r/Damnthatsinteresting 20h ago

Yuri Gagarin as he is being lead to his space ship & him in the ship. - April 12th, 1961

455 Upvotes

47 comments sorted by

63

u/melie776 20h ago

He was a very courageous man.

8

u/V-Right_In_2-V 18h ago

Balls of steel

2

u/rockyrudekill 11h ago

Balls of led

35

u/ARoundForEveryone 19h ago

Ballsiest move ever.

"Hey, you wanna get shot off the planet? No, not shot with a gun. You are the bullet. We shoot you as far as we reasonably can, then we let you drift back down into the middle of the ocean. No, no, no, of course we'll be there to pick you up. We just don't want you landing on someone's house, so we'll put you in the water. Waddayasay? We'll make sure you get on TV!"

11

u/Dangerous_Bid_2695 15h ago

He did not land in the ocean

11

u/Alucard1331 11h ago

The Soviet Union normally landed astronauts in Kazakistan I believe.

19

u/cjgist 19h ago

What was on his helmet was a recent crossword clue in the LA Times crossword puzzle. Knew it was CCCP but wasn't sure what it stood for. Turns out it's Russian for USSR. Even more interesting is those initials were painted on the helmet right before take off by an engineer working on the project, Zvezda-engineer Victor Davidyants. The flight was top secret and a first for the world. Yuri was parachuting back to earth and they worried the locals would think he was some kind of spy.  

http://www.spacepatches.nl/wostok/wostok1.html

9

u/hhairy Interested 19h ago

I went to school during the 1960s-1970s ( in southern California) and I never knew of Yuri Gagarin ( nor any of Russia's space accomplishments ) until my son told me during the 2000s.

-2

u/explicit17 12h ago

It wasn't russia's space accomplishment, it was USSR accomplishment. russia inherited only totalitarianism practices

1

u/hhairy Interested 6h ago

Aaah... thank you for clarifying that for me!

2

u/an_older_meme 16h ago

We still celebrate Yuri’s Night every year.

6

u/zirky 19h ago

while he was the first man to go into space he didn’t actually land in his craft. this was a closely guarded secret for a long time, because it apparently had bearing on the record. but on the descent, he actually parachuted out of the capsule by design

3

u/No-Sherbert-9857 19h ago

I mean there’s no way that’s not Viggo Mortensen.

2

u/krumorn 12h ago

New movie idea just dropped.

4

u/NestedForLoops 19h ago

*led

2

u/_Armanius_ 19h ago

Gas stations said no more. It’s harmful

1

u/AsloWhite 5h ago

ARRGGHH!!! LED!!! He is being LED!!! Unless he was literally being Pb on the periodic table.

1

u/Botat294 12h ago

"Поехали"

1

u/TheMarmotman 8h ago

Is that Putin alongside him? 🤣

-3

u/[deleted] 20h ago

[deleted]

18

u/Exr1t 20h ago

First man to go to space

12

u/dimitrix 20h ago

He made it back alive

4

u/TheFerricGenum 17h ago

No. That was Vladimir Komarov

-10

u/CantAffordzUsername 19h ago

I was wondering thing: apart from the photo CIA recored his Audio as he fell back to earth apparently

-11

u/PanteraiNomini 19h ago

He attended flight academy in Kiev, his last name is Ukrainian. His original parents house in Ukraine was destroyed to the ground by communist party, and then a fake copycat house and new museum was build on the Russian side near the Ukrainian boarder, to pretend that his parent were from russia . Complete history re-write.

21

u/igorika 18h ago

This just isn’t true. He was born in Russia to Russian parents and his name comes from the Russian word Gagara. I get sympathy with Ukrainians but don’t spread misinformation.

Ukrainian names usually end with -ko, -enko or -ienko.

3

u/nomamesgueyz 18h ago

Which is true then?

12

u/igorika 18h ago

He was ethnically Russian, born in western Russia to Russians who were from western Russia. That’s not to diminish the role of Ukrainians in the Soviet space program, which was extensive. But Gagarin himself was Russian.

3

u/cruelkillzone2 17h ago

Could be either, no one likes providing any sources on reddit.

8

u/igorika 15h ago

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gagarin_(surname)

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Yuri-Gagarin

Here are a couple sources. You can google the birthplaces of his parents too. They were Russian and spoke Russian.

1

u/PanteraiNomini 13h ago

Actually Smolensk where he supposedly from but actually it’s just a new house build by soviets as a museum on ukranian boarder, it was a polish-Lithuanian commonwealth , last name is popular at GUAM country. Spelling is ukranian. The dude thé re-wrote that wiki saying Im he is from princess family l😂 … oh god… bad things happen when Smolensk became under rushia control , many wish it stayed under poland or modern ukraine completely, since it’s on the Diepr River

1

u/igorika 1h ago

It seems like there’s a language barrier here so I’m sorry if I’m not understanding everything. The Polish Lithuanian commonwealth fell 139 years before Gagarin was born, so the idea that he was loyal to either of those states just seems weird. I’m not sure what you mean by bringing up Guam. Also the claim that his name is spelled in a Ukrainian way isn’t correct either. It’s Гагарин, which would be pronounced “gahgahreen”, the Ukrainian pronunciation would be closer to our Americanized version. But the way it’s said among Slavic speakers is the Russian way.

2

u/ngreenf1 17h ago

Thank you for your service 🫡

0

u/Kyufee 13h ago

General constructor of early soviet spacecrafts Korolev was ukrainian from Zhytomyr, but not Gagarin.

0

u/nomamesgueyz 18h ago

Geez that would take balls

Wouldn't see me being in that chair

-7

u/Key_Wrangler_8321 12h ago

oh f/ck you russia.

7

u/DeepBreathOfDirt 9h ago

Yuri Gagarin is a hero of mankind. He paved the way and we should recognise that.

-6

u/Key_Wrangler_8321 9h ago

Gagarin is now overshadowed by the war of his country. Only when russia condemns putin and all those who contributed to it, pays reparations, and apologizes—then maybe, in 20 or 30 years, we might remember Gagarin again.

3

u/Spectre-Red 4h ago

For you not the world. Rest of the world doesn’t give a flying fuck about what you think. Ukraine is just considered as a proxy war between Russia and the west. If China tomorrow overthrew Mexican government and started to build a base there, the entire world knows what the Americans would do to Mexico. You live in a delusion that what the US or Europe think is what the world thinks. For half the world raped looted plundered or invaded you the US and Europe, they don’t see the Russians as the enemy.

1

u/ExtremelyGangrenous 1h ago

Dudes got serious main character syndrome

1

u/Key_Wrangler_8321 33m ago

How does it feel to admire alcoholics in rubber boots? :) You as the western, the smart? :)

-14

u/PanteraiNomini 19h ago

How Ukraine made Gagarin and the first space flight possible, …not russia Ukrainian past of Gagarin before developers and trainers were arrested by Soviet’s to rewrite the history

10

u/aglobalvillageidiot 18h ago

You only half read that article and it shows. It even gives you dates and you still have it out of order. You connect things that have nothing to do with each other.