Korabl-Sputnik 1 ( meaning ''Vessel Satellite 1''), also known as Sputnik 4 in the West, was the first test flight of the

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

Vostok programme The Vostok programme ( ; rus, Восток, p=vɐˈstok, a=ru-восток.ogg, t=East) was a Soviet human spaceflight project to put the first Soviet cosmonauts into low Earth orbit and return them safely. Competing with the United States P ...

, and the first

Vostok spacecraft Vostok (, translated as "East") was a class of single-pilot crewed spacecraft built by the Soviet Union. The first human spaceflight was accomplished with Vostok 1 on April 12, 1961, by Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin. The Vostok programme ma ...

. It was launched on May 15, 1960. Though Korabl-Sputnik 1 was uncrewed, it was a precursor to the first

human spaceflight Human spaceflight (also referred to as manned spaceflight or crewed spaceflight) is spaceflight with a crew or passengers aboard a spacecraft, often with the spacecraft being operated directly by the onboard human crew. Spacecraft can also be ...

Vostok 1 Vostok 1 (, ) was the first spaceflight of the Vostok programme and the first human spaceflight, human orbital spaceflight in history. The Vostok 3KA space capsule was launched from Baikonur Cosmodrome on 12 April 1961, with Soviet astronaut, c ...

. Its mass was , of which was instrumentation. The spacecraft, the first of a series of spacecraft used to investigate the means for crewed space flight, contained scientific instruments, a television system, and a self-sustaining biological cabin with a dummy of a man. It was designed to study the operation of the life support system and the stresses of flight. The spacecraft radioed both extensive telemetry and prerecorded voice communications. After four days of flight, the retro rocket was fired and the descent module was separated from its equipment module, but because the spacecraft was not in the correct flight attitude when its retro fired, the descent module did not reenter the atmosphere as planned. SputnikSiteManitowocWI

The descent module re-entered the atmosphere on September 5, 1962, while the equipment module re-entered on October 15, 1965. A 20-pound piece of the descent module landed in Manitowoc,

Wisconsin Wisconsin ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest of the United States. It borders Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michig ...

in the northern United States. Giovanni Battista Judica Cordiglia, who set up his own amateur listening station at Torre Bert near

Turin Turin ( , ; ; , then ) is a city and an important business and cultural centre in northern Italy. It is the capital city of Piedmont and of the Metropolitan City of Turin, and was the first Italian capital from 1861 to 1865. The city is main ...

, is reported to have claimed that radio signals were received on November 28, 1960, which could have originated from this spacecraft; the spacecraft is known to have radioed prerecorded voice communications. It has led some to believe a

conspiracy theory A conspiracy theory is an explanation for an event or situation that asserts the existence of a conspiracy (generally by powerful sinister groups, often political in motivation), when other explanations are more probable.Additional sources: * ...

that the spacecraft may have been crewed by one of the Lost Cosmonauts. Sputnik IV plaque

Notes

References

* {{Orbital launches in 1960 May 1960 1960 in the Soviet Union Spacecraft launched in 1960 Spacecraft which reentered in 1962 * Korabl Sputnik 1