Alexei Leonov: First person to walk in space dies aged 85

A generation has passed the first man to walk in space Mr Alexei Leonov had the untold pleasure of looking down from above and seeing the planet we inhabit, the trust he must have had in his collegues must have been beyond compare, have we achieved enough in the 50+ years since his brave and downright dangerous mission

He trained with Yuri Gagarin, the first human in space, and they became close friends, now there is two dinner time guests to have spoken to.

Tethered to a spaceship by a 4.8m (16ft) cable, the Russian floated above Earth for 12 minutes.

"I was surrounded by stars and was floating without much control. I will never forget the moment. I also felt an incredible sense of responsibility. Of course, I did not know that I was about to experience the most difficult moments of my life - getting back into the capsule."

12 minutes of wonderment, 12 minutes of trepidation, 12 minutes to become eternal, I thank you Mr Alexei Leonov for being the first

Alexei Leonov: First person to walk in space dies aged 85

Video of space walk included in link

Also worth noting there has been talk of other missions which pre dated both Yuri and Alexei dubbed "The Lost Cosmonauts", which if true makes what they achieved even greater (if thats possible).

a reply to: UpIsNowDown
I remember seeing the movie 2010 back in the 80’s and wondering who the Russians had named their spacecraft after.
So when I got home I looked it up in the ole Encyclopedia Britannica I used at the time for school work and looked him up.

Wow, I stayed up for a quite a while reading about Leonov, Gagarin, Kamorov, and Titov.

RIP Comrade.

a reply to: UpIsNowDown


Leonov almost did not make it back inside his VOSKOD space capsule

In space his suit ballooned out so much and became so stiff as to prevent him from entering the airlock

Totally exhausted and drenched in sweat was forced to depressurize his space suit to fit back in airlock

Their automatic landing system failed forcing the crew (Leonov, Pavel Belyayev ) to go around for another orbit and use
manual backup The service module failed to separate from the crew module until it was freed by reentry

The crew were forced to under go a ballistic re entry and land far from their normal landing zone, coming down in Ural
Mountains and be forced by wolves to spend an uncomfortable in their capsule until recovery crews reached them

Quite an adventure

Gene Cernan had similar experience on Gemini 9A with suit ballooning out and becoming so stiff as to maje movement impossible

Cernan became so exhausted was forced to cut EVA short and try make back inside Gemini - suit was so stiff was unable to get back in - partner, Thomas Stafford was forced to pull Cernan in by pulling on legs to get inside

Speaking of Tom Stafford, I had the pleasure of hearing him speak a few years ago and he spoke very warmly of Leonov and their friendship that developed during the Apollo-Soyuz mission. He sounded like an entertaining guy.

He was due to speak at the same venue another time but ill health prevented it. A generation of pioneering legends is fading from us. Shame.

Was reading about this yesterday and was more surprised the fella lived as long as he did, Cosmonauts didn't have much luck living long lives back on earth.
Not being a viewer of Russia Today it got me thinking, was he like their Buzz Aldrin wheeled out whenever something spacey went on?

Good travels Comrade.