The Life of Yuri Viktorovich Sokolov
I've become increasingly fascinated by Yuri Sokolov over the last few months.
He was born in Chelyabinsk to a poor but hard working family, typical of those then living in the foothills of the Ural Mountains.
They were of part-Belarusian descent, Belarusians who had headed east during the Yekaterinburg 'Gold Rush' of the 1830s. Only recently just a small town,
Chelyabinsk had become a nexus of industrial production during the first Five-Year Plans.
His mother Maria Timofeyevna was an administrator at the Chelyabinsk Tractor Plant.
Where his father worked as a chemical engineer. A successful one - he had a significant part in improving the fluid dynamics in the
Samokhodnaya ustanovka 85 (SU-85) self-propelled gun - although I didn't understand all the details here!
The city was out of range for Luftwaffe bombers, and far from the frontlines, so their experience of the Great Patriotic War was lighter than most. Though
apparently at the start of the rasputitsa in '49 their apartment burnt down in a massive conflagration that ruined much of the nearby Pipe Rolling Plant.
As a boy Yuri apparently excelled as a volunteer air cadet. It sounds like the branch he was in was attached to the laconically titled
Chelyabinsk Military Aviation School of Navigators and Communication Specialists of Long-Range Aviation, but really hard to find details on this without
Russian fluency.
At twenty-two he was commissioned as a leytenánt in the Soviet Air Forces, where he had stints flying experimental aircraft (possibly on an early version of the MiG-29).
Then after a period as a liaison officer with Interkosmos, he transferred
to the main Soviet space program (Космическая программа СССР).
Again he did excellently here, so much so that he was personally picked by Valentin Glushko to join the now immortal Венера-9 mission. His role was to pilot
the main vehicle that would remain in orbit while the landing vehicle descended to the surface.
Because of this he wasn't part of the crew that set foot on Venus.
Instead he circled alone above the hot planet. Little is to be known of his experience during those eight days of solitude, and he was extremely reluctant to speak
of it after, further from home than any man has still ever been.
There's surprisingly little detail on his life post-mission, partly as he died only three years after returning to Earth. Some claim he passed away from repeated
alcohol abuse, although this is unconfirmed. Perhaps this association is why he is so often overlooked compared to Gorodokin, Kazlauskas and the rest of the crew.
The statue of the cosmonaut in front of the Poyushchiy Fountain in central Chelyabinsk must be a nod in his direction though.
It's nameless, but still seems to stand for him.
Sokolov (Соколо́в) is an old Cossack name. It means: falcon.
Last edited by Søren; August 13, 2022 at 01:34 PM.
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Originally Posted by mishkin
