The most secret scientist of the USSR: How Sergei Korolev went from a prisoner to a rocket star

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

The name of Sergei Korolev is known to the whole world. This man was not just at the origins of Russian cosmonautics. He actually opened the space era of world history. As a "secret citizen" on duty, he had to go through many trials and obstacles. Korolev was peculiar: he hated gold, did not launch rockets on Mondays, and in the rank of the country's chief rocket designer was going to personally fly into space.

The future of a brilliant aircraft designer

Even while studying at the Moscow State Technical University. Bauman, Tupolev was the head of Korolev's student diploma. He prophesied successes in aircraft construction to the future luminary of rocketry. At the age of 17, Korolev designed the K-5 non-motorized aircraft. On his second glider, the pilot Artseulov set the all-Union record for the range of soaring flight. In 1930, the royal glider SK-3 made even more noise. On the aircraft intended for aerobatics, the pilot Stepanchenok for the first time in the world performed three dead loops without towing to a height.

By the way, Sergei Pavlovich himself was going to fly. He was prevented by typhoid fever. Despite such a successful experience in aviation, Korolyov soon switched to jet engines and missiles. In 1929, he became acquainted with Tsiolkovsky's work on the exploration of world spaces by jet devices. The idea that it is possible to carry out flights not only by airplanes and gliders, but even beyond the atmospheric limits, engulfed him forever.

First successes, sentence and lifelong aversion to gold

In 1931, under Osoaviakhim, a small Group for the Study of Jet Propulsion (GIRD) was formed. At first, this organization was not given much importance. The GIRD did not even have a separate room - the first developments were carried out literally in the basement. But the main role was played by the fact that the team consisted of true fanatics and enthusiasts. Korolev came to the GIRD as an ordinary engineer. At that time, the designers had at their disposal low-power test jet engines and small vehicles. But the start was given to the rocket business. After two years of active work by members of the GIRD, their organization came under the wing of the military department and was merged with the gas-dynamic laboratory into a new Jet Research Institute. And the work went well, and Korolev immediately presented a project of a rocket aircraft.

But clouds were gathering over the designers of the RNII. During the notorious "purges", the curators of the institute, Marshal Tukhachevsky, and the head of Osoaviakhim Eideman were arrested. They also came for Korolev. He was accused of complicity with the anti-Soviet Trotskyites and deliberately delaying laboratory design work on the main defense facilities. Both points were considered to be executed by firing squad. So the subsequent sentence in the form of ten years of imprisonment with defeat in political rights and confiscation of property at that time looked mild.

On June 1, 1939, after 8 months in the Novocherkassk transit prison, the 31-year-old "enemy of the people" was sent under escort to the Far East. In Kolyma, Korolev was employed in gold mines. Throughout his subsequent life after his release, he could not stand gold items. In the camp, Korolev almost died. After diagnosing scurvy, the doctors put an end to him, leaving him to die quietly. He was rescued by the director of the plant, Usachev, who was brought to the camp, on which the fatal plane of the crashed Chkalov was built. The new prisoner made sure that Korolev was transferred to the medical unit, where he was attended by caring nurses.

Scientific work in custody and early release

During his time in prison, many were busy about the prisoner. Dozens of appeals were received on behalf of his mother Maria Nikolaevna, famous pilots Valentina Grizodubova and Mikhail Gromov asked for Korolev. At some point, the issue of saving a talented engineer was agreed at the very top. Stalin instructed Beria to review the affairs of defense specialists. By the end of 1939, Korolev was ordered to get ready for Moscow. After arriving at Lubyanka, the former prisoner was tried for the second time and sentenced to eight years in a Moscow special prison - the so-called "Tupolev sharashka".

Within its walls there were four design offices, where new aircraft were developed. Korolev was identified in the design bureau of his former teacher Tupolev, who created the Tu-2 dive bomber. In parallel, Sergei Pavlovich begins the development of a guided air torpedo, as well as a new type of missile interceptor. In the conditions of the outbreak of war in 1942, Korolev was transferred to another strictly closed bureau at the Kazan aircraft plant, where work was underway with rocket engines. In 1943, he was appointed chief designer in the group of rocket launchers, and in June 1944 he was released ahead of schedule with a complete clearing of the criminal record. For another year as a civilian, Korolev remains in Kazan, finishing work with rocket boosters for military aircraft.

Meeting with Stalin and launching a rocket

After the liberation, the glorious path of Korolev, the father of the global space program on a worldwide scale, began. In May 1946, Stalin adopted two most important Resolutions of the USSR Council of Ministers on the creation of a new direction in the defense industry - rocketry, as well as on the opening of an artillery plant and NII-88 on the basis of subunits near Moscow. The latter actually becomes the main enterprise for the creation of liquid-fuel guided missiles. And in the summer, Sergei Korolev was appointed Chief Designer of Long-Range Ballistic Missiles and Head of Department at the Research Institute. He immediately got down to work, debugging cruise missiles and making launches. During this period, the first domestic R-1 rocket was created.

In April 1947, Korolev was preparing to give a report on rocketry in Stalin's office. Here a personal meeting of the designer with the leader took place. Korolev, who entered, tried to sit down at a distance, but Joseph Vissarionovich insisted on the neighborhood at the conference table. Turning to Malenkov, Stalin said: "Move over, let Korolev sit down." He listened to the report of the chief rocket specialist with utmost attentiveness, asked many competent questions and expressed maximum interest in the common cause. It was evident from everything that Korolev liked the leader. On this day, Sergei Pavlovich left the main office of the country as a different, recognizable and trustworthy person.

As a result of the development of the industry Altai has become a land where rockets fall from the sky.