posted 01-08-2010 05:29 AM               

...the study claims Gagarin's death during a routine training flight in 1968 was caused by his panicked reaction after realising an air vent in his cockpit was open.

He threw his MiG-15 fighter jet into such a steep dive that he blacked out and crashed into a forest below killing himself and his co-pilot.

Igor Kuznetsov, a retired Soviet air force colonel, believes his findings will end years of conspiracy theories ranging from claims Gagarin was drunk to allegations the accident was staged by jealous Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev.

...Col Kuznetsov also raises the suggestion a careless pilot who used the same plane in the days leading up to crash may have been to blame for the open vent.

Until now, it had been thought that Gagarin himself was the last person to use the plane two days previously.

But Kuznetsov says he has now learnt that other pilots simulated a flight in the same plane prior to Gagarin's fatal flight. He believes they may have tampered with the air vent and wants to determine their identity and what kind of training they were doing.

posted 07-01-2010 01:05 PM               

Note: The English-version of RIA Novosti's article confuses the original Russian reporter's name with the name of the cosmonaut cited in the story. Alexander Kovalyov is a journalist, Vladimir Aksyonov is the cosmonaut.

A plausible theory into the mysterious plane crash that killed renowned Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin has been put forward in a limited edition book by fellow-cosmonaut Alexander Kovalyov Vladimir Aksyonov, who was with Gagarin shortly before the fated plane took off.

Gagarin died on March 27, 1968, a little under seven years after becoming the first human to fly to space and orbit Earth. His death came during what should have been a routine practice flight in a MiG-15UTI fighter plane, which crashed near the town of Kirzhach, about 100 kilometers outside Moscow.

Kovalyov Aksyonov said the last report received from Gagarin's plane was that the drill had been completed above the cloud level, at a height of four kilometers.

The cosmonaut explains that Gagarin and flight commander Vladimir Seryogin were under pressure to complete the maneuver in good time because another pilot was scheduled to use the plane after them. They therefore chose to undertake a dive to take them down to the cloud level.

On coming out of the dive, Gagarin and Seryogin hung in the air for a couple of seconds and unexpectedly dropped into the layer of clouds, causing the plane to spiral out of control, Kovalyov Aksyonov said.

According to official data, Gagarin's plane fell from the clouds to the ground almost vertically at a speed of around 700 kilometers an hour.

Kovalyov Aksyonov said the fact that the two pilots did not make any attempts to eject from the plane or signal for help shows that the drop was unexpected.

posted 06-15-2013 02:11 PM               

According to a declassified report, there is a human factor behind the tragic incident - an unauthorized SU-15 fighter jet was flying dangerously close to Gagarin's aircraft.

Leonov had been in charge of parachute jump training on that day. The weather was extremely bad, with rain, wind and snow making it impossible to carry out exercises. He waited for an official confirmation that the exercises would be cancelled, but then heard a super-sonic noise followed by an explosion only a second apart from each other. That is when he knew something was up.

"We knew that a Su-15 was scheduled to be tested that day, but it was supposed to be flying at the altitude of 10,000 meters or higher, not 450-500 meters. It was a violation of the flight procedure."

Leonov that day talked to witnesses that pointed at the model of a Su-15 saying that it appeared out of the clouds with its tail smoking and burning.

...There is a record of General Zapolskiy talking to the Su-15 pilot that leaves no doubt of the pilot's fault for creating such circumstances that led to the incident.

However, the name of the man responsible for Gagarin's death is still not being disclosed. Keeping him anonymous was a condition under which Leonov was allowed to talk.

It is only known that the pilot is now 80 years old and is in poor health.

"I was asked not to disclose the pilot's name. He is a good test pilot... It will fix nothing," Leonov said.