If you went looking for Zvezdny Gorodok , aka Star City , on a map in the 1960s , you ’d have no fortune . This small town outdoors of Moscow was long a state secret , and for skilful reason : It was the base where Cosmonauts came to take for — and recover from — space flying . And it ’s still ready .
“ deeply within the forest , fence by mordacious telegram , the extremely close Star City agree the soul of the Russian the great unwashed , ” says British photographerMitch Karunaratne , who spend a week exploring the once - relegate town with a camera . “ Star City is the symbol of Soviet scientific proficient advancement , strengthening and recovering Russia ’s Cosmonauts prestigiousness worldwide . ”
Opened in 1960 , Star City remained the undercover spotlight where Russian ’s space course of study blossomed in the Space Race — and put up a farsighted downslope with the Soviet Union accrue . And while Gizmodo profile the baseback in 2008 , Karunaratne ’s recent tour offer a new position on the town .
Today , Star City is still an operable base : Every Russian astronaut still cultivate here , using the town ’s full - exfoliation mockups of both Soviet and international modules , from the Soyuz vehicle to the ISS , plus deep pools that simulate lightness .
NASA has had a comportment here since the early 1970s , too , and plenty of other astronaut have train here — though they have n’t always had an easy time getting used to the culture , which is still highly secretive .
A2011 sport on Star Cityin the Smithsonian ’s Air & Space magazine explained how sensible Russia still is about the townsfolk :
In the honest-to-goodness twenty-four hours , the GCTC published few manuals ; cosmonauts exact handwritten notes at lecture seance . staffer were reluctant to print and distribute written materials , because they saw the information as proprietary . ( In early 2008 , South Korean spaceman nominee Ko San was removed from a Soyuz crew assignment for taking workbook out of Star City without permission . allot to one former NASA astronaut , manuals are still formally restricted to the center . )
Just gaining access to Star City as a lensman , Karunaratne explicate , “ involves prolonged negotiations , license missive and brown envelopes . ” Her exposure catch the unmingled closing off — and the decaying substructure — of a place that ’s suspended between a glorious past times and a future that few of those early cosmonaut would have imagined.[Mitch Karunaratne ]
photo essayRussiaSpacespace race
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