Yuri Gagarin

Yuri Gagarin Image: AP/Itar-Tass Space campInside Russia's secretive cosmonaut training centreBBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Inside Russia's space camp
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Georgy Grechko was one of the early cosmonauts and trained with Yuri Gagarin, the first man in space.
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Yuri Gagarin Image: AP/Itar-TassSpace campInside Russia's secretive cosmonaut training centre

By the time Yuri Gagarin orbited the Earth he was well and truly "infected" with the "space bug" an affliction which has remained with me to this day.One of my earliest memories was of being on my fathers farm and hearing rocket engines being tested ten miles away at the rocket propulsion establishment at Westcott.From that time he was determined that he would see a rocket launched, an ambition which he fulfilled in 1995 when I watched Space Shuttle Atlantis lift off for the first ever docking with the Mir space station.After a variety of jobs which included working as an assistant for the meteorological office, driving a truck, and working as a photographer on a cruise ship, he became a technical operator for the BBC, a job which included location sound and camera work, and studio based audio recording and editing.Currently he works for the Open University (a distance learning organization) creating Cdroms for disabled students.