Jamie Doran - Starman - The Truth Behind the Legend of Yuri Gagarin

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First published in 1998 by

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Copyright © 1998 by Jamie Doran and Piers Bizony

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TASS, Soviet Man in Space , Moscow: TASS/Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1961, p. 7. See also: Burchett, Wilfred & Purdy, Anthony, Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin , London: Anthony Gibbs & Phillips, 1961, pp. 87–99.

Quoted in Golovanov, Yaroslav, Our Gagarin , Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1978, p. 37.

Burchett & Purdy, Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin , p. 89.

Ibid., p. 90.

Golovanov, Our Gagarin , p. 42.

Burchett & Purdy, Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin , p. 91.

Golovanov, Our Gagarin , p. 43.

Burchett & Purdy, Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin , pp. 92–3.

Golovanov, Our Gagarin , pp. 263–4.

Ibid., p. 265.

Gagarin, The Road to the Stars , quoted in Golovanov, Our Gagarin , pp. 53–4.

Hooper, Gordon R., The Soviet Cosmonaut Team , Lowestoft: second edition, GRH Publications, 1990, Vol. II, ‘Cosmonaut Biographies’, pp. 299–301.

Ibid., pp. 161–6.

Oberg, James, Red Star in Orbit , New York: Random House, 1981, p. 97. Oberg’s highly entertaining book was the first popular Western account of the Soviet space programme.

Burchett & Purdy, Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin , p. 103.

Quoted in Golovanov, Our Gagarin , pp. 60–61.

Burchett & Purdy, Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin , p. 104.

Ibid., p. 104.

For an excellent account of the Chief Designer’s life and work, see Harford, James, Korolev , New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1997.

McCauley, Martin, Who’s Who in Russia Since 1900 , London: Routledge, 1997, pp. 212–13.

Burchett & Purdy, Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin , p. 25.

Khrushchev, Nikita, Khrushchev Remembers: The Last Testament , Boston: Little, Brown, 1970, p. 46.

Gatland, Kenneth, The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Space Technology , London: second edition, Salamander, 1989. Gatland’s book is a reliable general guide to spacecraft designs, launch dates and missions.

Interview with Oleg Ivanovsky. The silver cladding around the ‘ball’ was just a thin layer of reflective foil designed to protect the cabin against harsh solar radiation. The atmospheric heat-shield underneath comprised a much thicker and heavier layer of resin and fibre.

Quoted in Golovanov, Our Gagarin , p. 89.

Quoted in Golovanov, Our Gagarin , p. 265.

For a description of Baikonur’s construction, see Harvey, Brian, The New Russian Space Programme , New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1996, pp. 19–20, Kapustin Yar, pp. 141–3, Plesetsk, pp. 143–40.

Daily Telegraph , May 6, 1960, p. 1.

Secret US space projects are outlined in Trento, Joseph, Prescription for Disaster , London: Harrap, 1987, pp. 122–49.

Oberg, James, ‘Disaster at the Cosmodrome’, Air & Space Magazine, December 1990, pp. 74–7. For some years Western analysts were confused about the identity of the rocket that blew up. The Nedelin disaster happened to coincide with the early R-7 Mars probe failures, but Nedelin’s R-16 was definitely a military missile, not a space launcher. See also: Joint Publications Research Service-UMA-89-015, June 15, 1989, pp. 34–50.

Heppenheimer, T.A., Countdown , New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1997, pp. 188–9. See also: Harford, Korolev , p. 242, and Hooper, The Soviet Cosmonaut Team , Vol. 1: ‘Background Sections’, pp. 172–3. For a general analysis of Soviet cosmonaut fatalities and hidden rocket failures, see Oberg, James, Uncovering Soviet Disasters , London: Robert Hale, 1988, pp. 156–97.

Harford, Korolev , pp. 163–4.

Ibid., pp. 167–8.

A full account of the Mercury programme can be found in Swenson, Loyd, Grimwood, James & Alexander, Charles, This New Ocean: A History of Project Mercury , Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, NASA SP-4201, 1966.

On March 16, 1996, Sotheby’s auction house in New York held its second sale of Russian space hardware and memorabilia. Lot 25 consisted of ‘Ivan Ivanovich’s’ capsule, stripped of most of its interior equipment but still clearly recognizable as a Vostok prototype. The catalogue’s explanatory notes, prepared with the help of OKB-1 engineer-cosmonaut Konstantin Feoktistov, with additional material by James Oberg and various Russian historical experts, described Ivan’s adventures in full. See Sotheby’s Sale Catalogue 6753, Russian Space History , New York: March 16, 1996.

Popescu, Julian, Russian Space Exploration , London: Gothard, 1979, p. 16.

Interview with Gai Severin, quoted in Harford, Korolev , p. 162.

Cameraman Vladimir Suvorov’s account of his work can be found in Suvorov, Vladimir & Sabelnikov, Alexander, The First Manned Spaceflight , Commack, NY: Nova Science Publishers, 1997, pp. 61–75.

Kamanin diaries, April 7, 1961.

Suvorov & Sabelnikov, The First Manned Spaceflight , p. 58.