative videos.

Yuri Gagarin during the training phase

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Cold War blazing skies

February 24, 2008

Last week, strategic bombers Tu-95 caused the most serious incidents since Russia resumed its long-range air patrols: they violated the Japanese airspace and flew twice at low altitude over the aircraft-carrier USS Nimitz. The return of these giants of the sky brings back memories of the legendary Cold War oceanic flights, filled with incidents and anecdotes ranging from scratches and collisions in flight to pilots from both sides waving to each other while showing Playboy magazines.

Tu-95MS about to refuel in flight