Kids unlock secret early soviet space program

[davekill]

Just an excerpt of a long and pretty amazing story from the early secret space race, first discovered and recorded by chance...

FROM OUTER SPACE

There are those who believe that somewhere in the vast blackness of space, about nine billion miles from the Sun, the first human is about to cross the boundary of our Solar System into interstellar space. His body, perfectly preserved, is frozen at –270 degrees C (–454ºF); his tiny capsule has been silently sailing away from the Earth at 18,000 mph (29,000km/h) for the last 45 years. He is the original lost cosmonaut, whose rocket went up and, instead of coming back down, just kept on going.

It is the ultimate in Cold War legends: that at the dawn of the Space Age, in the late 1950s and throughout the 1960s, the Soviet Union had two space programmes, one a public programme, the other a 'black' one, in which far more daring and sometimes downright suicidal missions were attempted. It was assumed that Russia's Black Ops, if they existed at all, would remain secret forever.

The 'Lost Cosmonauts' debate has been reawakened thanks to a new investigation into the efforts of two ingenious, radio-mad young Italian brothers who, starting in 1957, hacked into both Russia's and NASA's space programmes – so effect­ively that the Russians, it seems, may have wanted them dead.



Find the full article here:
http://www.forteantimes.com/features/articles/1302/lost_in_space.html

[Dangelus]

Wow.

At first I thought I was reading the opening dialogue to the original Battlestar Galactica but it may turn out to be a Russian Buck Rogers! :)

Interesting stuff.

[ricdude]

Wow.  Just. Wow.

[X]

I really would describe them as kids. They were 20 and 23 respectively when they did this

[MARKO]

Wow.

At first I thought I was reading the opening dialogue to the original Battlestar Galactica but it may turn out to be a Russian Buck Rogers! :)



Me too i thought is sounded like  the old BSG...... Pretty cool interesting read. Amazing times we live in chaps.
Interesting stuff.

[turtlesrock]

i've heard a little about this, but always thought it was just a conspiracy theory.
so it's been proven? there really is a frozen body zooming away into space?
awesome!

[Dangelus]

i've heard a little about this, but always thought it was just a conspiracy theory.
so it's been proven? there really is a frozen body zooming away into space?
awesome!

Not so awesome for him!

[turtlesrock]

i've heard a little about this, but always thought it was just a conspiracy theory.
so it's been proven? there really is a frozen body zooming away into space?
awesome!

Not so awesome for him!

*shrug* i guess. but still, pretty cool to be that far out.

[Ricardocameron]

Anyone seen any more news on this?

[davekill]

Anyone seen any more news on this?

Only that skeptics have been trying to debunk the story, arguing that the antennas used could not have worked, etc.

If the soviets would send a dog 'Laika' on a one way trip, then I guess anything is possible.
http://www.space.com/17764-laika-first-animals-in-space.html

The wiki page tells a darker story about Laika's fate:
" since 1951, they had lofted 12 dogs into sub-orbital space on ballistic flights, working gradually toward an orbital mission possibly some time in 1958."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laika