Grigori Nelyubov, one of the original 20 cosmonauts

Grigori Grigoyevich Nelyubov (March 31, 1934 – February 18, 1966) was a Russian cosmonaut who was likely to have been the third or fourth person in space before his dismissal from the Soviet space program. Image File history File links Download high resolution version (594x894, 55 KB) Summary File photo of Nelyubov Grigori. ... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (594x894, 55 KB) Summary File photo of Nelyubov Grigori. ... March 31 is the 90th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (91st in Leap years), with 275 days remaining. ... 1934 (MCMXXXIV) was a common year starting on Monday (link will take you to calendar). ... February 18 is the 49th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. ... 1966 (MCMLXVI) was a common year starting on Saturday (the link is to a full 1966 calendar). ... U.S. Space Shuttle astronaut Bruce McCandless II using a manned maneuvering unit. ... Soviet Soyuz rockets like the one pictured above were the first reliable means to transport objects into Earth orbit. ...

Born in Porfiryevk, Crimea in the Ukraine, Nelyubov was a captain and pilot in the Soviet Air Force. He was selected as one of the original 20 cosmonauts on March 7, 1960 along with Yuri Gagarin. The following year six of the original twenty were evaluated for assignment on Vostok flight crews between January 17 and 18; Gagarin, Titov, and Nelyubov are considered the top three candidates [1]. Crimea /kraɪˈmia/ is a peninsula and an autonomous republic of Ukraine on the northern coast of the Black Sea. ... The Soviet Air Force, also known under the abbreviation VVS, transliterated from Russian: ВВС, Военно-воздушные силы (Voenno-Vozdushnye Sily), formed the official designation of the airforce of the Soviet Union. ... -1... Gherman Titov Gherman Stepanovich Titov (Russian: Герман Степанович Титов; September 11, 1935, Verkhnee Zhilino – September 20, 2000, Moscow) was a Soviet cosmonaut and the second person to orbit the Earth. ...

For Vostok 1 Nelyubov was chosen as second double for Gargarin and presumably first double for Vostok 2 for Titov in April and August 1961 respectively. For the dual launches of Vostok 3 and Vostok 4, Nelyubov was again chosen as a double for Andrian Nikolayev and Pavel Popovich. Vostok 1 was the first manned space mission. ... Gherman Titov Vostok 2 was a Soviet space mission which carried cosmonaut Gherman Titov into orbit for a full day in order to study the effects of a more prolonged period of weightlessness on the human body. ... Vostok 3 was a mission in the Soviet space program. ... Vostok 4 was a mission in the Soviet space program. ...

On March 27, 1963 Nelyubov, Anikeyev and Filatyev were arrested for drunk and disorderly conduct by the militia at Chkalovskiy station. According to reports, the officers of the security patrol that arrested them were willing to ignore the whole incident if the cosmonauts apologized, but Nelyubov refused, and the matter was reported to the authorities. Because there were previous incidents, all three were dismissed from the cosmonaut corps on April 17, 1963, though officially not until May 4, 1963. Nelyubov never completed a space mission.

Sochi Six with Nelyubov in back row center

Same image with Nelyubov airbrushed out

Following dismisal he went back to flying interceptors in Siberia but fell to drinking and depression. He died on February 18, 1966. While drunk, he stepped in front of a train near the Ippolitovka station, northwest of Vladivostok. It was officially ruled a suicide. Image File history File links Sochi_Six_-_with_Nelyubov. ... Image File history File links Sochi_Six_-_with_Nelyubov. ... Image File history File links Sochi_Six_-_without_Nelyubov. ... Image File history File links Sochi_Six_-_without_Nelyubov. ... Siberia Siberia (Russian: , common English transliterations: Sibir’, Sibir; from the Tatar for “sleeping land”) is a vast region of Russia and northern Kazakhstan constituting almost all of northern Asia. ...

To protect the image of the space program, efforts were made to cover-up the reason for Nelyubov's dismissal and his following suicide. His image was airbrushed out of the famous "Sochi Six" photo which showed the top members of the original class of Soviet cosmonauts. This airbrushing led to early Cold War speculation about reasons for the removal even though actual reasons were often mundane. The Cold War was the protracted geostrategic, economic, and ideological struggle that emerged after World War II between the global superpowers of the Soviet Union and the United States, supported by their respective and emerging alliance partners. ...

External links

• Details of the Soviet training program and launch
• Airbrushed cosmonauts
• Biographical details
• Titov recounts about Nelyubov #4 Research topic
• Straight Dope entry about lost cosmonauts