Starman_ The Truth Behind the Legend of Yuri Gagarin - Jamie Doran [27]
To his left, Gagarin would have seen another small panel with four rows of toggle switches. Leonov says that he fiddled with some of them, understanding straight away that he could only get to these left-hand controls by reaching across with his right arm. The natural armchair-style arrangement of an aircraft cockpit obviously did not apply here, although his right hand in repose settled comfortably on a small lever, the nearest equivalent any Vostok crewman would find to the control joystick in a fighter plane. Higher up, on the right, there was a radio transceiver. The only other piece of equipment obviously accessible to him was a food locker. It did not seem to matter which hand one used to reach that.
Below and slightly forward of his feet, Gagarin would have seen a round porthole with elaborate calibrated markings. The ‘Vzor’ was an optical orientation device consisting of mirrors and lenses. Through this, the curvature of the earth’s horizon would appear greatly exaggerated. When Vostok was aligned at a particular angle relative to the ground, the pilot would see a brilliant circle of horizon all around the Vzor’s outer edge. This would indicate that the craft was properly positioned for its re-entry burn. The effect was rather akin to a distorting mirror at a fairground, adapted by ingenious but under-equipped engineers into a precision tool of space navigation.
The layout of this Vostok test cabin was not exactly the same as Gagarin would find aboard the actual flight version. In time he would encounter more equipment: for instance, an intrusive television camera that pointed directly at his face, and a bright lamp that shone uncomfortably into his eyes so that his every expression could be recorded for the doctors. And, on the left-hand switch panel, a numeric keypad – two rows of three numbers, six digits in all – whose purpose was not immediately clear to him or any of the cosmonauts who clambered into the cabin after him.
They called Gagarin out after a few minutes. The other cosmonauts took their turns in the cabin, while Korolev and Ivanovsky leaned into the hatch to show them the controls.
Afterwards, while they were leaving the construction hall, the cosmonauts chattered eagerly about Vostok and who would be first to fly it. Alexei Leonov remembers putting his arm around Gagarin and saying, ‘Believe me, today could’ve been very important for you. I know you can be the first to go.’ Several in the group chimed in their agreement. Gagarin had made an impression back there.
Meanwhile Valya was beginning to understand the pitfalls of being a cosmonaut’s wife. As she told journalist Yaroslav Golovanov in 1978, ‘Yuri would often come home late, and he frequently went on trips to do with his work. He wasn’t very communicative about what he did, and if I ever showed any curiosity he would dismiss it with a joke. I know he wasn’t allowed to talk about these things even with his family, but it sometimes seemed to me that his work at Star City was taking him away from me more and more. I tried to make it seem that I hadn’t noticed, but from time to time I would be overcome by a strange anxiety.’8
One day towards the end of 1960 Gagarin brought some of his cosmonaut friends home, and Valya, coming in from work at the Star City clinic, overheard them whispering. ‘It’ll be soon now. Either Yuri or Gherman.’
4
PREPARATION
When Korolev and his colleagues brought home captured German V-2s and began to fire them, they built a small testing station 180 kilometres