Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman in space
On this day · 16 June 1963
A textile worker and amateur parachutist orbited Earth 48 times in 1963, beating the entire U.S. crewed program to the milestone.
On June 16, 1963, Soviet cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova lifted off aboard Vostok 6, becoming the first woman to fly in space. She was 26, a former textile-mill worker recruited for her skill as an amateur parachutist rather than as a pilot.
Over the next 70.8 hours, Vostok 6 circled the planet 48 times. A second craft, Vostok 5 carrying Valery Bykovsky, was already aloft, and the two passed within a few kilometers of each other before both landed on June 19.
By the time she touched down, Tereshkova had logged more hours in orbit than every American astronaut who had flown to that point, combined.
No woman would follow her into orbit for another 19 years, until Svetlana Savitskaya in 1982. To this day Tereshkova remains the only woman to have flown a solo space mission, a distinction unlikely to be matched in the crewed era of multi-seat capsules.
Sources & references
2 referencesWell-established. Corroborated by 2 independent sources.
