Yuri Gagarin

Astronaut

1934 – 1968

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Who was Yuri Gagarin?

Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin was a Soviet pilot and cosmonaut. He was the first human to journey into outer space, when his Vostok spacecraft completed an orbit of the Earth on 12 April 1961.

Gagarin became an international celebrity, and was awarded many medals and titles, including Hero of the Soviet Union, the nation's highest honour. Vostok 1 marked his only spaceflight, but he served as backup crew to the Soyuz 1 mission. Gagarin later became deputy training director of the Cosmonaut Training Centre outside Moscow, which was later named after him. Gagarin died in 1968 when the MiG-15 training jet he was piloting crashed.

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Born
Mar 9, 1934
Klushino
Also known as
  • Ю́рий Алексе́евич Гага́рин, Jurij Aleksejevič Gagarin
  • Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin
  • Juri Gagarin
  • Yuriy Gagarin
  • Yuriy Alekseevich Gagarin
Parents
Siblings
Spouses
Children
Ethnicity
  • Russian
Nationality
  • Soviet Union
Profession
Employment
  • Lieutenant, Soviet Air Forces
    (1957/11/05 - )
Lived in
  • Smolensk Oblast
  • Klushino
Died
Mar 27, 1968
Kirzhach
Resting place
Kremlin Wall Necropolis

Submitted
on July 23, 2013

Citation

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"Yuri Gagarin." Biographies.net. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 28 Mar. 2024. <https://www.biographies.net/people/en/yuri_gagarin>.

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