First Human Walks in Space

Date: March 18, 1965 • Location: Washington, United States

Cosmonaut Alexei Leonov, leaving his spacecraft Voskhod 2 for 12 minutes, becomes the first person to walk in space.

An astronaut is a person trained, equipped, and deployed by a human spaceflight program to serve as a commander or crew member of a spacecraft. Although generally reserved for professional space travelers, the term is sometimes applied to anyone who travels into space, including scientists, politicians, journalists, and space tourists. In the United States, it is a designated term used by three agencies: NASA, the FAA, and the military. The term is also used for people who are trained to fly in a spacecraft after passing certain training courses, regardless of their experience of space travel.