Thursday 3 September 2015

Remember When A Soviet Spacecraft Landed In Wisconsin?

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Korabl-Sputnik 1 wasn't one of the Soviet Union's greatest triumphs of the early space age. Following a successful mission, a flawed retrofire burn kept the spacecraft aloft until its orbit decayed, sprinkling radioactive metallic debris over Wisconsin on September 1, 1962.

Korabl-Spunik 1 was the first in a series of missions designed to check out new technologies for the Soviet's manned spaceflight program, namely the Vostok spacecraft and its life support system. To this end, the mission launched with a suite of scientific instruments, a television system, and a humanoid dummy housed in a pressurized cabin.

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