Tiraspol, April 12. /Novosti Pridnestrovya/. Precisely 60 years ago, man managed to burst into space environment for the first time in history. On April 12, 1961, the soviet pilot Yuri Gagarin started out for from the Baikonur Cosmodrome into the starry space. The place of the first rocket launching with an astronaut and Pridnestrovie are separated with 3 thousand kilometers. However, our republic is much closer to the space industry than it might appear. On Cosmonautics Day, the Novosti Pridnestrovya news agency presents the facts compilation about the connection between the PMR and space exploration.
Pridnestrovie can legitimately be proud of the fact that on April 12, 1961, local students managed to record the Yuri Gagarin callsigns. At first, the Tiraspol vocational school students didn’t understand what they were hearing in their radio deck house. It was later revealed that the Tiraspol residents were the first one on the USSR territory, who received a signal from space.
After that, the students immediately wrote a letter to Yuri Gagarin, where they asked to assign their secondary school of the first USSR cosmonaut’s name. Yuri Alekseevich used to study at a similar institution, that’s why he warmly answered a letter and agreed to their request. Thus, a Tiraspol vocational school was named after Yuri Alekseevich Gagarin on May 8, 1961.
Personally, Yuri Gagarin was never been to Pridnestrovie. However, a fighter aviation regiment was based at the Tiraspol airdrome, where eight young men, who later became cosmonauts, were doing a military service in the 119th aviation division. Among them are such honorary citizens of Tiraspol as Viktor Gorbatko, Evgeny Khrunov, Anatoly Berezovoy, Vladimir Dezhurov, Yuri Malenchenko, Yuri Gidzenko, Vladimir Jenibekov and Anatoly Filipchenko. At that time all future space explorers were living in the Krasnye kasarmy microdistrict.
The Pridnestrovian industry also made contribution to the space exploration. The Tiraspol Metallolithography enterprise in the 1970s began to produce special tubes for space food. Our packaging was superior to the Estonian one, which was used before. The narrow tubes, which were made in Estonia didn’t allow the food to squeeze out rapidly. The tube neck of our national production was much wider and easy-to-use.
The Elektromash enterprise manufactured the Russian RT-64 radio telescope details. It’s located in the Tver Russian region at the Kalyazin radio astronomical observatory. The radio telescope is intended for astronomical research, receiving signals as well as for controlling spacecraft in outer space.
Another Moldavizolit enterprise has left its mark on space history, where the finest electrical insulating materials for printed wiring boards, which are the basis of many electrical devices and mechanisms, were produced.
Moreover, at various domestic enterprises, special pencils for astronauts, equipment details as well as spacecraft sheathing were produced.
Our republic is still directly connected with the space industry. Pridnestrovian astronomers are members of the Pulkovo Optical Observers Cooperation. It consists on over 30 observatories in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), Bolivia, Mexico as well as the United States. The Pridnestrovian observation station is located in the most south-westerly part. Astronomers of the republic cooperate with the Keldysh Russian Institute of Applied Mathematics, helping to conduct observations that are related to the spacecraft security supporting.
