Legendary Cosmonaut
Twice Hero of the Soviet Union Alexei Leonov..


March 18, 1965 USSR pilot-cosmonaut
Alexey Leonov made an exit for the first time in history
into outer space from the Voskhod-2 spacecraft
piloted by Pavel Belyaev.

Leonov Alexey Arkhipovich
Serial number 15 - (11)
Number of flights - 2
Flight duration is 7 days 00 hours 33 minutes 08 seconds.
Spacewalk 1 - the first person to walk in outer space.
The duration of the release is 23 minutes 41 seconds.

Born on May 30, 1934 in the village of Listvyanka
Tisulsky district, Kemerovo region, RSFSR.
In 1955 he graduated from the 10th Military Aviation School
initial training of pilots in the city of Kremenchug
entered the Komsomol recruitment.. Since September 1961
until January 1968 he underwent training at the Air Force
Engineering Academy (VVIA) named after N.E. Zhukovsky, specialty
"Design and operation of aerospace
devices and engines for them." Upon its completion
received the qualification "Pilot-Engineer-Cosmonaut."
Leonov became the first person in the history of astronautics to
Entered Outer Space.
From 18 to 19 March 1965 as the second
pilot of the Voskhod-2 spacecraft, together with Pavel Belyaev.


During the flight, he made the world's first outing
outer space lasting 23 minutes 41 seconds..
of which 12 minutes 09 seconds were outside the ship, moving away from the ship by 5.35 meters..
During the exit, dangerous situations arose when the astronaut
could not get back on board the ship and several
minutes his life hung by a thread, because in
He could have died any minute...


The flight of Alexei Leonov forever entered the history of exploration of near-Earth space; the Soviet cosmonaut became the first to travel into outer space. It was initially planned that Leonov would be sent into orbit as part of the Vostok-11 mission, but the fateful launch was postponed for 18 months, and as a result, Alexey flew on March 18, 1965 on the Voskhod-2 spacecraft together with his partner Pavel Belyaev .


When the cosmonauts reached orbit, preparations began: Leonov put on a specially designed spacesuit with a supply of oxygen for 45 minutes, and Belyaev began installing a flexible airlock through which Alexey would go into space.
After all the necessary precautions were taken, Leonov left the ship and spent a total of 12 minutes and 9 seconds outside of it. When it was time to return, an unexpected problem arose - the astronaut's spacesuit, under vacuum conditions, became greatly inflated and did not fit into the airlock chamber.


At first, Leonov wanted to report an emergency situation to Earth, but he realized that they would not help him with advice, because he was the only person who had ever encountered something similar. The first prisoner of outer space in history quickly found a way out of the situation: in order to get inside the ship, it was necessary to reduce the size of the spacesuit, and this could only be done by bleeding off excess oxygen.


Leonov decided to take this step, realizing that every additional minute spent in thought could be his last. He began to release oxygen from the suit, squeezing into the airlock centimeter by centimeter. The cosmonaut prefers not to tell what he had to endure in those few minutes, but the impressions were probably not pleasant.

Leonov gently pushed off and felt that the ship trembled from his push. The first thing he saw was the black sky. Belyaev’s voice was immediately heard:
"Almaz-2" has begun its exit... Is the movie camera on? The commander addressed this question to his comrade.
Got it... I'm Almaz-2. I take off the lid... I throw it away... Caucasus! Caucasus! I see the Caucasus below me! Started to move away from the ship...
Before throwing the lid away, Leonov thought for a second where to point it - into the satellite orbit or down towards the Earth... He threw it towards the Earth... The cosmonaut's pulse was 164 beats per minute, the moment of exit was very tense...

Belyaev transmitted to Earth:
Attention! Man has entered outer space!


When the episode with the stuck Leonov was safely resolved, it turned out that the orientation system had failed - the cosmonauts had to land, controlling the device manually, and after the capsule with Belyaev and Leonov entered the Earth’s atmosphere, it began to rotate quickly due to the fact that the orbital module did not separate from the landing plane, as calculations suggested.

On this “carousel” the astronauts experienced overloads of up to 10 G, but when the cable that prevented the landing and orbital modules from disconnecting burned out, the capsule was stabilized. Because of all these troubles, the landing did not take place at all where expected - the astronauts found themselves in a dense forest approximately 180 km north of Perm...


Belyaev and Leonov spent two nights in the taiga, the temperature sometimes dropped to -30 °C, and the landing module became unusable, so the cosmonauts could not use it to warm up. When they were discovered, the rescuers first built a huge fire to warm up the heroes, and later the whole company skied another 9 km to get to the helicopter.

The feat of Pavel Belyaev and Alexey Leonov is
a convincing example of what strong-willed people are capable of
and courageous people even in open conditions
space or under overloads of 10G.
For the successful implementation of the flight to its participants
awarded the high title of Hero of the Soviet Union!

In the twentieth century, the world gave us brave and fearless people. They were able to provide the world with the opportunity to see the beauty of space with their own eyes.

Man's first footprint on the moon

Apollo 11 was the first American spacecraft to take humans to the surface of the Moon. The flight itself took place on July 16 and ended on July 24, 1969.
Neil Armstrong And Edwing Aldrin spent almost a day on the surface of the Moon. The exact time they were there was 21 hours 36 minutes 21 seconds. The module was controlled all the time Michael Collins.

The very first person to travel into outer space

It happened in 1965, Soviet cosmonaut Alexey Leonov March 18, together with his partner Pavel Belyaev on the Voskhod-2 ship, set off on that important flight for all of us. Leonov spent 12 minutes 9 seconds outside his ship. An interesting fact is that when Leonov returned, he could not fit into the airlock chamber and then Alexey vented the excess oxygen, he was very worried, but still managed to get into the chamber. It is also interesting that during landing these two heroes ended up not where they had planned, namely 180 kilometers from Perm, somewhere in the taiga.

The first legendary person to go into space

Probably everyone knows this man - Yuri Gagarin. His unforgettable flight, which conquered the whole world, took place on April 12, 1961. Let us remind you that this date is called “Cosmonautics Day”. Yuri made his flight on the Vostok-1 spacecraft; the flight itself lasted 108 minutes, and the cosmonaut spent only 89 minutes in orbit; the remaining time was spent on takeoff and landing.

The first woman astronaut

Valentina Tereshkova- the first brave woman who was able to go into space. Her flight was carried out alone - this is a unique case. She made a flight on the Vostok-6 spacecraft, which ended up in Earth orbit on June 16, 1963. The flight lasted only 22 hours 41 minutes.

Space battle - this is how one can describe the rivalry between two superpowers - the USSR and the USA - in the exploration of outer space during the second half of the last century. Our country started this event, first with the launch of an artificial Earth satellite, and then with the launch of a person into a completely new reality for him - into space. Later, the first spacewalk took place.

Progress of engineering science

The 20th century became a true scientific and technological breakthrough for humanity. Especially the period after the Second World War gave impetus to the development of rocket science - what was previously unattainable became quite possible to achieve. People have long looked closely and tried to study outer space, but this was done exclusively from the surface of our planet. The second half of the last century became the real dawn of astronautics and the era of near space exploration. The geopolitical opponents of that period - the USSR and the USA - advanced especially far in this. The United States carried out developments in this direction, especially when the “father” of German rocket technology, V. von Braun, ended up in this country. It was he who was the pioneer of the European region in this direction of engineering design. However, long-standing developments were carried out in the USSR. The founders of Russian rocket science (Tsiolkovsky, and later Korolev) first theoretically and then practically substantiated their conclusions.

First steps in space exploration

The end of the 50s had a truly impressive impact on the minds of his contemporaries. The Soviet Union first launched an Earth satellite designed by engineers into orbit. Many nations greeted this event as a huge progress in scientific and technological thought, but for America it meant, albeit a small, defeat in this competition. An event that occurred on an April day in 1961 created an even greater sensation. It was then that Yuri Alekseevich Gagarin became the ancestor of all cosmonauts, regardless of their nationality, and the first person to be outside the Earth. Preparations for the flight were carried out in an atmosphere of increased secrecy. After all, then our country risked not only the life of a particular person, but also its authority in the international arena. The stakes were very high, but the results were comparable. After this, our country became a leader. John Kennedy, at a meeting of his government, announced an accelerated research program and the allocation of large investments in space exploration.

Competition of minds

The person who was the first to travel into outer space would provide his country with the title of space leader or take a retaliatory step to the enemy’s step. Both countries actively began preparing for this event. American NASA tried to speed up the process of building manned spacecraft, but the rush led to the opposite result. Lack of experience led to a breakdown - the malfunction was noticed during testing, so human casualties were avoided, but the deadlines were seriously violated. In the USSR, almost at the same time, similar calculations and preparations were carried out for the person who would be the first in outer space. The slightest shortcomings could seriously affect the entire further program of mastering a world new to man. In addition, haste and party control had a rather depressing effect on all participants in the project. And yet, the one who was the first to go into outer space was our compatriot.

Historical moment

This man became He was chosen from a galaxy of well-trained astronauts. And already at the end of 1964, careful preparation and testing of all possible situations that could arise during this flight began. And then the long-awaited moment came: in 1965 (March 18), the Voskhod-2 spacecraft found itself in low-Earth orbit. After a short preparation, Alexey Leonov was the first to go into outer space. The stay outside was very short, about twelve minutes or so. This was a monumental step in the history of all mankind. However, even in such a short period of time, an extraordinary situation occurred. increased in size, and Alexey Arkhipovich could not get back into the ship's airlock. But he did not panic - by weakening the internal pressure of the spacesuit, he achieved its reduction in size and was able to enter back into the spacecraft.

The vicissitudes of flight

The one who was the first to go into outer space had enormous courage and endurance, these personality traits helped him in the future. Another unpleasant situation happened to Leonov - during landing, the descent module turned out to be outside the calculated landing point. But this circumstance did not bother the brave space conqueror. Upon landing, he found himself in the remote taiga, and at that time there were severe frosts there. The crew stayed in such conditions for two days, only on the third day did the rescue team get through to them. For his feat he was awarded the title of “Hero” of the country. The Americans admitted their defeat, but intensified preparations for the flight and landing of a man on the Moon, but this happened four years later and did not detract from the merits of Soviet engineers and cosmonauts. And Alexey Leonov is the man who was the first to travel into outer space and forever wrote his name in the annals of history.

More from

Was Yuri Gagarin the first man in space?
Soviet propaganda myth: Gagarin was not the first in space? / "Unsolved Mysteries"

According to one source, Yuri Gagarin was the second man in space, according to others - the fourth, and some claim even the twelfth. In the Guinness Book of Records for 1964, the first cosmonaut on Earth was listed as Victor Ilyushin. Other

It is in our days that data is being revealed about what preceded Gagarin’s famous flight and who preceded it. The flight of April 12, 1961 - is it another myth of Soviet propaganda or is it still an undeniable story?
Was Gagarin the first in space? Or was he the first to return alive from orbit? Why are they still talking about the cosmonauts who died before him, and what mysteries of the first flights have only recently been declassified? 108 minutes that shocked the world - what were they worth? Read the answer to these questions and watch in the documentary investigation program “Unsolved Secrets” of the TV channel “Moscow Trust”.

"Unsolved Mysteries": Was Yuri Gagarin the first man in space

First before Gagarin

November 10, 1959. A newspaper with sensational material is published in the USA. It contains a secret recording of conversations between the chief Soviet designer Sergei Korolev and the cosmonaut: “Earth. Pressure is normal.” After a minute of silence: “I can’t hear you, the batteries have failed. Oxygen. Comrades, for God’s sake, what to do? What? I can’t. Do you understand? Do you understand?” Then the astronaut’s speech turned into an indistinct muttering and disappeared completely. According to journalist Allen Henders, the deceased's name was Alexander Belokonev.

“As for Gagarin, there is no smoke without fire. There are some factors that allow rumors to emerge. We all know the canonical date of Gagarin’s flight – April 12, but before his flight there were five satellite ships on which the flight of the Vostok spacecraft was tested,” - said Vadim Lukashevich.

Andrey Simonov has been researching flight tests in our country for many years. He admits experiments in this industry have been going on since 1953.

Yuri Gagarin, 1961

“Nobody wanted to show, imagine: the world’s first man in space, and suddenly death. It would be an even greater shame than if we fell behind. Therefore, we checked every detail so that there was a one hundred percent guarantee of success. On the eve of Gagarin’s flight, the Daily Worker publishes an article of his Moscow correspondent. He reports: “On April 8, Vladimir Ilyushin, a test pilot, the son of a legendary aircraft designer, made an orbital flight on board the Rossiya spacecraft.” It is he who will be listed in the Guinness Book of Records for 1964 as the first cosmonaut on the planet,” comments Andrey Simonov.

“The Hungarian writer Eastwood Nemory wrote a whole book about how the first cosmonaut was Viktor Ilyushin, who survived, but was in unsightly shape after this unsuccessful landing,” said Yuri Karash.

The Italian agency "Continental", shortly after Gagarin's return, published an interview with its scientists, the Undico-Cordillo brothers, who said that since 1957 they had recorded three tragedies in space. In their space listening center, they picked up radio signals of the dying, groans and intermittent heartbeats. Those recordings still exist today.

“Initially, about 3,000 people were selected. They looked first of all at their medical records, that is, there was a requirement for almost absolute physical health. Of these, as a result of strict selection, 6 people were left who flew under the Vostok program. In fact, “Of course, more were selected,” adds Yuri Karash.

The last unofficial flight in the foreign press is listed as February 4, 1961. The Baikonur launch actually took place that day, but who flew? Why didn't you come back? The details remained classified for many years.

Why did cosmonaut Bondarenko die?

The West is convinced that Gagarin only played the role of the first cosmonaut to hide his failures.

“Before Gagarin’s flight, the Americans were also working on their Mercury spacecraft, they had two suborbital launches, they managed to launch them. The rhesus monkey Sam flew in the first, and the first astronaut, the chimpanzee Ham, flew in the second. He flew two months before Gagarin, he rose to a height of 285 km vertically. Perhaps that is why Korolev began to say that there was no point in launching Gagarin suborbitally, it was necessary to immediately make a full orbit. Otherwise he would have been second behind the monkey. Therefore, the race was neck and neck," said Vadim Lukashevich.

Today, astronauts acknowledge the death of one of their colleagues. This really happened before Gagarin, and they don’t like to talk about it. Valentin Bondarenko was one of the favorites of the first squad - the youngest and most cheerful. Pilot-cosmonaut Viktor Gorbatko was friends with him, but even he admits that he died through his own fault.

"We heated food and tea on ordinary spiral tiles. We wiped his head for sensors with alcohol, and an alcohol swab accidentally fell on the tile - he was getting ready to have dinner. A fire occurred, he had 80% burns, he was taken away in an ambulance, but he I lived only two or three hours,” recalls Viktor Gorbatko.

Yuri Gagarin before the start

Gagarin could not say goodbye to Bondarenko, he is called to the start. There is a battle for space. Before sending Yuri Gagarin into flight, he and his backup, German Titov, are brought to the cosmodrome twice. They work out to the smallest detail everything that can be done on Earth, and for real: in spacesuits, with a report, with negotiations.

“They rehearsed the landing, reported, they were taken in an elevator to the very top, to the ship. Everything was done except boarding the ship. That is, a large retinue: conscript soldiers standing in a cordon saw that the cosmonauts reported, went to the rocket, rocket flew away,” said Vadim Lukashevich.

This is how rumors are born. They are also fueled by kitchen conversations of dissidents who do not trust the authorities.

“Once I was in Italy, those who proved that Gagarin and Tereshkova were not the first gathered there,” recalls Viktor Gorbatko.

Late 70s Almost twenty years after Gagarin's flight. Cosmonauts can already divulge some details of the first launches. Then Viktor Gorbatko says for the first time that Valentin Bondarenko died not in space, but in a soundproofing chamber during a test. But those radio signals that the Italian brothers heard really existed, and they came from space.

“Radio transmitters were taken on board. They simply recorded the voice and watched how the signal would pass to Earth. There were simple call signs: “Reception!”, “Can you hear me?”, etc. Western pilots, having heard this, might well have thought “that a person is saying this, although in fact it was a tape recorder speaking,” said Andrei Simonov.

Human trials

So was astronaut number zero, and who are the people whose names were named by the largest foreign publications? Why did they believe in them so much? Was Gagarin the first, second or twelfth cosmonaut in the world? The first journalistic investigation appeared in the summer of 1965.

“In American publications - Belokonev, Ledovsky, Shiborin, Gusev, Zavadovsky also flew before Gagarin - a lot of names were given. And it turned out that in 1959 in the Ogonyok magazine there was a detailed publication where testers of spacesuits for pilots, not for cosmonauts, were interviewed ". And they said that they tested high-altitude spacesuits. And so the Americans took the names of people from this group and passed them off as astronauts. But the questions remained. What really happened to Vladimir Ilyushin?" - said Andrei Simonov.

“He was a very unique person. In 1959, he set a world altitude record for flying an airplane, a lot was written about him. And then in 1960 he suddenly disappeared from view. Everything was simple: on June 8, 1960, he got into a car accident on the way from Moscow to Zhukovsky, and was treated for a long time. This year he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, and he came on crutches to the presentation. And, apparently, someone saw, and gossip began to spread that he had an unsuccessful flight into space. Although he “I myself have always denied this,” recalls Simonov.

Yuri Gagarin in the Grand Kremlin Palace, 1961

Evgeny Kiryushin is also one of those who was named among the dead cosmonauts. His friends heard about this on a foreign radio station.

"Someone randomly asked me: 'Oh! Are you alive? “I heard you died” - “No, I say, you’re alive!” said Evgeny Kiryushin.

Kiryushin was one of those who did everything to prevent the cosmonauts from dying. For more than 20 years, he was officially listed as either a simple laboratory assistant or a mechanic at the Institute of Space Medicine. Only in the early 1990s did it become possible to speak out loud about his work, and he received the title of Hero of Russia.

“Let’s say, explosive decompression, when they checked the suit for an explosion - a fraction of a second passes until complete depressurization, from earth pressure to vacuum - three tenths of a second. God knows what can happen: maybe lightning will tear off, maybe the helmet, and maybe the head ", explained Kiryushin.

There are countless tragedies among the testers; not many can withstand twelve-fold overloads and emergency ejection. A common injury is a spinal fracture. Until the very end, no one knows how a person will behave in space. It is believed that in a state of weightlessness he will simply go crazy. Gagarin's entire ship control panel is blocked. The code is in a special envelope; a deranged pilot will not be able to decipher it. Until the last minute, the success of the flight is in doubt.

“After the Second World War, the International Commission banned experiments and tests on people. But how can you develop such a new industry as astronautics without conducting experiments with people? This is impossible, therefore, despite all sorts of international acts, we had a group of testers who did this.” , - said Evgeny Kiryushin.

Vadim Lukashevich has written more than one book about astronautics. He believes that the Americans, by spreading rumors about Soviet launch failures, did not want to belittle the achievements of the Soviet country. On the contrary, they were frightened by such information. During the Cold War, they kept a close eye on the Russians. For meetings in the US Congress on the budget, the Pentagon even published a special brochure “Soviet Military Power”.

"The West then accepted very little information about the Soviet Union. To the point that they would not say where we started from. We started from Chuo Tama, but they said that from Baikonur, and this is hundreds of kilometers away. And the Americans recognized the launch site from ballistic calculations, looking at where the rocket took off from. Gagarin is the first person in space, but according to the rules of the international association, in order to register a record, he had to take off in a ship and land in a ship. And he ejected at an altitude of 80 km and landed on a parachute separately, but when we submitted documents to register the record, we hid it. That is, they thought up a lot of things,” said Vadim Lukashevich.

Death of Ivan Ivanovich

Larisa Uspenskaya knows the secrets of space flight like no one else. For many years she has been in charge of the archive of the first cosmonaut corps. Unique, recently closed documents are stored here.

“In 2011, when celebrations and anniversary events took place, a massive declassification of documents was carried out. Documents from the archives of the president, the state authorities at that time and our department were declassified. Recently, a non-departmental commission declassified a significant block of archives relating to the first space flights,” said Larisa Uspenskaya .

The very first recordings of the archive of Gagarin's flight were made in real time by Korolev and the cosmonaut personally immediately after landing. Gagarin writes how he lost his pencil in weightlessness, how he was thirsty, how the ship deviated from course.

Designer Sergei Korolev and first cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, 1961

“The Americans took direction finding of Gagarin’s negotiations with the Earth during the flight and woke up the president that the race was lost,” said Vadim Lukashevich.

Meanwhile, three weeks earlier, a resident of the village of Korsha, in Western Kazakhstan, discovered a man in a spacesuit on a high spruce tree - he landed unsuccessfully with a parachute. The news about the deceased cosmonaut quickly spread around the area. But no one had time to get close to him: the military arrived and the victim disappeared without a trace.

“We can only call the dummy Ivan Ivanovich as cosmonaut number zero. It was absolutely impossible to imagine how the human body would react. The overloads that the astronauts were subjected to during training and testing on Earth could not compare with what would happen there,” said Larisa Uspenskaya .

Officially, two dummies flew into space, jokingly nicknamed Ivan Ivanovich by the designers. In order not to scare people, they will write on the suit of the second one: “Model”. But it was impossible to stop the rumors.

“It was only fifty years later that the UN established that April 12, 1961 is the day of the first human flight into space,” said Viktor Gorbatko.

Today, for $1 million, anyone can go into space. But has it become safe? What are astronauts still hiding?

“I was worried, of course, but there was no fear. Unfortunately, the previous crew, when we flew to Almaz (the Salyut-5 military station), panicked, they began to take things more and more acutely, which caused a deterioration in their health, and this led to an emergency landing, and for some time it was even believed that the station was poisoned.

Only behind the scenes, testers say that the risk in flights has not disappeared. It's still roulette, which is why they sign non-disclosure documents. Their reports are kept as secret files for years.

“As a result of each flight, not counting TASS reports, a whole complex of documents arises. For example, Gagarin’s flight log has not yet been published. What do we know about the flights after Gagarin?” - Vadim Lukashevich argues.

It would seem that the veil of secrecy of the first flights has been lifted, and except for dogs and mannequins, no one had been in orbit before Gagarin, but until all the documents are declassified, these questions will be investigated again and again.

Major Gagarin completed the task. After him, Viktor Gorbatko managed to travel into space three times, each time the mission was made more difficult.

“Plains, forests, all this can be seen from space. On my second flight, taking the appropriate equipment, we could see a person,” recalls Viktor Gorbatko.

50 years ago, Alexei Leonov was the first in history to enter airless space.

Half a century ago, on March 18, 1965, Soviet cosmonaut Alexei Leonov made the first human spacewalk in history.

The experiment was planned as part of the expedition of the Voskhod-2 spacecraft, which launched on the same Thursday from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the Kazakh SSR. The ship's crew consisted of commander Pavel Belyaev and pilot Alexey Leonov. On the occasion of the anniversary of "360 Moscow Region" I have prepared five interesting facts about this significant event.

Too much radiation

Even as the spacecraft (SC) entered orbit, problems began. The fact is that Voskhod-2, due to a technical error, moved away from the Earth by 495 kilometers instead of 350 kilometers, as planned. At the same time, the radiation layer, harmful to humans, is located at a distance of 500 kilometers from the Planet.

The dose of radiation received by the astronauts was 70 billion rads, which is almost twice as high as during the Voskhod-1 spacecraft expedition. If at this moment streams of solar wind of increased intensity passed near the Earth, the astronauts could have died.

The main thing is that the suit fits

To enter airless space, OKB-1 employees developed the Berkut spacesuit, which, unlike modern extravehicular suits, did not allow the air exhaled by the astronaut to be regenerated. In the Berkut, designed for a 30-minute stay in outer space, Alexey Leonov moved away from the Voskhod-2 spacecraft five times at a distance of up to 5.35 meters.

However, when the astronaut wanted to return to the airlock chamber, he realized that due to the pressure difference the suit was inflated. Leonov had to risk his life to reduce the pressure inside the Berkut and, violating safety rules, get into the airlock head first. As a result, the astronaut still managed to return to the spacecraft.

CCTV

Leonov spent 23 minutes and 41 seconds in airless space. The historical event was observed by video cameras installed on the outer surface of the Voskhod-2 spacecraft. The image from them was transmitted to Earth, in addition, the astronaut himself recorded video using the S-97 camera.

Rough landing

During the spacecraft's return to the Planet on March 19, the ship's automatic landing system failed, so the cosmonauts had to land Voskhod-2 manually. The landing took place in an unplanned place - in the taiga, 180 kilometers from Perm. Pavel Belyaev and Alexey Leonov were discovered only four hours later, and the heroes were evacuated only two days later, and the cosmonauts had to use skis to get to the helicopter landing pad.

Space Race

Domestic cosmonauts managed to overtake the American astronauts at this checkpoint of the space race. US Representative Edward White performed the first spacewalk only on June 3, 1965. Apparently, because of this, the phrase “Triumph of the Soviet Country” was printed on Soviet postage stamps dedicated to the feat of Pavel Belyaev and Alexei Leonov.

Since man's first spacewalk, 729 walks through airless outer space have been completed, with a total duration of more than four thousand hours. Soviet cosmonaut Svetlana Savitskaya stepped outside her spacecraft on July 25, 1984, becoming the first woman in outer space. In total, 210 people visited airless space. The record holder for the number of spacewalks is Anatoly Solovyov - he has 16 of them with a total duration of more than 78 hours.