Valentina Tereshkova: Spent more time than all the astronauts that went before her

What do you think of when you think of space?

Exciting, adventurous...

Yes it is all of those things. Yes you will fly from weightlessness in space.

Your food will fly, your water will fly too. Yes even your pee will fly if you did not control it. So is it not natural that all the fluids in your body will want to fly too.

Of course yes, and this means that water which keeps your eyes moist would fly. All digestive juices in your stomach will fly and your blood also loses track of where to go. What it means then is, unless you are very very fit, space can make you sick and you may even die.

This is probably why no one thought that a girl could go to space at the time. Why? Of course they thought that girls were simply not fit enough to go to space.

But Valentina Tereshkova proved everyone wrong. She proved she was as fit to go to space as anyone else by passing all the fitness tests in flying colors. These tests included 120 parachute jumps, being shut in a capsule for days together. In addition to going on weightless flights, centrifuge tests, she also had to pass rocket theory, spacecraft engineering and pilot training tests in MiG-15UTI jet fighters. Learning all these things and passing all these tests were very difficult for her as she was just a textile factory assembly worker before her recruitment as a cosmonaut. But Tereshkova never gave up and her experience as an amateur skydiver helped her greatly.

Finally, on the morning of 16 June 1963, she became the first women to fly in space, and orbited the earth 48 times and spent almost three days in space. Although she was physically uncomfortable and nauseous the whole time, she logged in more flight time than the combined times of all astronauts who had flown before her. And the next women astronaut: Svetlana Savitskaya took another 19 years to fly even though she was from her own country. Hence for a long time she was in inspiration and symbol of gender equality not only in Soviet Union but also all around the world.

In the Mission Starhip Game she is going to help you train for your journey into space.

Are you ready to learn the tricks of how to go into space from her?

#space #astronaut #games