Word: cosmonauts
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...just about the pressure that he would breathe it on earth. As air escaped from the lock, the vacuum of space reached into it like a monster's claw. The oxygen in Leonov's suit tried to expand, and the suit inflated like a balloon. The cosmonaut must have listened anxiously for the hissing of tiny leaks. But all went well; he flung open the outer door and was the first human to look the deadly vacuum full in the face...
After finishing school in 1953, Leonov was sent by the Young Communist League to flying school at Chuguyev, near Kharkov, where he made 115 parachute jumps, became a parachute instructor, and was one of the first pilots to be selected for training as a cosmonaut. He was courting the girl whom, he was to marry when he learned that he might be sent on a novel and very difficult mission. Told that the mission would not interfere with his marriage, he signed up enthusiastically...
Belyayev, 39, and the oldest cosmonaut who has yet flown in space, was born in the Vologda region east of Leningrad. As a child he skied three miles to school and tried at 16 to join the ski troops in the war with Nazi Germany...
Rejected as too young, he worked in a factory for two years, then went into training in the Red air force where he fought as a pilot for the rest of the war. He was studying at the air force academy when he was selected for cosmonaut training, and he astonished space physicians with the punishment he could take in centrifuge tests. At one time they stopped the machine for fear that he had gone too far. But Belyayev was undamaged...
...however, wholly invulnerable. During parachute training he broke a leg. The double fracture healed slowly, and he feared he would be washed out of cosmonaut training. His father, a rural physician, prescribed weight-lifting to rebuild the damaged leg, and eventually it grew strong enough to pass examination...