One of first Soviet cosmonauts, Viktor Gorbatko, dies

Soviet cosmonaut Viktor Gorbatko, a colleague of Yuri Gagarin, the first man in space, died Wednesday at the age of 82, Russia’s space agency says.

Cosmonaut Yuri Gorbatko (Wiki Media/Creative Commons)

Gorbatko was among the eight young pilots chosen in 1960 from 3,000 candidates in the Soviet manned flight program to train for the country’s first space mission.

Trained alongside Gorbatko and others, it was eventually Gagarin who made the first human space flight, circling the Earth in 1961. Gorbatko followed several years later on three occasions: in 1969, 1977 and 1980.

According to the Roscosmos space agency, he will be buried at the military cemetery outside Moscow on Friday.

— AFP