The Conqueror of the Universe Pavel Ivanovich Belyaev left a bright mark in the Soviet and world cosmonautics. It was he who controlled the Voskhod-2 spacecraft, from which Alexei Leonov went into outer space. With a failed navigation system and no communication with the Earth, Pavel Ivanovich was able to manually land Voskhod-2 in the remote Permian taiga, for which he later received the title of Hero of the USSR.
Biography
Pavel Belyaev was born on 1925-26-06 in the village of Chelishchevo, North Dvina province (now it is the Vologda region). His father was a paramedic, but before the war he changed jobs and moved his family from the Vologda region to the Urals, to the city of Kamensk-Uralsky. Pavel, who at that time was a sixth grader, began to study at a regular school No. 3, and it was there, at the lessons of physics and astronomy, that he was infected with the dream of space.
In June 1941, the boy graduated from the ninth grade, and in August the school was converted into a hospital, and the first wounded from the front began to arrive there. The last year of the decade, Pavel Belyaev studied at school number 1. He had an accordion donated by someone fromrelatives, and at breaks he sometimes played it. Despite his passion for music, the teenager dreamed of becoming a pilot and several times sent applications to a flight school. Pavel liked to read adventure and science fiction literature. He imagined aviation from books about the flights of Gromov and Chkalov and the northern flights of Soviet pilots.
War and post-war years
In 1942, after graduation, sixteen-year-old Belyaev decided to volunteer for the front, but because of his young age, he was not accepted. Then he began working at a pipe plant as a turner, engaged in the production of artillery shells.
In 1943, upon reaching the age of eighteen, Pavel nevertheless entered the Yeysk Aviation School, which was then located in Sarapul, Udmurt Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic. In 1945 he graduated from it and went to serve in one of the units of the Air Force. In August-September of the same year, he took part in the Soviet-Japanese War as a fighter pilot, then served in the Navy Aviation.
During the years of service in the Far East, Pavel Belyaev has flown over five hundred hours and mastered dozens of types of aircraft. From 1956 to 1959 studied at the Red Banner Air Force Academy.
Space flight
In 1960, Pavel Ivanovich was enrolled in the cosmonaut corps. Among the recruited pilots, he was the oldest and senior in rank and position. Prepared to fly on Voskhod and Vostok class ships.
On March 18-19, 1965, the main event in the biography of Pavel Belyaev happened: asthe commander of the ship, he made a space flight. On board the Voskhod-2, along with him, was the co-pilot, Alexei Leonov, who, during the flight, went out into open space for the first time in the world. When returning to Earth, the ship's attitude control system malfunctioned. Pavel Ivanovich oriented Voskhod-2 by hand and started the braking engine. Such operations in the world astronautics were performed for the first time. The pilots landed in the Permian taiga, seventy kilometers from the cities of Usolye, Solikamsk and Berezniki. In total, their flight lasted one day, two hours, two minutes and seventeen seconds. It was possible to evacuate the astronauts from the remote taiga only two days later: the rescuers had to cut down the forest to prepare the helipad.
After returning to Earth, Pavel Ivanovich Belyaev received the military rank of colonel, the Order of Lenin and the title of Hero of the USSR.
Family
Pavel Belyaev met his wife Tatyana Filippovna while serving in the Far East. She became his faithful companion. The couple had two daughters: Lyudmila and Irina. They both went to a music school and played the piano, which was at the Belyaevs' house. Pavel Ivanovich himself was very musical, he often sat down at the instrument and performed Schubert's serenade or Oginsky's polonaise.
The cosmonaut's wife worked in Star City as the director of the Museum. Gagarin. According to the memoirs of Tatyana Filippovna, when Belyaev and Leonov flew into space, she could not find a place for herself and did not leave the TV. Subsequently, the woman visited the landing site"Voskhod-2" and was shocked that her husband was able to land the ship in such an impenetrable thicket.
Recent years
In the early 1970s, Pavel Ivanovich Belyaev, Hero of the Soviet Union, had to make a space flight again. It was planned that he would go to the natural satellite of the Earth and fly around it. But in the end, another cosmonaut, Valery Voloshin, was sent to the moon, and Belyaev was suspended due to he alth problems.
Doctors performed a complicated operation on Pavel Ivanovich, and it would seem that he is on the mend. But then the astronaut developed peritonitis, and on 1970-10-01 he died at the age of forty-four. The Hero of the USSR was buried at the Novodevichy cemetery of the capital.
Memory
A small planet, a crater on the Moon, and a research ship of the Russian Academy of Sciences are named after Pavel Belyaev. One of the boards of the Aeroflot airline bears his name. In 1970, Belyaeva Street appeared in the residential area of Vologda, named after the astronaut. In addition, the square and street in Kamensk-Uralsky bear the name of Pavel Ivanovich.
In May 2015, a memorial plaque with a sculptural image of three pilots: Pavel Belyaev, Georgy Beregovoy and Nikolai Kuznetsov was installed in Star City on house No. 2.
In 2017, a film called "Time of the First" was released, based on real events that took place in 1965 during the space flight of Belyaev and Leonov. Pavel Ivanovich was played by Konstantin Khabensky, and Alexei Arkhipovich was played by Evgeny Mironov. It is known that Leonovdirectly involved in writing the script of the film. The film received mostly positive reviews and was awarded several prizes at film festivals.
