On March 27, 1968, Yuri Gagarin, the first man to fly into space in 1961 aboard the Soviet capsule Vostok 1, died in a plane crash at the age of 34. This cosmonaut remains an iconic figure in the conquest of space, becoming a hero of the Soviet Union and a symbol of his country's scientific prestige.
That day, Gagarin conducted a training flight aboard a MiG-15 UTI aircraft, accompanied by instructor Vladimir Seryogin. At 10:18 a.m., the aircraft took off from Chkalovsky Air Base near Moscow. Less than ten minutes later, Gagarin requested to return to the base, without reporting any abnormalities. At 10:31 a.m., contact was finally lost. It was not until early afternoon that rescuers found the remains of the aircraft, crashed in a forest more than 60 kilometers from the base. The impact was so violent that the aircraft dug a crater several meters deep. The bodies of the two men were found the following morning.
Several investigations were conducted, but the precise causes of the accident remained confidential for a long time. The official report, partially declassified, mentioned a sudden evasive maneuver that led to a loss of control, probably to avoid a weather balloon or due to turbulence from another aircraft in the area. An altitude error due to inaccurate weather data could also have played a role. In the absence of a definitive conclusion, numerous theories circulated. The USSR declared a national mourning; Gagarin's ashes were placed in the Kremlin wall, a final tribute to the man who had left his mark on human history.
