The history of science is a story of conquest.
Of nature and the minds of men.
One could not happen without the other.
On April 121961,
Yuri Gagarin would travel outside the earth for the first time.
A step that would have been impossible without the sacrifice of Galileo Galilei.
This is a dramatisation of these two momentous events,
as they happened on two days that shook the world.
April 121633.
In England, Charles I is locked
in a power struggle with parliament...
In the New World,
puritan pilgrims struggle to gain a foothold in what will become America...
While in Rome, 70 year old Galileo Galilei
is on trial for heresy.
In a few hours they will put him on the stand.
He prays for God's guidance, and for the leniency of the church.
Outside the sun rises.
Galileo's crime is to suggest that it - and not the earth
- is the centre of the universe.
And that the earth orbits the sun, just like any other planet.
It is a monstrous affront to the teachings of the Church.
30 years ago, a Dominican friar,
Giordano Bruno made the same claim...
and was burned to death for his heresy.
Now they are coming after Galileo.
He has written a book - The Dialogue on the Two Chief Systems of the World,
which he thought would convince the sceptics.
He believed that, after 30 years, the Church had softened its line...
that the pope himself had given him his blessing to write.
He was tragically wrong.
The opening session of the trial.
It will be a quiet, informal affair.
But for Galileo the stakes couldn't be higher.
In this room, they will decide the fate of his career,
his reputation, perhaps even his life.
Imprisoned for the last three months,
Galileo is ill and suffers from arthritis.
He is allowed no lawyer to defend him,
and has no idea of the formal charge.
Presiding is Father Vincenzo Maculano, a Jesuit priest.
With the power of the Catholic Church behind him,
he is expected to secure a simple confession.
But he underestimates the man behind the tired and aged face.
He begins with exhibit A - Galileo's book The Dialogue.
Did he write it?
Can he explain what's in it
that might have brought him before the Holy Inquisition?
Galileo's book is not the first to claim
that the earth orbits the sun.
The polish astronomer Copernicus
first suggested it in 1543.
The Church realised the danger.
A special edict ordered all Catholics to avoid his theories.
And Galileo was issued with a personal injunction,
not to support Copernicus -
as they now remind him.
The injunction forbids him to teach
or defend the Copernican theory.
When he sought a licence to print his book,
did he inform the authorities about the injunction?
It's a simple question.
Miachialano expects a simple admission of guilt.
Without hesitation,
Galileo not only flatly denies that he ever supported Copernicus's theory...
he goes further and claims his book actually refutes Copernicus.
Surely this cannot be true?
If the book is not heretical, then why is he here?
Unsure how to proceed, Maculano dismisses the court.
Galileo is returned to house arrest
until the book can be re-examined.
The trial is far from over.
The pope has demanded a confesion of guilt
and popes generally get what they want,
one way or another.
Eight years earlier, and things look very different.
Galileo is at the height of his fame as a mathematician and writer.
While the Church enjoys a mini renaissance
under a new pope, Urban the Vlll.
Urban wants to be seen to encourage
new ideas in philosophy and science.
And who better to advise him than Galileo Galilei?
There should be plenty to discuss,
Europe is alive with new discovery,
but in Italy there is a problem -
the Edict against Copernicus.
Galileo complains that Catholic science
is suffering because of it... so much so,
that a credibility gap is opening with the rest of Europe.
Urban fears it too;
the loss of prestige will reflect badly on his 'enlightened' papacy.
Sensing Urban's distaste for the Edict,
Galileo makes a decision that will change his life.
He carefully raises the possibility of a new book.
Resurrecting Copernicus's theory
He somehow forgets to mention the injunction.
His mind is elsewhere on all the evidence he's compiled to support Copernicus's theory.
Galileo is employed by Medici, Duke of Florence
to teach his children mathematics.
He is also a pioneering astronomer.
Twenty years ago, he took a simple spyglass,
increased its magnification tenfold...
and transformed an amusing toy into a true scientific instrument,
capable of unlocking the secrets of the heavens.
It's not Copernicus's ideas that bother Urban,
it's Galileo claiming to prove them.
Scientific theories are fine, as long as they stay theories.
Proof denies faith and without faith, there is no religion.
For the pope, the universe is run by God's miracle,
not natural law as interpreted by Galileo.
He challenges Galileo to accept that God can make things move
and appear in any way he chooses.
And that any attempt at proof is ultimately in vain.
Gallileo realises he may have seriously mis-read the situation.
The future of his work hangs in the balance.
But then, without realising it, Urban throws him a lifeline.
Confident that he has made his point,
he gives Galileo his blessing
to write about the sun, the Earth and stars -
'hypothetically'
He even suggests are more philosophical title...
The Two Chief Systems of the World.
Galileo hears only the blessing,
and forgets the veiled warning.
In his mind, it seems that 10 years of official obstruction have finally been lifted...
But there is a new challenge...
To write a ground breaking scientific treatise,
hypothetically.
His solution is ingenious -
he constructs an imaginary dialogue between three characters.
One is Galileo's alter ego,
who argues the Copernican view.
The second maintains the old Church view...
And the third character weighs both sides equally.
It seems to be the perfect vehicle
to carry his ideas, without censure.
But he can't avoid the evidence
and despite his attempt to satisfy the church
it unbalances the book,
tilting it openly towards Copernicus.
And in the seven years it takes him to write,
the world itself changes.
The Renaissance cools.
The book is doomed.
By March 1632,
pope Urban is in the eye of a political storm.
The wars for religious dominance of Europe rage ever closer to Rome.
The Catholic world feels increasingly under threat from a rising protestant tide.
Cardinal Borgia, the Vatican ambassador to Spain,
accuses Urban of failing in his duty to fight for the true faith.
In fact, according to Borgia,
he seemed unwilling to try,
and should be impeached.
Meanwhile, The Dialogue is being printed,
not in Rome, but in Florence.
Galileo is supposed to have passed a copy
to the Vatican for approval, before printing.
But because of plague outbreaks, nothing has been sent anywhere for a while.
It gets rubber-stamped by the inquisition's local representative in Florence.
The most explosive scientific work
in 500 years is about to be born.
In Rome, Urban needs to make a gesture,
to prove his ability to defend the Catholic Faith.
His brother attempts to make it for him.
The last thing Urban needs now
is to be seen allowing heretical texts to flourish, unchecked.
That summer of 1632,
the Dialogue is finished.
When it hit the streets, no-one is prepared for the response.
It sells out in 5 days.
The Church's reaction is less enthusiastic.
When the book finally arrives in Rome,
Urban has no time to read it.
Advisers judge it for him.
The one character in Galileo's book who supports the church has been made to look a fool.
His name is Simplicio and is clearly modelled on the pope.
The book itself they declare a scandalous glorification of Copernicus.
It is beyond question that Galileo teaches
the Earth's motion in writing.
He declares war on everybody
and regards as mental dwarfs
all who are not Copernican.
Enraged,
Urban demands both the book and its writer stand trial, for Heresy.
The Dialogue is about to land Galileo in court.
But he still has powerful friends.
His employer, Medici, Duke of Florence
has sent his star lawyer -
Ambassador Francesco Niccolini - on a mission to Rome.
Niccolini hopes to persuade Urban to drop the case.
But Urban has been publicly humiliated
and wants blood.
Niccolini points out that the book was officially approved by the Inquisition.
But Urban doesn't care.
Whatever Galileo hoped to achieve with his book,
the end result has been an embarrassment to the pope.
Now it's personal.
Niccolini tries his best to give Galileo at least a fighting chance in court,
but all assistance is denied.
Urban wants Galileo charged
with heresy for supporting Copernicus.
But the edict against Copernicus contains a major loophole.
Nowhere does it actually use the word 'heretical.'
It would make little difference to Urban either way.
Niccolini tries to point out
that the case against Galileo is legally unsound for a number of reasons.
But for Urban,
the stakes are now too high to back down.
He insists Galileo be tried for heresy -
for supporting a doctrine that is not technically heretical.
It's such a huge oversight, it nearly lets Galileo off the hook.
Following the first day of the trial,
Galileo waits for his book to be re-examined.
The court is in recess.
And they have a big legal problem.
The book supports Copernicus.
But because Copernicus is not actually heretical,
they can't convict him of heresy.
They need him to confess.
Chief prosecutor Maculano has been sent to persuade Galileo
to give up the fight.
He strongly suggests to Galileo that he has already condemned himself by his own hand.
Which reluctantly, Galileo seems to accept.
Day two of the trial opens
with everyone expecting a speedy resolution.
But Galileo hasn't given up the fight.
He confesses his error.
And it's a simple one to make -
that he may have accidentally appeared to support Copernicus...
when of course he did not,
by being too clever with his arguments.
He was just guilty of showing off.
It's a confession.
But not the one Maculano needs.
Namely - that he supported a doctrine contrary to Holy Scripture.
Macualano dismisses the court, once more at a loss.
Meanwhile Urban has been receiving reports of the trial's progress...
Or lack of it.
The trial runs into a third day
and Galileo has saved a surprise strategy for this moment,
when he feels the case against him is weakening.
He produces his copy of the injunction from 16 years ago,
which ordered him not to support Copernicus.
Galileo feels he has scored a major victory.
But all he has done, is forced the Church into a corner.
At a meeting of the Cardinal Inquisitors,
Urban makes it clear he has had enough of legal niceties.
He wants the matter ended, now.
Galileo is to confess and retract.
By whatever means necessary.
Including torture.
Trial day four.
The Inquisition makes it's intentions unmistakably clear.
Galileo began his career as a doctor.
He knows very well the effects metal has on flesh.
It's the end of the road for the Book and for Galileo.
They have won.
Galileo's sentence is that he will be formally imprisoned,
at the pleasure of the Holy Office - indefinitely.
The dialogue is banned by the Catholic church,
and will remain so,
for the next two hundred years.
Yet the earth still turns.
He knows it. And they know it.
It is April 12, 1961.
In Algiers, rebel French generals
stage a coup to topple de Gaulle...
In Vietnam, American military advisers help sort out a little local unrest.
And in the USSR, a human being prepares to leave the planet.
Baikonur Cosmodrome, Soviet Central Asia.
In six hours,
one of these two men will become immortal.
He will take a step no human has ever taken:
From the earth into space.
The two rivals for this greatest of all adventures are expected to rest.
But Gherman Titov is not asleep.
And neither is Yuri Gagarin.
They are being monitored, listened to. Watched.
Having prodded and pushed,
recorded and measured both contenders
through every waking moment for a year...
The scientists of Russia's Space programme
want to probe their final sleep
before lift off.
Strain gages monitor their state of rest.
Officially Gagarin is Cosmonaut Number one,
but there's still time to change the order.
A restless night could make them question
his mental readiness for the mission.
He hardly dares to breathe.
He's so close to his dream.
As a child Yuri Gagarin dreamed of flight.
In summer,
when the warm winds would send golden waves rippling across the rye,
I would raise my head to the clear blue sky above me.
How wonderful it would have been
to soar straight up into that natural beauty
and float away to the horizon where the earth meets the sky.
As young man, Yuri made time to learn to fly.
By the age of 23 he had achieved his boyhood ambition
to become a fighter pilot,
and defender of the USSR.
It was all he had ever dreamed of -
until the air force announced they were looking for pilots
for new, experimental craft -
spacecraft.
Through years of tests, two front-runners emerged from the pack.
Titov and Gagarin.
Impossible to separate in physical trials...
Gagarin had a quality Titov would never possess.
Yuri is a farmer's boy,
just like the Soviet leader Khrushchev.
The perfect political background
for a space age Soviet hero.
06:30 AM
The morning of the flight,
Titov is already suited up,
and it feels like a cruel joke.
Far from getting him ready to fly,
they are just keeping Gagarin cool.
Relaxed. Happy.
Titov knows that barring any last minute hitches,
it's Gagarin who will be going into space.
He will take all the glory.
But then, he's taking all the risks.
The rocket he will ride
is a converted ballistic missile.
Designed to carry a nuclear warhead into the heart of America,
today it will deliver a simple message -
that the Russians are winning the space race.
If the rocket works...
Just 6 months ago
190 engineers perished when a rocket misfired.
Rocket design is still in its infancy.
Nearly half of all launches have so far ended in failure.
A degree of caution would seem advisable.
But the Americans have their own space programme.
In Florida, the Mercury spacecraft nears completion.
By eavesdropping on NASA's radio signals,
they know the Americans are close to launching their own manned flight.
Perhaps just a matter of days.
So they must go now
or risk losing the race.
There are other risks, aside from the rocket itself.
Less than a month ago,
a successful launch sent a Vostok space capsule into space...
With a certain lvan lvanovich on board.
Ivan survived the trip.
But then, lvan was made of rubber.
Even if the rocket works,
no-one knows
what will happen to a man in space.
The doctors watch for signs of strain,
any last minute psychological weakness.
Their greatest fear is that, under the unknown effects of weightlessness,
isolated from all human contact,
even the most disciplined and dedicated cosmonaut may go mad.
Or worse - defect.
They have taken precautions.
The flight is designed to be fully automatic -
controlled by computers on the ground.
Gagarin and Titov have always been unhappy about their lack of control.
And said so.
Supposing the auto-pilot malfunctions, as it has often done before?
A very 'Soviet' compromise has been reached.
The cosmonaut will have a key-pad to unlock the autopilot,
but won't be told the number
unless there's an emergency.
The combination is hidden in the cabin
and its location will radioed to the pilot
as a last resort.
Chief Designer Sergei Korolev comes to say goodbye.
As technical director, the entire operation rests on his shoulders.
And it shows.
The Chief Designer came in,
and it was the first time I'd ever seen him looking careworn and tired.
Clearly, he'd had a sleepless night.
I wanted to give him a hug, just as if he were my father.
Korolev has overseen the cosmos programme from the start.
These are his boys.
He calls them his 'Little Eagles'.
But only one of them will fly today.
Titov knows his chance has finally gone.
We'd trained together a long time.
We were both fighter pilots, so we understood each other.
He was commanding the flight, I was his back up,
'just in case'.
But we both knew that just in case wasn't going to happen.
Was he going to catch flu between the bus and the launch gantry?
Break his leg?
It was all nonsense...
but what if?
...What if?
There remain a lot of 'what ifs'.
Today will be the ultimate test of Soviet technology.
Gagarin is manoeuvred into the Vostok capsule.
Home for the next two hours.
Meanwhile, Korolev descends into the bowels of the earth.
He will spend the flight in a bomb-proof bunker,
300 yards from his control team on the surface.
They are expendable.
He is not.
The mission is Korolev's baby.
If it fails, he will take the blame.
Yet if it succeeds, he will not share in the accolades.
Korolev's genius is too big
a state secret to put before the world's press.
Beneath Gagarin
lies 250 tonnes of rocket propellant.
Zero hour approaches.
The capsule is locked.
Gagarin tenses his entire body.
If the rocket misfires now,
his seat will eject automatically,
and he will land in a giant safety net.
If the force doesn't kill him
or rip his legs off on the way out.
Lf... what if.
All the questions and calculations...
the years of trial and sacrifice
come down to this moment.
Gagarin is on his way.
The world is about to shrink forever.
Rising at 1,000 feet per second,
G forces are so strong they prevent Gagarin from speaking.
60 miles up;
Gagarin is now higher than any human being has ever been.
80 miles up and heading east,
Gagarin is now out of range of the TV receivers at Baikonur.
Korolev won't see him again
until he lands.
Just ten minutes after lift off,
Gagarin is free of the earth's gravity.
He is now the first man in orbit.
Half an hour into the flight.
At 20 times the speed of sound,
Gagarin slips silently into darkness.
Below him lie cities.
Above him, stars.
He tries to identify the constellations,
but the light from the on board TV camera gets in his eyes.
Flying ever eastwards
at 18,000 miles per hour,
Gagarin meets the rising sun.
For the first time in his career,
he is just a passenger...
He is free to enjoy the greatest view any human has ever had.
I wondered... what would the people on earth say
when they heard about my flight?
...I thought about my mother, and how, when I was a child,
she used to kiss me between the shoulder blades before I went to sleep.
Did she know where I was right now?
No she did not.
The last Yuri told his mother
was that he was going away on a business trip.
She asked where to,
he told her far away.
It was as much as he dared divulge.
Anna is completely unaware
that her son is 80 miles above her.
He's has flown higher than any other human.
But he still has to get down.
And he is about to hit trouble.
The tiny Vostok capsule must re-enter the Earth's atmosphere.
But it has to separate from its larger equipment module first.
And at the critical moment, the separation fails.
At Ground Control,
they are totally unaware of any problem.
But Korolev's star is falling.
The two halves of the Vostok space craft spin uncontrollably
like a pair of boots tied by their laces.
On the ground the first sign of trouble.
Instruments show that separation hasn't happened.
It might just be a communication failure...
In fact Vostock is dangerously out of control.
Gagarin has the code to unlock the flight controls,
but there is no control to be had.
Meanwhile, confident that the flight was in order,
TASS radio have made their first announcement.
The Soviet Union has launched a manned mission into space.
On Board, Major Yuri Gagarin.
Yuri's mother has the radio switched off.
But his sister in law, Zoya has heard the news.
Anna decides on impulse to go to Moscow
to see Yuri's wife Valentina, alone with the children.
But she's not thinking straight,
its over 250 miles away.
While Gagarin's been in space,
they promoted him to Major.
But he may not live to find out.
Vostok is still spinning wildly.
And now it begins to heat up.
This should be a good sign -
it means Gagarin's in the friction of the Earth's atmosphere.
But he's no idea if he's coming in too steeply.
He hears Vostok's heat shield expanding.
If it comes off, he will be incinerated.
And the friction creates another problem: A magnetic shield.
No radio signals can get in, or out.
Korolev doesn't know if Gagarin is still on course.
Or in a million pieces scattered through space.
In the control centre, they're still in the dark.
The radio remains silent.
The implications of failure are not hard to imagine.
The Russians have a phrase -
'packing your sled',
knowing you're headed for the gulag.
Korolev's fate hangs with Gagarin's.
And Gagarin is close to losing consciousness.
Five miles below him,
Tractor driver Yakov Lysenkov hears an explosion.
It's loud enough to be heard
over the sound of his tractor.
Lysenkov thinks it's the sound of an aircraft breaking up.
He looks for the stricken plane,
and sees something falling.
It's Gagarin.
The heat of re entry
has burnt through the cables joining the two halves of his tumbling craft,
and he took the chance to eject.
On the ground,
the instruments show that the escape hatch has been fired.
Two miles higher than they planned,
but at least they know he's alive.
After 108 minutes in space,
Yuri Alexeivich Gagarin is once more back on planet earth.
An official reception is sent to collect the new hero of the Soviet Union.
But his unofficial reception has got there first.
Yakov Lysenko is eager to greet the unknown man from the stars.
Other locals come to welcome the stranger from the sky.
Gagarin's mission finally complete, Mazzhorin's letter has been opened.
A second radio announcement addresses the Nation.
Anna's little Yura has just become the most famous man on earth.
But before his hosts can enjoy the novelty of greeting the world's first Space Man,
the party is over.
The party have some serious prestige to make from their favourite fly boy.
Yuri Gagarin, the cosmic man of the people, is taken away,
to begin his new life as a Soviet Hero
and world celebrity.
All across the USSR, they can hardly believe they've done it again.
First Sputnik, now this.
How much better can it get?
It's a good time to be a Soviet citizen.
But the one citizen who made it all happen, remains in the shadows.
While Gagarin bathes in public glory,
Korolev quietly returns to work...
His eyes on bigger prizes.
Longer flights, space walks,
perhaps a manned mission to the moon.
Today the Russians have thrown down the greatest technological challenge of all time.
The Space Race has begun.