Space Race

by Deborah Cadbury

Korolev: Do you read me?

  Gagarin: I read you …

  Korolev: There are sixty-three of them. You will get fat.

  [Gagarin laughs.]

  Korolev: You can eat everything when you arrive today …

  Gagarin: Nope – the main thing is that there is some sausage – to have with samogon [home-brewed vodka].

  [Everyone laughs.]

  A little later:

  Korolev: Are you busy right now?

  Gagarin: … I am not very busy. What do you need?

  Korolev: I found the sequel to the ‘Lilies of the Valley’. Do you get it?

  Gagarin [laughs]: I get it. I get it. ‘In the Thicket of Bulrushes’.

  Korolev: We’ll sing it tonight.

  There is a pause.

  Gagarin: The buggers, they will kill me with their communication tests.

  In the main room of the bunker, Korolev, although immersed in technicalities, was clearly under strain. In front of him was a red telephone which would only be used if the launch was a disaster. He would communicate the signal that would throw Gagarin clear from what might be a blazing inferno. Two other people in the bunker knew the password. The other essential thing he had insisted on was a telemetry system that would mark in patterns of ‘fives’ if the upper-stage engines worked as planned. If the engine failed, a pattern of ‘twos’ would be shown.

  Korolev: This is it. Good luck.

  Gagarin: Thank you.

  Korolev: Good luck, dear.

  Gagarin: See you …

  Korolev: Good luck. See you.

  Gagarin: Today in Kuybyshev.

  Korolev: It’s a deal.

  [Gagarin laughs.]

  On the gantry, it was time for Ivanovsky to say goodbye to Gagarin and close down the hatch of the Vostok. Yuri was still whistling quietly to himself – the tune of ‘The Motherland Hears, the Motherland Knows’ – and showing no sign of anxiety. Ivanovsky felt strongly that it was wrong to keep the three-number code for manual control from the cosmonaut. Heaven only knew what dangers Yuri was going to find. He needed all the help he could get.

  ‘Yuri,’ he whispered so that the intercom would not pick it up. ‘The three numbers are …’

  ‘Yes, I know. Korolev told me, and Kaminin,’ Yuri laughed. ‘Thank you anyway’.

  It took some time to screw down the hatch and when it was completed, an angry Korolev on the gantry phone asked why the hatch was not sealed. Ivanovsky assured him that it was. Korolev assured him that it was not. There was no confirming light in the bunker. Ivanovsky ‘turned cold’. He was convinced he had carried out the procedure correctly. Using colourful language, Korolev ordered him to repeat the process.

  Korolev: Yuri Alexeyevich. It looks like after the hatch was closed one of the contact wires did not show. It got pinched and this is why we will probably take off the hatch and put it back on later.

  Do you read me?’

  Gagarin: I read you. The hatch is open. I am checking the alarms.

  The heavy hatch was removed and sealed once more using the thirty screw bolts.

  If there were a fault this time, the launch would be delayed. Ivanovsky could see a little of Yuri’s face from a mirror on his sleeve. He was smiling, in spite of the strain of waiting, arguably even greater than it might have been since witnessing a terrible event a few days back when a rocket had exploded on takeoff. Yuri appeared calm; he would not allow negative thoughts to encroach. The explosion he had witnessed inadvertently with the other cosmonauts had been that of a combat missile. It had been most terrifying. He would rather not have seen so graphically what a launch-pad disaster looked like. But he was a cosmonaut. He carried on singing softly. Korolev now confirmed that the hatch was airtight.

  In the bunker, the atmosphere was growing tense as the time drew near to liftoff. Korolev was thankful that he was alone with his assistants. The remainder of the commission, including Glushko, were in another room. He briefly spoke again to Gagarin, asking him how he was. Gagarin had requested music. There were only minutes left now before the final moment. The propulsion system and the life support had been checked. Every detail connected with the massive rocket had been checked and rechecked, the gyros, the fuel. Korolev grew more agitated, listening to the conversation of the launch technicians and frequently butting in. He took some tranquillizers, which made no visible difference.

  Gagarin began whistling a Soviet song called ‘Lilies of the Valley’. His pulse rate and blood pressure were normal. Mishin was concerned. Over the radio he could hear Gagarin had lapsed into singing a frivolous version of the song that he had taught him during training. Everyone could hear it.

  Today you bought me not a bouquet of red roses

  But a bottle of Stolichnaya vodka

  We’ll hide in the bulrushes and

  We’ll get drunk out of our skulls

  So why do we need these goddamn lilies of the valley?

  With a few minutes to launch, Korolev was controlling his voice with effort, forcing it to sound normal. ‘We could tell by the sound of his voice – heavy and broken – that the Chief Designer was more agitated than anyone else who was there,’ observed Mark Gallai. ‘He hid it well enough … but I was aware of his heavy breath and the beat of the blue vein in his neck.’ Korolev looked ill. Soon would come the moment of no return. If the takeoff stalled, he was ready with the abort code. He gave the order for launch. The button was pressed. Ignition began, unleashing the sounds of a giant orchestra tuning up.

  ‘Ignition is being given, Kedr. I am Zarya-1’

  ‘I read you. Ignition is being given.’

  ‘The preliminary phase.’

  ‘I read you.’

  ‘An interim phase.’

  ‘Got it.’

  ‘Complete takeoff.’

  ‘Poyekhali!’ Gagarin shouted. ‘Let’s go!’

  Below the rocket was an inferno of white and orange flame sucking in and spitting out. The vibration was so great the bunker seemed to shake, almost a part of the launch. Lying in his citadel with walls of sheet metal, perched on top of the R-7 now glutted with fuel, Gagarin became aware of the subtle movement. The rocket shivered like an object in the wind as the gantry fell away. He had a sense of the struggle as the inert machine fought against the surge lifting it. He listened, trying to understand the sounds. Was the inferno under him going to work or would he suddenly find himself shot through the hatch in a bid to escape the roasting flames. The jangled noise of an orchestra out of tune grew and grew. The sounds were difficult to identify. Slowly power was lifting him. At 09.07 precisely, Lieutenant Yuri Gagarin began to make history.

  The orchestral cacophony was turning into a roar. It felt as if the rocket was swaying. Gagarin’s pulse rate was 157.

  Twenty seconds into the flight:

  ‘Zarya-1, I am Kedr. All is going well. There is a faint noise in the cabin. I am feeling well. I can feel the overload, the vibration. All is well.’

  ‘I am Zarya-1. We are all wishing you a good flight. Is everything OK?’

  ‘Thank you. Bye bye. See you soon, dear friends. Bye, see you soon.’

  Two minutes into the flight, the four booster rockets fell away. Gagarin began to feel the g-forces pressing him down. Almost a minute passed. On time, the nose cone fell away. Suddenly, he could see the world below him spread out like a map.

  ‘Kedr. I can see rivers and the folds of the terrain. I can tell them apart, well … I can see the earth. Visibility is fine.’

  ‘I am Zarya-1. How are you feeling? I am Zarya – over.’

  ‘I am Kedr. I am feeling fine.’

  The g-load was increasing, pushing Gagarin back into his seat, pressing hard on his facial muscles and making speech difficult.

  In the bunker, Korolev was going through hell, his worst fears realized. The telemetry system had been delivering a series of ‘fives’ but now it changed, issuing a series of ‘threes’. ‘Twos’ would mean disaster. The whole venture annihilated; Gagarin in unspeakable d
anger. Should he eject? In a moment so intense, seemingly outside measurable time, the many lights and dials demanding attention hardly existed as Korolev listened to the telemeter. Another ‘three’. Another ‘three’, and then a ‘five’. The ‘fives’ were back. Korolev felt sick with relief. He was shaking. He wanted to hear Gagarin.

  ‘I am Zarya-1. All is well. Everything is working.’

  ‘I hear you. I can feel it working. I am watching the earth.’

  Gagarin lost contact with Zarya-1 and Tyura-Tam at around seven minutes into the flight and communications were transferred to Zarya-2 at Kolpashevo and at Zarya-3 in Yelizovo. ‘At the moment of communication transfer, there were a few unpleasant seconds. The cosmonaut did not hear us and we did not hear him,’ recalled one engineer. ‘Korolev, who was standing next to me, was very worried. When he picked up the microphone, his hands were trembling. His voice changed, his face changed colour – changed so much we could not recognize him!’

  About ten minutes into the flight, the upper-stage engines had done their job and were relinquished. Travelling at 28,000 mph, Vostok had left the earth’s gravity and the protective halo of the atmosphere. Gagarin began to experience weightlessness, the familiar substance and weight of his body feeling like cotton wool. TASS was informed of the launch and directed to open the envelope that told of a successful manned space flight. The Vostok was turning slowly, flying at five miles per second. Gagarin had no feeling of speed. His view of the earth changed constantly as the capsule rotated. The hazy pictures of him coming across the television monitor showed him alert and well.

  ‘I am Zarya. All is going well. Can you hear me? How are you feeling?’

  ‘I am Kedr. I can hear you fine. I am feeling fine. The flight is going well. I am watching the earth … I am feeling well.’

  As the Vostok was controlled from the bunker, there was little for Gagarin to do but observe the great display outside his window and monitor the equipment. His flight took him over Siberia and into the Arctic Circle. He found weightlessness far from being a worry, was actually enjoyable, but he was not ready for objects moving about and lost his pencil as it floated out of reach.

  ‘The feeling of weightlessness is interesting. Everything is floating [joyfully]. Everything is floating! Beautiful. Interesting.’

  He described the beauty of the earth, the radiant intense blue of the sky and the rainbow colours surrounding the earth. As he crossed America it was dark, but the sky was bright with a myriad brilliant stars. In the South Atlantic he noticed the sea was grey.

  ‘I can see the earth’s horizon. It is such a pretty halo … It is very beautiful … I can see the stars floating by through the Vzor. It is a very beautiful spectacle. The flight is continuing through the shadow of the earth. I am watching a little star in the illuminator. It is going from left to right. The star has disappeared. It is disappearing, disappearing … I am watching the earth, flying over the sea …’

  Meanwhile at base there was growing concern because the expected announcement from TASS had not been made. In the telephone room, Gallai knew they were anxious to have the report before Gagarin attempted to land. Eventually, fifty minutes into the flight, ‘when it seemed it was not possible to wait any longer’, the music on the radio station was interrupted:

  Attention, Attention. All radio stations of the Soviet Union are making an announcement. It will be made in a few minutes …

  The world’s first satellite ship Vostok with a human on board was launched into an orbit around the earth from the Soviet Union. The pilot cosmonaut of the space ship satellite Vostok is a citizen of the Soviet Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, Major of Aviation: Yuri Alexeyevich Gagarin.

  After an hour, as the ship completed one orbit around the earth, it was starting to circle back towards the Soviet Union. The order came from base to align the Vostok to the correct attitude for re-entry into the earth’s atmosphere. The retrorocket fired at 10.25. Gagarin noted and recorded this success. But the success was only partial. The rocket fired for forty seconds. Then came a sickening jolt and the Vostok was sent spinning. Gagarin noted: ‘The rate of rotation was almost 30 degrees per second. I was like an entire corps de ballet: head, then feet, head then feet, rotating rapidly. Everything was spinning around. Now I see Africa, next the horizon, then the sky.’

  When Isayev’s retro rockets fired, Gagarin’s descent capsule should have separated from the instrument module which was strapped to its back. This did not occur. They were still joined by cables, turning wildly over and over like a pair of cuff links at something like 30 degrees per second. Gagarin could feel the heat coating burning through and ominous cracking sounds. It was becoming very hot. After firing the retro rockets, he had no communication with bunker control. They did not know of his ordeal. He understood that his descent capsule had failed to separate and knew there was nothing ground control could do about it. He thought that if he could stay conscious, he had a reasonable chance of ejecting safely and landing on target. The major obstacle was getting back into earth’s atmosphere under such impossible gyrations. Using code he transmitted the message that the retro rockets had fired successfully.

  The g-load began increasing. About ten minutes of the tempestuous, tumbling, turning descent passed before the heat of re-entry burned through the cables, separating the two units. With loads as heavy as 8 g’s, Gagarin was on the point of losing consciousness. His vision was blurred and grey. He made a huge effort to remain alert. There was a strange purple light in the cabin, which he thought must mean he was re-entering the earth’s atmosphere. The capsule was still revolving, but less madly now.

  Korolev was desperate for information. Although he had the report confirming the retro fire, experience told him that much could still go wrong. There was nothing he could do but wait. He wanted so much to see Gagarin standing in front of him unharmed, with that indelible trademark smile. While he waited for news, he telephoned Khrushchev, informing him of the historic flight. The telephone wires were hardly robust enough to transmit the Soviet leader’s excitement. ‘Is he alive, is he alive?’ he wanted to know.

  In the turning capsule, Gagarin became aware of the rays of the sun, shooting through the porthole, nearly blinding him. He was in the earth’s atmosphere. Soon he would be ejected. This could be a problem with the craft turning as fast as it was. Then a series of events suddenly unfolded. At about 20,000 feet, the main parachute opened, and the hatch above him instantly shot away. He felt vulnerable in the open cabin. The sound of it falling through the air was unnerving. Before he had time to ponder his position, he was shot out through the hatch in his ejection seat, thankfully avoiding the turning capsule and its parachute. When the rockets in the ejection seat had used up their fuel, he slowed then started to fall. From a great height he saw the land beneath him. Its features were growing larger very quickly. His parachute opened, then almost immediately the seat which had carried him through space fell away.

  Now he hung in the sky making a slow descent. The Volga River and the features of his homeland were far below. He had parachuted when on training in this area. He knew it well. His journey in space had taken him nearly two hours. And in that time he had seen the world as no other human had ever seen it – the long, curving arc of the horizon, the beautiful transition between the turquoise atmosphere and the blackness of space. Now Korolev’s incredible skill was casting him back down on familiar territory where his home and his wife were waiting, and where his footprints would mark a slower step.

  He landed in soft ground near a village and struggled for some time with a valve before he could breathe fresh air. A woman and child were walking towards him but hesitated on seeing his strange shape. The child ran away. The woman was unsure. ‘It’s all right,’ he yelled. ‘I’m a Soviet, a friend.’ Some workers arrived and a man on a tractor. They listened wide-eyed to his story of travelling in space. He told them his name. They were suddenly excited. ‘You are on the radio,’ they said. ‘Your journey is being
transmitted at this very moment.’

  At Baikonur, before Korolev and the team could leave for the landing area, an impromptu celebration was hurriedly organized. The first toast was ‘For Success’. Korolev downed the champagne and in time-honoured tradition threw the glass on the floor. Everyone was about to follow suit when one of the officials stepped forward and objected: ‘The Chief Designer is allowed to do that, but we comrades can’t. Who will answer to the glasses division?’

  The champagne soon created a sense of gaiety. The deathly tension that had gripped the bunker for the whole of the flight was dissolved. Korolev was euphoric. He hardly needed champagne; he was intoxicated with the wonder of what had just happened. No one had ever seen him so totally unrestrained and free from anxiety. First they flew to see the capsule. Korolev examined it minutely, touching it, almost memorizing the marks of its journey as though it really was part of a dream that might fade. He simply could not be torn away.

  Finally, they flew to be reunited with Gagarin. When Korolev saw him, he appeared like Lazarus returned from the dead. Suddenly shy, he did not know what to say. Emotionally, he was still adjusting to the enormity of the event. Gagarin came to the rescue.

  ‘Lieutenant Gagarin reporting. All is well, Sergei Pavlovich, things are just fine.’

  Korolev was moved, too moved to speak immediately, then slowly, emphasizing Gagarin’s on-flight promotion, he said: ‘Well done, Major Gagarin. You are a true folk hero.’

  Moscow news was transmitting the story worldwide. The Soviets were celebrating having put one over on Kennedy and the Americans. There was a genuine interest and excitement over what seemed a miraculous endeavour. A son of the Soviet Union was a world-class hero.

  At 5.30 a.m. in America, a news reporter decided the Soviet space story was hot news. He wondered what NASA’s reaction would be. Ringing the press office in Florida, his call was answered by an overworked PR man trying to catch up on a few hours’ sleep after dealing with publicity for Alan Shepard’s flight in May. From his camping mattress on the floor, and with indignation in his voice, he shouted down the phone: ‘Go away. We are all asleep.’