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by Staff Writers Moscow, Russia (RIA Novosti) Apr 05, 2011
Russian pilot and cosmonaut Vladimir Aksyonov has offered the most plausible account to date of the crash of the fighter jet that killed Yury Gagarin, the first man in space, and Vladimir Seryogin, a regimental commander at the cosmonaut training center where Gagarin was enrolled. Aksyonov, a two-time Hero of the Soviet Union, was with Gagarin at a pre-flight medical exam on March 27, 1968, the day of the crash. He flew in a different plane on that fateful day. Aksyonov presents his unofficial version of events in his book "Along the Roads of Trial", which has just been released in a limited printing. A signed copy was presented to this RIA Novosti correspondent at the Memorial Museum of Cosmonautics. Gagarin and Aksyonov saw the same doctor before boarding different planes Outside the Polbin Higher Air Force School, where Gagarin was enrolled from 1955 to 1957, stands a concrete pedestal supporting the MiG-15 jet in which the world's first cosmonaut learned to fly. "The first person to offer this version of the crash was Hero of the Soviet Union Sergei Anokhin, an experienced test pilot, and a member of the commission that investigated the disaster," Aksyonov told me. "It was soon after the crash. He told me first not only because we were friends and knew each other so well that could finish each other's sentences, but also perhaps because on that tragic day I shared the same changing room with Gagarin, got my pre-flight medical clearance from the same doctor and was briefed about the weather by the same officer." Aksyonov says that the crews then went to their separate aircraft, with Yury Gagarin assigned to fly in a MiG-15 with Vladimir Seryogin, and Aksyonov assigned to a plane conducting training in zero-gravity conditions.
Bad weather a factor
Gagarin's last words They were flying at a low speed but at a great altitude. Their next maneuver was to make a rapid descent and prepare for a dive through the cloud cover.
Minutes before Gagarin's death Aksyonov believes that Gagarin and Seryogin were two to three seconds late in pulling out of the dive after the half-roll, causing them to end up in the thick cloud layer. But there could have been other factors as well: the greater altitude and density of the cloud cover at the point of entry compared with the general level, or the inadequate height at which the MiG-15 started the half-roll.
Causes of the tragedy in Aksyonov's account
Entering tailspin
Gagarin and Seryogin did not try to eject He also noted the difficulty of piloting a heavy MiG-15 UTI fighter in a vertical position. "At the lower point of any aerial figure or half-roll, aircraft speeds are at their highest - about 700 kilometers an hour," Aksyonov said. "So it is quite possible for a MiG-15 in rapid descent to overshoot the target altitude by a few hundred meters or even a kilometer."
Official report on Gagarin's death still classified According to the official version of events, due to a change in air conditions (the commission did not specify what change) the crew performed a sharp maneuver and entered into a tailspin. The pilots, despite their efforts to right the plane, crashed to the ground and died. No equipment failures or malfunctions were reported. An analysis of the pilots' remains and blood revealed no traces of foreign substances.
Aksyonov rejects rumors that the pilots were drunk "That day was very important for Yury Gagarin, and everyone who knew the details and the pilots personally find speculation that Gagarin and Seryogin were drunk during flight preposterous," Aksyonov said.
Popular myths Some would-be investigators claim that Gagarin staged his own death, and lived the remainder of his life under a false name in the Orenburg Region, where he died as an old man in a hunting accident. Yet another conspiracy theory, the so-called "Soviet Moon plot", has it that Gagarin died a few days before the alleged training flight during the launch of a new secret spacecraft to explore the ?oon. The views expressed in this article are the author's and do not necessarily represent those of RIA Novosti.
Source: RIA Novosti
Related Links - Station and More at Roscosmos S.P. Korolev RSC Energia Russian Space News
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