Russian pilot cosmonaut 1970-1992. 1 spaceflight, 211.4 days in space. Flew to orbit on Soyuz T-5 (1982). From 1992 to 1999, Deputy President, Russian Space Federation.Retired for medical reasons (due to injuries he received as the victim in an armed robbery).

U.S.-IGY scientific satellite equipment, including a radio transmitter and instruments for measuring temperature, pressure, cosmic rays, and meteoric dust encounters, was tested above earth for the first time, as a rocket containing this equipment was fired by the Navy to a 126-mile altitude.

The booster is rolled out to the pad at 05:00. At 10:00 the cosmonauts meet with Feoktistov for a last review of the flight plan. Launch is set of 09:07 the next day, followed by shutdown and jettison of the lateral boosters of the first stage at 09:09, and orbital insertion at 09:18. The spacecraft will orient itself toward the sun for retrofire at 09:50. At 10:15 the first command sequence will be uploaded to the spacecraft, followed by the second at 10:18 and the third at 10:25. Retrofire of the TDU engine will commence at 10:25:47. The service module will separate from the capsule at 10:36 as the capsule begins re-entry. The capsule's parachute will deploy at 10:43:43 and at 10:44:12 the cosmonaut's ejection seat will fire. While the cosmonauts go through this, the booster has been brought upright on the pad, the service towers raised, and all umbilical connections made. Korolev, Yazdovskiy, and the others make a final inspection at the pad prior to the commencement of the countdown. At 13:00 Gagarin meets a group of soldiers, NCO's, and officers. After this Kamanin and the cosmonauts go to the cottage formerly occupied by Marshal Nedelin, where they will spend the last night before launch. They eat 'space food' out of 160 g toothpaste-type tubes for lunch - two servings of meat puree and one of chocolate sauce. Gagarin's blood pressure is measured as 115/60, pulse 64, body temperature 36.8 deg C. He then subjects to placement of the biosensors he will wear during the flight, and baseline measurements are taken for an hour and twenty minutes. He is very calm through all this. At 21:30 Korolev comes to the cottage, says good night to the cosmonauts, then goes back out to check on launch preparations. Gagarin and Titov go to bed after this. Kamanin stays up a while in the next room, listening to them talk to one another in the dark.

Christopher C. Kraft, Jr., John D. Hodge, and William L. Davidson of MSC's light Operations Division met at Langley with a large contingent of that Center's research staff to discuss LaRC's proposed Manned Orbital Research Laboratory (MORL). Langley spokesmen briefed their Houston visitors on the philosophy and proposed program phases leading to an operational MORL. Kraft and his colleagues then emphasized the need for careful study of operational problems involved with the MORL, as well as those associated with the smaller crew ferry and logistics supply vehicles. Specifically, they cited crew selection and training requirements, the need for a continuous recovery capability, communications requirements, and handling procedures for scientific data.

Gagarin, Gorbatko, Nikolayev, Popovich, and their wives went out with delegates to the 23 Party Congress from Kiev. Afterwards an argument broke out between Popovich and his wife when she caught him in an embrace with Gorbatko's wife. Popovich struck his wife in the presence of the others, and her brother punched Popovich in response, giving him a black eye.

A Headquarters USAF Systems Management Directive (SMD) for Minuteman I and IT directed that an Improved Third Stage (ITS) propulsion system. This would be used with the Mark 12 and Mark 17 reentry vehicles and a Post Boost Control System (PBCS) and that initial operational capability (IOC) be achieved in July 1969. The Minuteman with the new third stage was designated the Minuteman III (LGM-30G) weapon system and was to be compatible with either the WS 133B or WS 133A/M ground systems.

Apollo 13 (AS-508) was launched from Pad A, Launch Complex 39, KSC, at 2:13 p.m. EST April 11, with astronauts James A. Lovell, Jr., John L. Swigert, Jr., and Fred W. Haise, Jr., aboard. The spacecraft and S-IVB stage entered a parking orbit with a 185.5-kilometer apogee and a 181.5-kilometer perigee. At 3:48 p.m., onboard TV was begun for five and one-half minutes. At 4:54 p.m., an S-IVB burn placed the spacecraft on a translunar trajectory, after which the CSM separated from the S-IVB and LM Aquarius. (The crew had named lunar module 7 Aquarius and CSM 109 Odyssey.) The CSM then hard-docked with the LM. The S-IVB auxiliary propulsion system made an evasive maneuver after CSM/LM ejection from the S-IVB at 6:14 p.m. The docking and ejection maneuvers were televised during a 72-minute period in which interior and exterior views of the spacecraft were also shown.

At 8:13 p.m. EST a 217-second S-IVB auxiliary propulsion system burn aimed the S-IVB for a lunar target point so accurately that another burn was not required. The S-IVB/IU impacted the lunar surface at 8:10 p.m. EST on April 14 at a speed of 259 meters per second. Impact was 137.1 kilometers from the Apollo 12 seismometer. The seismic signal generated by the impact lasted 3 hours 20 minutes and was so strong that a ground command was necessary to reduce seismometer gain and keep the recording on the scale. The suprathermal ion detector experiment, also deployed by the Apollo 12 crew, recorded a jump in the number of ions from zero at the time of impact up to 2,500 shortly thereafter and then back to a zero count. Scientists theorized that ionization had been produced by 6,300 K to 10,300 K (6,000 degrees C to 10,000 degrees C) temperature generated by the impact or that particles had reached an altitude of 60 kilometers from the lunar surface and had been ionized by sunlight.

Meanwhile back in the CSM/LM, the crew had been performing the routine housekeeping duties associated with the period of the translunar coast. At 30:40 ground elapsed time a midcourse correction maneuver took the spacecraft off a free-return trajectory in order to control the arrival time at the moon. Ensuring proper lighting conditions at the landing site. The maneuver placed the spacecraft on the desired trajectory, on which the closest approach to the moon would be 114.9 kilometers.

At 10:08 p.m. EST April 13, the crew reported an undervoltage alarm on the CSM main bus B, rapid loss of pressure in SM oxygen tank No. 2, and dropping current in fuel cells 1 and 3 to a zero reading. The loss of oxygen and primary power in the service module required an immediate abort of the mission. The astronauts powered up the LM, powered down the CSM, and used the LM systems for power and life support. The first maneuver following the abort decision was made with the descent propulsion system to place the spacecraft back in a free-return trajectory around the moon. After the spacecraft swung around the moon, another maneuver reduced the coast time back to earth and moved the landing point from the Indian Ocean to the South Pacific.

Polar Orbiting Geomagnetic Survey satellite designed to measure the Earth's magnetic field vector as a function of position. Data from the experiment was used to improve Earth navigation systems, and was stored in an experimental solid state recorder. Six low cost ground stations were designed, built and located around the world to operate the spacecraft flown on this mission.

250 orbits. In addition to Russian materials science experiments, Foton 6 carried out the French Gezon experiment using the Russian Zona-4M electric furnace (Foton spacecraft have also flown the Zona 1, Zona 4, Splav 2, and Konstanta 2 electric furnaces as well as the Kashtan electrophoresis unit). Foton 6, which also carried the European Biopan life sciences experiments, was successfully recovered on the 15th day.

The International Space Station's Expedition Two Crew spent this week loading the Progress supply craft with trash and unneeded items in preparation for its undocking next week to clear the aft port on the Zvezda module for the relocation of the Soyuz capsule. This air traffic control activity clears the way for the arrival next week of Space Shuttle Endeavour and the STS-100 crew delivering the Canadian built station robot arm and another high tech moving van full of supplies. Additional Details: here....

"University of California-Berkeley fight song" performed by the school band and"All Right Now" performed by the Stanford University band. Ochoa requested the songs be played for crewmates Walheim and Smith who attended the rival schools. Ochoa's also a Stanford graduate.

At 1030 UTC the S0 truss was unberthed from Atlantis, and berthed to the Destiny module's Lab Cradle Assembly at 1346 UTC. At 1433 the Quest airlock was depressurized and the astronauts emerged to bolt in place the two forward MTS struts and deploy a trailing umbilical for the mobile transporter. The airlock was repressurized at 2224 UTC.

Delayed from November 9, 2004; January 19, March 18, 2005. Military Autonomous Rendezvous Technology. It tested navigation technologies for rendezvous that directly measured relative position to the target satellite. It was have to rendezvoused with several defunct American satellites. However it was only known to have conducted operations with its own Minotaur upper stage

The 53-minute orbit insertion burn begain at 07:10 GMT and left VEx the spacecraft in a highly elliptical polar orbit around Venus with an apoapsis of 350,000 km. A series of further engine burns would place the satellite in a 257 x 70,463 km orbit by 23 April..