Gagarin's return to Earth. Artwork showing the re-entry sequence for Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin (1934-1968) following his historic spaceflight as the first human in space. Gagarin (lower right) launched on 12 April 1961 in the Vostok 1 spacecraft (upper left) and circled the Earth once in a flight that lasted 1 hour and 48 minutes. During re-entry, the descent module separated from the rest of the spacecraft (upper centre) and experienced high temperatures (fireball, upper right) as it was slowed by the atmosphere. Gagarin ejected 7 kilometres up (centre). Both cosmonaut and descent module deployed parachutes, descending safely to the ground (lower left) in the Saratov region of Russia.