The Cosmonauts: Birth of the Space Age exhibit will run at the Science Museum London for the next 6 months. The opening was attended by cosmonauts Valentina Tereshkova and Sergei Krikalev.
Many of these exhibits have never left Russia before…
The Science Museum London has put together a new exhibition chronicling the early days of the Russian space age.
Cosmonauts: Birth of the Space Age tells the story of the hugely successful Russian space programme.
The Russian side of the space race is little known in the West, and many of the items on display have never been outside of Russia.
Several have not even been available for public viewing in their home country until now.
On 17 September we were invited to a special event, with special guests Valentina Tereshkova and Sergei Krikalev.
Tereshkova was the first woman ever to fly in space and told the story of her space flight.
While in orbit she realised that her space craft was orientated wrong and had to convince her superiors of this or risk being fired into deep space.
She also told of the less serious crises of bad space cuisine and a forgotten toothbrush.
Until very recently, Krikalev held the record for the most number of days spent in space having spent 800 days on the space station Mir and other missions.
However his stint was not expected to be this long, however.
During his time on Mir the Soviet Union collapsed and with no money to send a ship to get him, his stay doubled in length to ten months.
The Cosmonauts exhibition is being held at the Science Museum, London.
Valentina Tereshkova, the first woman in space, chatted with director Ian Blatchford about her trip to space.
Sergei Krikalev has spend 803 days, 9 hours and 39 minutes in space and has completed eight space walks.
Valentina Tereshkova in front of Vostok 6, the spacecraft that carried her to space. Tereshkova often whispers “my lovely one, my best and most beautiful friend, my best and most beautiful man” to her craft.
The exhibition features artwork as well as space hardware, capturing the spirit of the golden era of the space age as well as its history. ‘New Planet’ by Konstantin Yuon, 1921.
Model of the Venera-7 lander and parachute. Venera-7 landed on Venus in 1970, the first time humanity had ever landed on another world.
Model of the Luna 1 space probe, the first to pass the Moon.
Model of Luna-24 lander, the last of three successful sample return missions to the Moon.
Dogs used to perform tests for later manned missions using equipment as this ejection seat and suit used on sub-orbital rocket flights.
A medical student’s jacket was painted with the words ‘Space is ours!’ in 1961 to celebrate Yuri Gagarin’s first space flight.
Chief Designer’ by Yuri Korolev depicts Sergei Korolev, the chief designer of the Russian space programme, whose identity was kept secret until his death in 1966 for fear of assassination.
The uniform jacket of Yuri Gagarin, the first man in space.
The exhibit features several concept drawings from early on in Russia’s space programme.
‘To the Cosmos’ tea set from the State Dmitrovskii Procelain Factory is one example of the memorabilia on display.
LK-3 lunar lander. The lander would have carried a single cosmonaut to the Moon, however the Russian space programme changed its direction following the Apollo landings, and the mission never happened.
Pressure trousers were designed to help astronauts readjust to life under the Earth’s gravitational pull.
Familiar to most modern astronauts, the space toilet is vital to health and sanitation while in space.
Model of a table from space station Mir. Meals are a time where working astronauts can gather together to socialise and relax.
The Tissue-Equivalent Phantom Mannequin was flown around the Moon to test how human’s would react to radiation.
The exhibit is a fitting tribute to the golden era of the space age, and the nation that helped to shape it.
Ezzy Pearson is the News Editor of BBC Sky at Night Magazine. Her first book about the history of robotic planetary landers is out now from The History Press.
