1907 Sergei Korolev born Ukraine
1930 aircraft designer
Late 30’s interested in rockets…
- Marshal Mikhael Tukhachevsky sponsored Gas Dynamics Laboratory in Petroplavsakaya
- Reaction Propulsion Lab, Central Moscow
- Valentin Glushko, designer of thrust chambers/fuel pumps
- Korolev – overall vehicle design
1933 Soviet Army Marshall Tukhachevsky begins major consolidation of rocket programmes for military applications
June 1937 Tukhachevsky is arrested & executed. Korolev is sentenced to ten years in Siberia
June 1941 Nazi invasion of Russia
Korolev and others brought back to work on design in aircraft factories as prisoners
Sept 1945 Korolev on mission to Germany to claim remnants of V2 programme
1950s Korolev & Glushko develop range of rockets and missiles
May 31 1955 work begins Baikonur as ICBM base
1956 Korolev in control of his own industrial empire based around OKB1 (Special Design Bureau) Kaliningrad, near Moscow
August 3 1957 R-7 (Semyorka) first successful launch, Baikonur
October 4 1957 Sputnik launch
November 3 1957 Laika
January 31 1958 American Explorer 1 Van Allen belt discovery
Autumn 1959 Korolev begins cosmonaut selection
May 15 1960 First Vostok prototype launched & lost in space
June 18 1960 – meets Gagarin
July 28 Chaika & Lisicha dog mission explodes after launch, witnessed by cosmonauts
Aug 19 Strelka & Belka dog mission successful
Sept 19 1960 Korolev’s proposal for manned mission approved
Oct 10 1960 Rival R-16 prototype explodes on launch pad killing Marshall Nedelin and hundreds of ground crew
December 22nd 4th dd mission aborted during climb -dogs survive emergency ejection. Dog capsule rescue mission
March 9, 1961 first of two ‘Ivan Ivanovich’ dummy missions
April 3 faked scenes of launch preparations filmed
April 7 Final selection of Gagarin to make first flight
April 12 Vostock launch scheduled date
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6 Responses to SERGEI (Sergey) KOROLEV TIMELINE
Andrey Posashkov
Small error: “July 28 Chaika & Lisicha dog mission”
The name of a second dog was Lisichka (small fox) 😉
Anton Grafov
I noticed a chronology error in this timeline. Korolyov was brought back from GULAG system not in 1941 but in 1940, when he was picked to work in so called “sharaga”-the aircraft design bureau managed by NKVD. Later, in 1942, he was transferred to Kazan to the same sort of “firm” and there he was given an early release with previous conviction removal (1944). Leonid Kerber, who was in the same “sharaga”, in his book about great Soviet aicraft designer Tupolev recalled that favorite Korolyov’s phrase was “they’ll whack us without obituary”. Sorry if these facts was already known to you.
Stalin
An obscure meaning of the phrase “Sergei Korolev born Ukraine” hints at that poor Sergei had to bear the whole republic. Which, to my knowledge, wasn’t the case.
Pete Hodkinson
Thanks Anton,
This is helpful to us.
We’ll check this out and amend in a reprint.
Emmanuel Yudovsky
Yes. Theres the same mistake in the timeline of Yuri Gagarin, it said Chaik and Lisicha and in Russian, Lisicha (Лисича) dosen’t make sense. The proper word is Lisichak (Лисичка), which means small, child fox, or a nice/gentle way of saying fox.
P Hodkinson
But Лисичка means chanterelle, as in mushroom!?