Yuri’s Night Events Set at Pima Air & Space Museum

A day-long celebration of 50 years of space exploration, named Yuri’s Night in honor of Yuri Gagarin, the first man to go into space, will be held Saturday, April 9, at the Pima Air & Space Museum, 6000 E. Valencia Road in Tucson.

Yuri’s Night  features an afternoon of presentations from leaders in space exploration, starting at 1 pm, and a family-oriented evening program, from 5 pm to 9 pm, featuring space, astronomy and physics displays and activities.

Yuri’s Night is one of 200 events honoring space exploration and travel that are scheduled in 30 countries.  Russian Yuri Gagarin was the first man in space April 12, 1961. Twenty years later, on April 12, 1981, the first US Space Shuttle Mission was launched.

The afternoon presentations include University of Arizona Lunar and Planetary Laboratory Professor Peter Smith, who was the leader for the Phoenix Mars Lander Mission; Grant Anderson, vice president of engineering for Tucson-based Paragon Space Development Corporation and lead design engineer for the International Space Station solar arrays; Astronaut James McDivitt (BrigGen. USAF Ret), who flew on Gemini 4 and Apollo 9 and was the Apollo Spacecraft Program Manager for three years in charge of Apollo 12 through 16; and Sy Liebergot, the EECOM (Emergency, Environmental and Consumables Management) Flight Controller on duty in Mission Control during Apollo 13.

The panel discussion will be held in the Flight Central Hangar.  The presentations are free with admission to the museum. Admission to the Pima Air & Space Museum is $15.50 for adults; $9 for children ages 6 to 12 and free for children six and under.  The museum is open from 9 am to 5 pm daily.

Yuri’s Night evening events include viewing space through telescopes provided by the Tucson Amateur Astronomy Association; hands on activities from the Physics Factory; displays and activities from the National Optical Astronomy Observatory at Kitt Peak;  the International Dark Sky Society; Southern Arizona Rocketry Association; Tucson L5 Space Society; the University of Arizona Russian and Slavic Studies Department; the Titan Missile Museum;  Flandreau Planetarium and the Planetary Science Institute.   A collection of objects from manned space flight will be presented by Space Aholic.

In addition, participants will be able to sign a card for Astronaut Mark Kelly, wishing the STS-134 crew a successful April 19 launch.

Events will be held in Hangar One, Flight Central, the Spirit of Freedom Hangar and in the Dorothy H. Finley Space Gallery.

Admission to the Yuri’s Night evening events from 5 pm to 9 pm is $10 for adults. Children 12 and under are free.  (Last admission is at 8 pm.)

Flight Grill, the new restaurant at the Pima Air & Space Museum, will be open for the evening event.