On a cold morning of March 18, 1965, at 10:00 am, a rocket carrying Voskhod-2 spacecraft with commander Pavel Belyayev and pilot Alexei Leonov, lifted off from Baikonur, in modern-day Kazakhstan. After a relatively normal ascent, the spacecraft entered an orbit.

Upon reaching orbit, immediate preparations for the spacewalk began. Approximately an hour and a half after liftoff, Alexei successfully exited into open space, marking the first time any human had left the safety of a spacecraft and free-floated in orbit.

As Alexei Leonov emerged from the spacecraft, floating 300 miles above Earth, he felt no sense of motion despite traveling at speeds far exceeding that of a jet.

Below him lay Earth's expansive beauty. The vast and vivid geography of our planet stretched out before his eyes.

He was the first of his species to see our planet in such glorious aspect.

The news of the first spacewalk on March 18, 1965, stirred a mixture of astonishment and joy worldwide, unfolding amid the intense space race between the United States and the Soviet Union.

Following World War 2, the Cold War saw America and Soviet Union in a new form of rivalry, with space exploration emerging as a key battleground from the late 1950s.

The Voskhod 2 mission was celebrated in the Soviet Union as a significant achievement, casting a shadow over American efforts.

However, this triumphant narrative bore little resemblance to the actual events behind the scenes, where the mission nearly failed multiple times and could have resulted in the cosmonauts' deaths on several occasions.

The Soviet leadership kept the mission's difficulties under wraps, leaving the true story hidden for many years.

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