Little-known facts about the flight of Valentina Tereshkova

• Little-known facts about the flight of Valentina Tereshkova

I dream to visit space did not leave mankind for centuries. April 12, 1961 she was destined to be fulfilled - Yuri Gagarin made the first flight. After a successful flight of Soviet cosmonaut Sergei Korolev had the idea to launch into space a woman astronaut. And it became Valentina Tereshkova flew into space 16 June 1963 on the spacecraft "Vostok-6".

We wish to recall its landmark space mission.

Medical examination of Valentina Tereshkova.

The first space flight took place in the face of fierce competition between the USSR and the USA. Both superpowers have worked hard to make their ships travel through the universe. But as you know, the palm in the matter belonged to the Soviet Union. After the debut of "male" flight from the Americans was only one trump card - to prepare the "female" flight. But here, they are ahead of the Soviet cosmonauts. As soon as the Land of the Soviets received information about the preparation of the American "women's team," Nikita Khrushchev personally insisted that among Soviet women also held a competitive selection.

Contenders for the role of women, which was the first visit in the space, it was a lot. So the scale would be the envy of any modern beauty contests: from 800 contestants in the "final" out 30. They are something, and began to prepare for a decisive flight. In preparation was selected the top five candidates, and Valentina Tereshkova was not the first in this ranking. For medical reasons she did ranked last.

The girls passed hard tests: they were placed in extremely high temperatures and in areas with high humidity, they had to prove themselves in conditions of weightlessness and to study grounded on the water, jumping with a parachute (training needed for a touchdown during the spacecraft landing). Wires and psychological testing: it is important to understand how comfortable will the women during their stay in space (by the way, Tereshkova experience was unique in that she was in space for almost three days alone, all later flights are a duet).

The decision about who will fly into space, took Khrushchev personally. History Valentina Tereshkova perfectly fit the ideal of "the girl of the people," which made all his own work. Valentina was a simple family, she herself was born in the village and worked at a textile factory, professional skydiving is never done, all its assets were less than 100 jumps. In short, the character of the people is fully consistent with the desired ideal.

The launch of the ship Tereshkova occurred June 16, 1963. She flew on the ship "Vostok-6". Valentina Tereshkova can rightly be called the heroine, because during the flight, she was faced with a lot of difficulties, but would survive all the trials. The main problem was unwell: nausea, lethargy, drowsiness - with all it had to contend. There was even a recorded case that Valentine stopped responding to requests from the earth: it turned out that she just fell asleep from exhaustion. It was only able to wake Valery Bykovsky, another Soviet cosmonaut, who at that time was in orbit. Between their ships had an inner connection by which to communicate the astronauts.

In the Mausoleum June 22, 1963.

But the most terrible ordeal, which was a long silence the authorities, has become a fault in the mechanism of the ship Tereshkova. Instead of landing on Earth, she ventured to fly in space and perish distance. Miraculously Gagarin, following the flight, has figured out how to fix the situation, and Valentina Tereshkova, yet was able to return.

Yuri Gagarin and Valentina Tereshkova.

Landing was not easy in the Altai Territory. Exhausted female astronaut literally fell on the head of the local residents. Tired and exhausted, she gladly brought change into her clothes, revealing a body, turned into a hematoma on his suit, and tasted peasant food - potatoes, kvass and bread. For it then she received a reprimand from the Sergei Korolev, because thus it violated the purity of the experiment.

For many years after the flight of Valentina Tereshkova Soviet women we did not go up into space - it occurred in flight due to "the individual characteristics of the female body" too many difficulties. But the name of the first Soviet female cosmonaut forever inscribed in the history of the world!