Gagarin and Viscount G-AOYN

[bakerpictures]

There's a documentary on Radio 4 this morning about the 50th anniversary of Gagarin's flight and the accompanying picture (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0105vtr) shows the celebrated cosmonaut in the cockpit of G-AOYN, then with BEA.

The reg seemed familiar and a quick google shows me (http://www.vickersviscount.net/Index/VickersViscount263History.aspx) it was a British Air Ferries a/c during my time at Southend in the early 80s. To think, I sat (long story) in the r/h seat occupied by the first man in space!

Is there anything to mark Gagarin's two flights to Manchester in the Vickers that is still at Bournemouth?

[Jamie-Southend]

Hello,

2 Months for a reply, oh dear sorry !

Anyway what I know about Yankee November and the Yuri Connection is as follows ;

11th July 1961 he arrived in London as part of a 4 day tour of the UK, as a guest of The Foundry Workers Union, this was before he was launched into space ! Apparently before his space career he was a foundry worker. How Russian foundry workers got to have trips to the UK in the 60`s is beyond me !

On the 12th he flew from London to Manchester Ringway aboard YN, returning the same day, and hence the picture.

Hope that helps, and well done on spotting that registration.

I have to say i may have also sat in that seat, in my case as an Engineer, so probably just the odd ground run ;)

Jamie


British Air Ferries Engineering (1979-1982)

PS Have a look at Vickers Viscount Network - A Virtual Museum dedicated to the Vickers-Armstrongs VC2 Viscount (http://www.vickersviscount.net) - Greta site that i'm a researcher for.

[A30yoyo]

Gagarin was driven to Heathrow Central down the slope to the tunnel in an open limo past the rear of the original Northside Control Tower waving to the planespotters (self included) from the Green Gragon cafe.
Rather appropriate that Gagarin was flown in a Viscount called Sir Isaac Newton as I suppose he was the first human to escape the gravitational bond to Earth

[bakerpictures]

That's a lovely postscript, the Newton connection, I mean.

I'd assumed he had already been in space and was on his post-flight world tour so I suppose the Foundry Union thing is even stranger though propaganda worked in weird ways back then, I suppose.

I worked in Traffic so stooped many a time in that cockpit to nervously present a heavy loadsheet but let's say, I also sat in that r/h seat on the way back from freight runs. No further comment!

[PinkHarrier]

Jamie-Southend said "11th July 1961 he arrived in London as part of a 4 day tour of the UK, as a guest of The Foundry Workers Union, this was before he was launched into space !"

Nope. He was launched on April 12, 1961 - three months earlier.


Yuri Gagarin - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yuri_Gagarin)

[WHBM]

Rather appropriate that Gagarin was flown in a Viscount called Sir Isaac Newton as I suppose he was the first human to escape the gravitational bond to Earth

But surely Newton was still there somewhere. Didn't Jim Lovell say in Apollo 13 (which Tom Hanks duly repeated in the movie) that when on their powerless trip between Earth and Moon that they "had just put Sir Isaac Newton in the driving seat".

[A30yoyo]

You're right of course..an orbiting object relies on gravity to maintain the circular motion, so the first humans to really cut the gravitational bond with Earth were the Apollo astronauts on the way to the Moon....but all orbiting around the Sun

[LAS1997]

I believe the Viscount Captain that flew up to Manchester with Gagarin was Stanley Key, who later commanded the ill-fated Trident 1C (G-ARPI) that crashed at Staines in June 1972. I have somewhere an old BEA in house magazine with the Gagarin feature in it.