As any American school child would know, of course.
On June 16, 1963, she soared to the heavens with the Vostok 6 mission and orbited the Earth 48 times, spending almost three days in space. Fun fact: In order to join the Cosmonaut Corps, Tereshkova was inducted into the Soviet Air Force, but since the distinction was only honorary, she was the first civilian to fly in space. Two records, one trip.
Bonus fun fact: At the age of 77, Tereshkova said that she was ready to come out of retirement to go on a one-way trip to Mars, her favorite planet.
That might be Yuri Gagarin on the left, and Jeebus Luis, did Khrushchev have a rubbery bullet head, or what?
The Russians have had difficulty getting beyond close Earth orbit lately, but since we can't lift anyone to our space station (thanks Barack), we need to pay them to get us there.
ReplyDeletecome on now. STS was built only to loft the space station into orbit. the whole rational was to reduce the cost per pound to low orbit. sadly, people got full of themselves and forgot just how dangerous manned spaceflight is. shit happens and management makes poor decisions they are not fully qualified to make. turned out that lighting a solid rocket booster frozen in ice and throwing a 10lb chunk of insulation at the wing at supersonic speeds was stupid beyond belief. Hm. and then it got expensive.
ReplyDeletebut hey. If Valentina would like some company on the trip, I am more than willing to go with her.