Sergei Pavlovich Korolev is considered the founder of practical astronautics.

In the 20th century, he was the man who determined the strategy and tactics of practical space exploration.

Created by him missile systems and the spacecraft that made the Soviet Union a pioneer in space exploration.

Biography, education

Sergei Korolev was born on January 12, 1907 in Zhitomir, which is 130 kilometers from the city. His parents were teachers. For several years he lived in Nizhyn with his grandparents. In first grade I went to a gymnasium in Odessa, which was soon closed. This was in the stormy year of 1917.

His mother and stepfather, who received an engineering degree in Germany, took care of his home education. In 1924, Sergei became a student at the Kyiv Polytechnic Institute, intending to be an aeronautical engineer. There he became interested in gliding.

Two years later, he continued his studies at the Moscow Higher Technical School named after N. E. Bauman (MVTU).

Through aviation to missiles

At the Moscow Higher Technical School he creates designs for original gliders and aircraft. He was actively involved in gliding and participated in gliding rallies in the Crimean Koktebel. He designed aircraft that received high marks from specialists. After meeting the great K.E. Tsiolkovsky devoted himself to rocket science.

In 1931, together with another enthusiast, F.A. Zander, he created a group for the study of jet propulsion. The following year it became a government agency for missile development. The results obtained interested the military, and in 1933 a special research institute for the development of missiles was created.

With the rank of divisional engineer, Sergei Pavlovich became deputy head of the institution, deputy head of the institute. Under his leadership, three years later, anti-aircraft and long-range cruise missiles were developed and tested. By 1938, projects appeared: cruise and ballistic missiles with liquid-propellant engines, missiles for aircraft, hitting targets in the air and on the ground, surface-to-air missiles using solid fuel.

A prisoner

However, a denunciation was written against him. An arrest followed in June 1938. Two months later, on charges of subversion, he was sentenced to ten years in prison and a five-year disqualification. Went through Butyrskaya and transit prisons, Kolyma. In the spring of 1940, he was unexpectedly transported to Moscow, where in the summer of that year he was sentenced to eight years in prison.

However, instead of the camp, they are sent to a special NKVD prison in Moscow called TsKB-29. Here he, under the leadership of also prisoner A.N. Tupolev participates in the creation of bombers and develops unique designs missile weapons. In 1942, he was transferred to the prison design bureau at the aircraft plant in Kazan, where he designed rocket boosters for aircraft and installations for launching missiles from a bomber.

In July 1944, he was released early and his criminal record was cleared. He was rehabilitated only in 1957 due to the lack of evidence of a crime.

Rocket shield constructor

Soon after the Great Patriotic War needed to create long-range missiles, capable of hitting targets thousands of kilometers away. In 1946 S.P. Queens are appointed by them general designer. Missiles of various modifications were developed, including those with a nuclear charge.

In 1956, an intercontinental ballistic missile was created, capable of delivering a charge, first 8, and a little later 11 thousand km. A year later, sea-based and mobile ground-based missiles appeared.

Path to space

Sergei Korolev led the development of satellites and space stations, more advanced rockets to launch them. The first result of this work was the launch in October 1957 of the first artificial satellite into low-Earth orbit. This fantastic success provided the USSR with enormous prestige in the world.

Work was carried out at an accelerated pace to create satellites for military, national economic and scientific purposes. Automatic stations are launched towards the Moon, the reverse side of which is photographed. The development of a device for landing on this satellite of the earth begins, which could photograph its surface and transmit images to Earth.

Sergei Pavlovich Korolev amazes the world with the creation of the first manned spacecraft, which for the first time circled the globe in space. Then there were other flights of Soviet cosmonauts, including joint ones, the flight of a female cosmonaut, and a man’s spacewalk. He developed the idea of ​​​​creating a long-term orbital station in which one could work without spacesuits and change crews.

Unfortunately, he did not live to see the practical implementation of this project.

Confession. Memory

Sergei Korolev was awarded the country's highest awards, including twice receiving the star of the Hero of Socialist Labor. The USSR Academy of Sciences elected him as a full member. S.P. died Korolev on January 14, 1966 during an operation that his heart failed. Buried in the wall of the Moscow Kremlin.

His name is borne by:

  • several space-related businesses;
  • city ​​near Moscow - Korolev;
  • several universities;
  • streets in many localities;
  • one of the most high peaks Pamir;
  • lunar and Martian craters;
  • research ship;
  • departmental medals and other awards.

Films were made and written about him literary works. Thousands of people visit memorial house museums in Moscow and Zhitomir.

  • Name S.P. The Queen during his lifetime was a mystery. He was not mentioned either after the launch of the first satellite, or in connection with the first flight of an earthling into space;
  • People who knew him closely recalled that he never cursed anyone and never complained. He looked gloomily at the future, was a skeptic and a cynic. He liked to say: “They’ll slam you without an obituary”;
  • when he was transferred from Kolyma to Moscow, he was late for the ship, which sank during a storm on the way to Vladivostok;
  • among the world's first launches was the flight of a satellite with a dog named Laika and the launch of a ballistic missile from under water;
  • a year before his rehabilitation, Korolev in 1956 became a Hero of Socialist Labor for the creation of an intercontinental ballistic missile.

Chief designer of OKB-1
1946 - 1966

Predecessor:

Position established

Successor:

Vasily Pavlovich Mishin

Date of Birth:

Place of Birth:

Zhitomir city, Volyn province, Russian empire

Date of death:

A place of death:

Moscow, USSR

Russian empire
USSR

Scientific field:

Rocket science

Place of work:

Academic title:

Academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences (1958)

Alma mater:

Known as:

Founder of Soviet cosmonautics

Awards and prizes:

Arrest and work in closed design bureaus

Man in space

Orbital station project

Lunar project

Medical history and death

Official version

Details from memoirs

Funeral

Awards and titles

In philately

Interesting Facts

(December 30, 1906 (January 12, 1907), Zhitomir - January 14, 1966, Moscow) - Soviet scientist, designer and organizer of the production of rocket and space technology and missile weapons of the USSR, founder of practical cosmonautics. The largest figure of the 20th century in the field of space rocketry and shipbuilding.

S.P. Korolev is the creator of Soviet rocket and space technology, which ensured strategic parity and made the USSR an advanced rocket and space power. Is key figure in human space exploration. Thanks to his ideas, the first artificial Earth satellite and the first cosmonaut, Yuri Gagarin, were launched.

Twice Hero of Socialist Labor, laureate of the Lenin Prize, academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences. Member of the CPSU since 1953. Lieutenant colonel.

Biography

S. P. Korolev was born on January 12, 1907 in the city of Zhitomir (then the Russian Empire, modern Ukraine) in the family of Russian literature teacher Pavel Yakovlevich Korolev (1877-1929) and Maria Nikolaevna Moskalenko (1888-1980). He was about three years old when his parents divorced. By the decision of his mother, little Seryozha was sent to Nezhin to his grandmother Maria Matveevna and grandfather Nikolai Yakovlevich Moskalenko.

In 1915 he entered the preparatory classes of the gymnasium in Kyiv, in 1917 he went to the first grade of the gymnasium in Odessa, where his mother, Maria Nikolaevna, and stepfather, Georgy Mikhailovich Balanin, moved.

I didn’t study at the gymnasium for long - it was closed, then there were four months of a unified labor school. Then he received his education at home - his mother and stepfather were teachers, and his stepfather, in addition to teaching, had an engineering education.

Also in school years Sergei was distinguished by exceptional abilities and an indomitable desire for the then new aviation technology. In 1922-1924 he studied at a construction vocational school, participating in many clubs and taking various courses.

In 1921, he met the pilots of the Odessa hydraulic squad and actively participated in aviation public life: from the age of 16 as a lecturer on eliminating aviation illiteracy, and from the age of 17 - as the author of the project for the K-5 non-motorized aircraft, which was officially defended before the competent commission and recommended for construction.

Having entered the Kiev Polytechnic Institute in 1924 with a specialization in aviation technology, Korolev mastered general engineering disciplines there in two years and became a glider athlete. In the fall of 1926, he was transferred to the Moscow Higher Technical School (MVTU) named after N. E. Bauman.

During his studies at the Moscow Higher Technical School, S.P. Korolev already gained fame as a young, capable aircraft designer and an experienced glider pilot. In 1955, Korolev wrote: “Back in 1929, I met K. E. Tsiolkovsky, and since then I have devoted my life to new area Sciences". From this trip, Sergei Pavlovich brought several works by Tsiolkovsky with a dedicatory inscription. This year Korolev worked on diploma work- project of the SK-4 aircraft, and on November 2, on the Firebird glider, he passed the exams for the title of soaring pilot. The aircraft he designed and built: the Koktebel and Krasnaya Zvezda gliders and the SK-4 light aircraft, designed to achieve a record flight range, showed Korolev’s extraordinary abilities as an aircraft designer. However, especially after meeting with K. E. Tsiolkovsky, he was fascinated by thoughts about flights into the stratosphere and the principles of jet propulsion. In September 1931, S.P. Korolev and a talented enthusiast in the field of rocket engines F.A. Tsander sought to create in Moscow with the help of Osoaviakhim public organization- Jet Propulsion Research Group (GIRD): In April 1932, it essentially became a state research and design laboratory for the development of rocket aircraft, in which the first domestic liquid-ballistic missiles (BR) GIRD-09 and GIRD-10 were created and launched.

In 1933, on the basis of the Moscow GIRD and the Leningrad Gas Dynamic Laboratory (GDL), the Jet Research Institute was created under the leadership of I. T. Kleimenov. Korolev was appointed his deputy. However, differences in views on the prospects for the development of rocket technology forced Korolev to leave this post. He, as the head of the rocket aircraft department, in 1936 managed to bring cruise missiles to testing: anti-aircraft-217 with a powder rocket engine and long-range-212 with a liquid rocket engine. In his department, by 1938, designs for liquid-fueled cruise and ballistic missiles had been developed long range, aircraft missiles for firing at air and ground targets and anti-aircraft solid-fuel missiles.

Arrest and work in closed design bureaus

Korolev was arrested on June 27, 1938 on charges of sabotage after the arrest of Ivan Terentyevich Kleimenov and other employees of the Jet Institute. He was tortured. According to some reports, his jaw was broken during torture. The author of this version is journalist Ya. Golovanov. However, in his book he emphasizes that this is only a version:

In February 1988, I talked with corresponding member of the USSR Academy of Sciences Efuni. Sergei Naumovich told me about the 1966 operation, during which Sergei Pavlovich died. Efuni himself took part in it only at a certain stage, but, being at that time the leading anesthesiologist of the 4th Main Directorate of the USSR Ministry of Health, he knew all the details of this tragic event.

Anesthesiologist Yuri Ilyich Savinov encountered an unforeseen circumstance, said Sergei Naumovich. - In order to give anesthesia, it was necessary to insert a tube, but Korolev could not open his mouth wide. He had fractures of two jaws...

Did Sergei Pavlovich have his jaws broken? - I asked Korolev’s wife, Nina Ivanovna.

“He never mentioned it,” she replied thoughtfully. “He really couldn’t open his mouth wide, and I remember: when he had to go to the dentist, he was always nervous ...

Korolev writes clearly: “investigators Shestakov and Bykov subjected me to physical repression and abuse.” But I cannot prove that Nikolai Mikhailovich Shestakov broke the jaws of Sergei Pavlovich Korolev. Unfortunately, no one can prove this anymore. You can't even prove that you hit him. That he just pushed. I repeat again: I cannot prove anything, there is no such evidence in nature. I can only try to see. There is no other evidence confirming that Korolev’s jaw was broken during interrogations.

On September 25, 1938, Korolev was included in the list of persons subject to trial by the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR. On the list he was in the first (execution) category. The list was endorsed by Stalin, Molotov, Voroshilov and Kaganovich.

This was a time of change in the leadership of the NKVD and repressions had already reduced their scope. Therefore, court decisions did not so blindly follow the recommendations of the NKVD. Korolev was convicted by the Military Collegium Supreme Court USSR September 27, 1938, charge: Art. 58-7, 11. Sentence: 10 years of labor camp, 5 years of disqualification. On June 10, 1940, the term was reduced to 8 years in the ITL (Sevzheldorlag), released in 1944. Completely rehabilitated on April 18, 1957.

On April 21, 1939, he arrived in Kolyma, where he was located at the Maldyak gold mine of the Western Mining Administration and was engaged in so-called “general work.” On December 23, 1939, he was sent to the disposal of Vladlag.

He arrived in Moscow on March 2, 1940, where four months later he was tried a second time by a Special Meeting, sentenced to 8 years in prison and sent to the Moscow NKVD special prison TsKB-29, where, under the leadership of A. N. Tupolev, also a prisoner, he took an active part in the creation Pe-2 and Tu-2 bombers and at the same time proactively developed projects for a guided aerial torpedo and a new version of a missile interceptor.

This was the reason for the transfer of S.P. Korolev in 1942 to another prison-type design bureau - OKB-16 at the Kazan aircraft plant No. 16 (now - Open Joint-Stock Company"Kazan Engine Production Association" /JSC KMPO/), where work was carried out on new types of rocket engines for the purpose of using them in aviation. Here S.P. Korolev, with his characteristic enthusiasm, devotes himself to the idea practical use rocket engines for the improvement of aviation: reducing the length of the aircraft's takeoff run during takeoff and increasing the speed and dynamic characteristics of aircraft during air combat. At the beginning of 1943, he was appointed chief designer of the group rocket launchers. Was engaged in improvement technical characteristics Pe-2 dive bomber, whose first flight took place in October 1943.

According to the memoirs attributed to L. L. Kerber, S. P. Korolev was a skeptic, a cynic and a pessimist, who looked absolutely gloomily at the future, “They will slam without an obituary,” was his favorite phrase. At the same time, there is a statement by cosmonaut Alexei Leonov regarding S.P. Korolev: “He was never embittered... He never complained, never cursed or scolded anyone. He didn't have time for that. He understood that embitterment does not cause creative impulse, but oppression."

In July 1944, S.P. Korolev was released early from prison with his criminal record expunged, after which he worked in Kazan for another year. On January 12, 2007, a high relief of S.P. was inaugurated on the building (entrance) of OJSC KMPO. Queen of work sculptor M. M. Gasimov.

Ballistic missile development

Speaking about the design of Soviet missiles that followed the R-1, it is difficult to distinguish between the time periods for their creation. So, Korolev was thinking about the R-2 back in Germany, when the R-1 project had not yet been discussed, he was developing the R-5 even before the delivery of the R-2, and even earlier, work began on the small mobile rocket R-11, and the first calculations for intercontinental missile R-7.

In August 1946, S.P. Korolev began working in Kaliningrad near Moscow (then renamed Korolev in 1996), where he was appointed chief designer of long-range ballistic missiles and head of department No. 3 of NII-88 for their development.

The first task set by the government to S.P. Korolev, as the chief designer, and all organizations involved in missile weapons, was to create an analogue of the V-2 rocket from domestic materials. But already in 1947, a decree was issued on the development of new ballistic missiles with a greater flight range than the V-2: up to 3000 km. In 1948, S.P. Korolev began flight design tests of the R-1 ballistic missile (analogous to the V-2) and in 1950 successfully put it into service.

During 1954 alone, Korolev was simultaneously working on various modifications of the R-1 rocket (R-1A, R-1B, R-1B, R-1D, R-1E), finishing work on the R-5 and planning five different modifications of it. , completes complex and responsible work on the R-5M missile - with a nuclear warhead. They're coming full swing work on R-11 and its marine version R-11FM, and the intercontinental R-7 is acquiring increasingly clear features.

In 1956, under the leadership of S.P. Korolev, the first domestic strategic missile, which became the basis of the rocket nuclear shield countries. In 1957, Sergei Pavlovich created the first ballistic missiles (mobile land-based and sea-based) using stable fuel components; he became a pioneer in these new and important directions of development missile weapons.

In 1960, the first one entered service. intercontinental missile R-7, which had two rocket stages. This was also a victory for S.P. Korolev and his employees.

The first artificial satellite of the Earth

In 1955 (long before the flight tests of the R-7 rocket), S. P. Korolev, M. V. Keldysh, M. K. Tikhonravov came to the government with a proposal to launch an artificial Earth satellite into space using the R-7 rocket ). The government supported this initiative. In August 1956, OKB-1 left NII-88 and became an independent organization, the chief designer and director of which was appointed S.P. Korolev.

To implement manned flights and launches of automatic space stations, S.P. Korolev developed a family of perfect three-stage and four-stage launch vehicles based on a combat rocket.

On October 4, 1957, the first satellite in human history was launched into low-Earth orbit. His flight was a stunning success and created high international authority for the Soviet Union.

“It was small, this very first artificial satellite of our old planet, but its ringing call signs spread across all continents and among all peoples as the embodiment of the daring dream of mankind,” S.P. Korolev later said.

Postal envelopes

Other satellites and launches of spacecraft to the Moon

In parallel with the rapid development of manned space exploration, work is underway on satellites for scientific, economic and defense purposes. In 1958, a geophysical satellite was developed and launched into space, and then paired Electron satellites to study the Earth's radiation belts. In 1959, three automatic spacecraft to the moon. The first and second - for delivering a pennant to the Moon Soviet Union, the third for the purpose of photographing the far (invisible) side of the Moon. Subsequently, S.P. Korolev began developing a more advanced lunar apparatus for its soft landing on the surface of the Moon, photographing and transmitting a lunar panorama to Earth (object E-6).

Man in space

April 12, 1961 S.P. Korolev again amazes the world community. Having created the first manned spaceship"Vostok-1", it implements the world's first human flight - USSR citizen Yuri Alekseevich Gagarin in low-Earth orbit. Sergei Pavlovich is in no hurry to solve the problem of human exploration of outer space. The first spaceship made only one revolution: no one knew how a person would feel during such a long period of weightlessness, what psychological stress would affect him during unusual and unexplored times. space travel. Following the first flight of Yu. A. Gagarin, on August 6, 1961, German Stepanovich Titov made a second space flight on the Vostok-2 spacecraft, which lasted one day. Again - a scrupulous analysis of the influence of flight conditions on the functioning of the body. Then the joint flight of the Vostok-3 and Vostok-4 spacecraft, piloted by cosmonauts A.G. Nikolaev and P.R. Popovich, from August 11 to 12, 1962; Direct radio communication was established between the astronauts. The following year - a joint flight of cosmonauts V.F. Bykovsky and V.V. Tereshkova on the Vostok-5 and Vostok-6 spacecraft from June 14 to 16, 1963 - the possibility of a woman flying into space is being studied. Behind them - from October 12 to 13, 1964 - in space a crew from three people various specialties: ship commander, flight engineer and doctor on the more complex Voskhod spacecraft. On March 18, 1965, during a flight on the Voskhod-2 spacecraft with a crew of two, cosmonaut A. A. Leonov makes the world's first spacewalk in a spacesuit through the airlock chamber.

Orbital station project

Continuing to develop the program of manned near-Earth flights, Sergei Pavlovich begins to implement his ideas about the development of a manned DOS (long-term orbital station). Its prototype was a fundamentally new, more advanced than previous ones, Soyuz spacecraft. This ship included a living compartment where astronauts could for a long time be without spacesuits and conduct Scientific research. During the flight, automatic docking in orbit of two Soyuz spacecraft and the transfer of cosmonauts from one spacecraft to another through outer space in spacesuits were also envisaged. Sergei Pavlovich did not live to see his ideas implemented in the Soyuz spacecraft.

Lunar project

Back in the mid-1950s, Korolev hatched ideas for launching a man to the Moon. The corresponding space program was developed with the support of N. S. Khrushchev. However, this program was never implemented during Sergei Pavlovich’s lifetime due to the lack of unity of command (the program was developed under the leadership of the USSR Ministry of Defense, in which Korolev did not work), disagreements with the chief designer of rocket engines V.P. Glushko, as well as a change in the leadership of the CPSU - L.I. Brezhnev did not attach the same importance to the lunar program as Khrushchev. After the death of Sergei Pavlovich, the program for launching astronauts to the Moon was gradually curtailed. The Soviet lunar exploration program was subsequently carried out using unmanned spacecraft.

Medical history and death

Official version

  • The official medical report was published on January 16, 1966. Is it true. 1966. No. 16 (17333).

“Medical report on the illness and cause of death of a comrade Korolev Sergei Pavlovich."

Comrade S.P. Korolev was sick with sarcoma of the rectum. In addition, he had: atherosclerotic cardiosclerosis, sclerosis of the cerebral arteries, pulmonary emphysema and metabolic disorders. S.P. Korolev underwent surgery to remove the tumor with extirpation of the rectum and part of the sigmoid colon. Death of Comrade S.P. Koroleva suffered from heart failure (acute myocardial ischemia).

Minister of Health of the USSR, full member of the USSR Academy of Medical Sciences, Professor B.V. Petrovsky; full member of the USSR Academy of Medical Sciences, Professor A. A. Vishnevsky; head of the surgical department of the hospital, associate professor, candidate of medical sciences D. F. Blagovidov; Corresponding Member of the USSR Academy of Medical Sciences, Professor A. I. Strukov; Head of the Fourth Main Directorate under the USSR Ministry of Health, Honored Scientist, Professor A.M. Markov.

Details from memoirs

  • Sergei Pavlovich was operated on by the Minister of Health of the USSR, full member of the USSR Academy of Medical Sciences, Professor B.V. Petrovsky, and Petrovsky was assisted by the head of the surgical department, associate professor, candidate of medical sciences D.F. Blagovidov.
  • It was not possible to stop the bleeding by removing the polyps. They decided to open the abdominal cavity. When they began to get to the site of the bleeding, they discovered a tumor the size of a fist. It was sarcoma - malignant tumor. Petrovsky decided to remove the sarcoma. At the same time, part of the rectum was removed. It was necessary to remove the remaining part through the peritoneum.
  • Due to an untreated injury received in exile (according to the version, see above, the investigator broke Korolev’s jaw by hitting Sergei Pavlovich on the cheekbone with a decanter. Due to unsuccessful bone fusion, Korolev could not open his mouth wide enough even while eating), difficulties arose in tracheal intubation. They could not insert a breathing tube into his trachea correctly.

Funeral

The coffin with the body of the late S.P. Korolev was installed in the Hall of Columns of the House of Unions. Access to farewell to the deceased was opened on January 17, 1966 from 12 noon to 8 pm.

  • The funeral with state honors took place on Red Square in Moscow on January 18 at 13:00. The urn with the ashes of S.P. Korolev is buried in the Kremlin wall.

Family

After Korolev's death the following remained:

  • his mother is Maria Nikolaevna Balanina;
  • first wife - Ksenia Maximilianovna Vincentini, who had a daughter from him - Natalya;
  • second wife - Nina Ivanovna.

Contribution

Sergei Korolev was the generator of many extraordinary ideas and the progenitor of outstanding design teams working in the field of rocket and space technology; his contribution to the development of domestic and world manned astronautics is decisive. One can only be amazed at the versatility of Sergei Pavlovich’s talent and his inexhaustible creative energy. He is a pioneer in many main areas of development of domestic missile weapons and rocket and space technology. It is difficult to even imagine what level she would have reached if the premature death of Sergei Pavlovich had not interrupted the creative flight of his thoughts.

In 1966, the USSR Academy of Sciences established gold medal named after S.P. Korolev “For outstanding achievements in the field of rocket and space technology.” Scholarships named after S. P. Korolev were established for higher education students educational institutions. Monuments to the scientist were built in Zhitomir, Moscow, Baikonur, and other cities, and memorial house-museums were created. The Samara State Aerospace University, a city in the Moscow region, the streets of many cities, two research vessels, a high mountain peak in the Pamirs, a pass in the Tien Shan, an asteroid, a thalassoid on the Moon bear his name.

Awards and titles

  • Twice Hero of Socialist Labor.
  • He was awarded three Orders of Lenin, the Order of the Badge of Honor and medals.
  • Academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences.
  • Lenin Prize laureate.
  • Honorary citizen of the city of Korolev.

Memory

Named in honor of Korolev and bear his name:

  • Science city Korolev, Moscow region (renamed in 1996 from “Kaliningrad”). The central avenue of this city also bears the name of Korolev.
  • Crater on Mars.
  • Crater on back side Moons.
  • Asteroid 1855 Korolev.
  • Rocket and Space Corporation (RSC) Energia named after. S. P. Koroleva.
  • SSAU - Samara State Aerospace University named after. Academician S.P. Korolev. In 2011, a bust of Sergei Korolev was installed near SSAU.
  • Military Institute in Zhitomir.
  • Medal named after S.P. Korolev, awarded by the Russian Cosmonautics Federation.
  • Korolev Badge, departmental award of the Federal Space Agency.
  • House of Culture named after S.P. Korolev in Kyiv.

In philately

Year of birth of Korolev postage stamps different - sometimes according to the old style, sometimes according to the new one.

Postage stamps and envelopes

  • Following the stage from Butyrka prison to Kolyma, Korolev spent some time in Novocherkassk prison.
  • Returning from Kolyma to Moscow, Korolev did not get on the Indigirka steamship in Magadan (due to all the seats being occupied). This saved Korolev’s life: while traveling from Magadan to Vladivostok, the steamship Indigirka was caught in a storm and sank off the island of Hokkaido.
  • Soon after the war, the British demonstrated the launch of a German V-2 rocket (the launch was carried out by German specialists). On instructions from management, Korolev arrived under a false name, under the guise of an artillery captain Soviet army. But they forgot to provide him with the awards that front-line officers had. And representatives of British intelligence became very interested in this “captain”.
  • Korolev were the first in the world to implement:
    • launch of the first cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin into space
    • launching an artificial earth satellite into space,
    • launching a satellite into space with a living creature - dog Laika,
    • launching a ballistic missile from a submarine.
  • Korolev is the only person in the history of the USSR who received the title of Hero of Socialist Labor without being rehabilitated (the title was awarded on April 20, 1956, and rehabilitated on April 18, 1957).
  • During his lifetime, Korolev’s name was considered secret. It was not mentioned either in the news during the launch of Sputnik or during Gagarin’s flight. Nevertheless, after his death, streets began to be named after Korolev, monuments were erected to him, and he himself was buried near the Kremlin wall. Soviet propaganda spoke of him as a brilliant scientist, the founder of astronautics, but kept silent about the fact of his arrest.

Movies

Feature and television

  • Taming of Fire (film) - ("Bashkirtsev" - Kirill Lavrov).
  • Running start - about the youth of S. P. Korolev, 1982.
  • Alien ship (film) (Oleg Tabakov).
  • Korolev (film) - (Sergei Astakhov).
  • Battle for Space (TV series) (as Korolev - Steve Nicholson).
  • “Cedar” pierces the sky (Igor Sklyar, 2011).
  • Furtseva (TV series) (Alexey Yanin, 2011).

Documentary

  • Sergey Korolev. Fate - creative workshop “Studio A”, “Channel One”, 2004.
  • Liberation of the designer - TV company "Civilization", cycle "Empire Queen". Film 1st. TV channel Culture, 2006.
  • Trophy space - TV company "Civilization", cycle "Empire Queen". Film 2. TV channel Culture, 2006.
  • Inaccessible Moon - TV company "Civilization", cycle "Empire Queen". Film 3. TV channel Culture, 2006.
  • Tsar Rocket. Interrupted flight - Roscosmos TV studio, TV Center, 2006.
  • The world consists of stars and people - TV Channel Culture, 2006.
  • The first on Mars. The unsung song of Sergei Korolev - Roscosmos television studio, 2007.
  • Sergei Korolev. Knocking on Heaven - Prospekt TV studio, Channel One, 2007.
  • Sergiy Korolov - NTU, 2007, (in Russian-Ukrainian language).
  • Five deaths of Academician Korolev - Studio “07 Production”, TV channel “Inter”, 2009, (in Russian-Ukrainian language).
  • Korolev. Countdown - NTV channel, 2010.
  • Sergey Korolev. Life at cosmic speed - Roscosmos television studio, Russian Space program, Russia-2 TV channel, 2011.

Sergei Pavlovich Korolev (1907-1966) is an outstanding designer and scientist who worked in the field of rocket and rocket-space technology. Twice Hero of Socialist Labor, laureate of the Lenin Prize, academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences, he is the creator of domestic strategic missile weapons of medium and intercontinental range and the founder of practical cosmonautics. His design developments in the field of rocket technology are of exceptional value for the development of domestic missile weapons, and in the field of astronautics they are of global importance. He is rightfully the father of domestic rocket and space technology, which ensured strategic parity and made our state a leading rocket and space power.

S.P. Korolev was born on January 12, 1907 in Zhitomir in the family of Russian literature teacher P.Ya. Queen. Already in his school years, Sergei was distinguished by an indomitable craving for the then new aviation technology. At the age of 17, he had already developed a project for an aircraft of an original design - the “K-5 engineless aircraft.” Having entered the Kiev Polytechnic Institute in 1924 with a specialization in aviation technology, Korolev mastered general engineering disciplines there in two years and became a glider athlete. In the fall of 1926, he transferred to the Moscow Higher Technical School (MVTU), where he gained fame as a young, capable designer and experienced glider pilot. The aircraft he designed and built: the Koktebel and Krasnaya Zvezda gliders and the SK-4 light aircraft, designed to achieve a record flight range, showed Korolev’s extraordinary abilities. He was especially fascinated by flights in the stratosphere and the principles of jet propulsion. In September 1931 S.P. Korolev and F.A. The Zanders are seeking the creation in Moscow, with the help of Osoaviakhim, of a public organization - the Group for the Study of Jet Propulsion (GIRD). In April 1932, it essentially became a state research and design laboratory for the development of rocket aircraft, in which the first domestic liquid-propellant ballistic missiles (BR) GIRD-09 and GIRD-10 were created and launched.

In 1933, on the basis of the Moscow GIRD and the Leningrad Gas Dynamics Laboratory (GDL), the Jet Research Institute was founded under the leadership of I.T. Kleimenov. S.P. Korolev is appointed as his deputy. However, differences in views with the heads of the laboratory on the prospects for the development of rocket technology force S.P. Korolev switched to creative engineering work, and as the head of the rocket aircraft department in 1936, he managed to bring cruise missiles to testing.

In 1938, Korolev was arrested by the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR under Article 58-7, 11. He was sentenced to 10 years in the camps. In 1940, the term was reduced to 8 years in the camps, released in 1944, and he was completely rehabilitated in 1957. The arrest and stay in the Gulag forever infected Korolev with a pessimistic attitude towards the surrounding reality. According to the recollections of people who knew him closely, Sergei Pavlovich’s favorite saying was the phrase “They’ll slap you without an obituary...”

He spent a year in Butyrka prison. During interrogations, he was subjected to severe torture and beatings, as a result of which Korolev’s jaws were broken (he also received a concussion). In 1939 he ended up in Kolyma, where he was at the Maldyak gold mine and was busy with “general work.” In 1940, he was sent to a new place of detention - to the Moscow NKVD special prison TsKB-29, where, under the leadership of A.N. Tupolev, also a prisoner, took an active part in the creation of the Pe-2 and Tu-2 bombers and at the same time proactively developed projects for a guided aerial torpedo and a new version of a missile interceptor. This was the reason for Korolev’s transfer in 1942 to another prison-type design bureau - OKB-16 at Kazan Aviation Plant No. 16, where work was carried out on new types of rocket engines for use in aviation.

In 1946, a unified research institute “Nordhausen” was created, of which Major General L.M. Gaidukov was appointed director, and S.P. was appointed chief engineer. Korolev. In 1948, S.P. Korolev began flight tests of the R-1 ballistic missile and in 1950 successfully put it into service. In parallel with S.

Doing martial arts ballistic missiles, S.P. Korolev strived for more - to conquer outer space. In 1955 S.P. Korolev, M.V. Keldysh, M.K. Tikhonravov goes to the government with a proposal to launch an artificial Earth satellite into space using the R-7 rocket. And already on October 4, 1957 S.P. Korolev launches the first artificial Earth satellite in the history of mankind into low-Earth orbit. Work on satellites is being carried out in parallel with preparations for human space flight.

April 12, 1961 S.P. Korolev again amazes the world community. Having created the first manned spacecraft "Vostok", he realized the world's first flight of a human citizen of the USSR, Yuri Alekseevich Gagarin, in low-Earth orbit.

S.P. Korolev was the generator of many extraordinary ideas and the progenitor of outstanding design teams working in the field of rocket and space technology; his contribution to the development of domestic and world manned astronautics is decisive. One can only be amazed at the versatility of Sergei Pavlovich’s talent and his inexhaustible creative energy. He is a pioneer in many main areas of development of domestic missile weapons and rocket and space technology. It is difficult to even imagine what level it would have reached if the premature death of Sergei Pavlovich on January 14, 1966 had not interrupted the creative flight of his thoughts. Urn with the ashes of S.P. Korolev is buried in the Kremlin wall on Red Square in Moscow.

Soviet scientist, designer of rocket and space systems, academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences (1958), twice Hero of Socialist Labor (1956, 1961). Founder of practical astronautics.

Sergei Pavlovich Korolev was born on January 12, 1907 in the city of Zhitomir (now in Ukraine) in the family of Russian literature teacher Pavel Yakovlevich Korolev (1877-1929). He was about three years old when his parents divorced.

In 1915, S.P. Korolev entered the preparatory classes of the gymnasium in Kyiv, and in 1917 he went to the first grade of the gymnasium in Odessa. After the closure of the gymnasium, he studied at the Construction Vocational School, from which he graduated in 1924, receiving the specialty of a tile builder.

In 1924-1927, S.P. Korolev studied at the aeromechanical department of the Moscow Higher Technical University. , in 1927 he began working at the factories of the All-Union Aviation Association. In 1929, he graduated from the Moscow Higher Technical School, defending his graduation project for the light-engine aircraft SK-4 under the guidance of aircraft designer A. N. Tupolev. In 1930, S.P. Korolev graduated from the Moscow Pilot School. From June 1930 he was a senior engineer at TsAGI. He developed a number of designs for successfully flown gliders.

Rocket and space systems, the development of which was headed by S.P. Korolev, made it possible for the first time in the world to launch artificial satellites of the Earth and the Sun, fly automatic interplanetary stations to the Moon, Venus and Mars, and make a soft landing on the surface of the Moon. Under his leadership, artificial Earth satellites of the Electron and Molniya-1 series, many satellites of the Cosmos series, and the first copies of interplanetary reconnaissance aircraft of the Zond series were created. S.P. Korolev trained many talented scientists and engineers.

S.P. Korolev was twice awarded the title of Hero of Socialist Labor (1956, 1961), awarded three orders, the Order of the Badge of Honor. In 1957 he became a Lenin Prize laureate.

S.P. Korolev died on January 14, 1966 as a result of an unsuccessful operation. His ashes are buried in the Kremlin wall behind the Mausoleum on Red Square.

In the history of space exploration, the name of S.P. Korolev is associated with the era of the first remarkable achievements. The outstanding organizational skills and talent of a great scientist allowed him to direct the work of many research and design teams to solve large complex problems for a number of years. The scientific and technical ideas of S.P. Korolev have been widely used in rocket and space technology. He was the generator of many extraordinary ideas and the progenitor of outstanding design teams working in the field of rocket and space technology; his contribution to the development of domestic and world manned astronautics is decisive. He is a pioneer in many main areas of development of domestic missile weapons and rocket and space technology.

The name of S.P. Korolev, as one of the founders of practical cosmonautics, was given to the largest formation (thalassoid) on the far side of the Moon.