What type of animal was inside Sputnik 2 when launched into orbit in 1957?
Sputnik 2 Sputnik 2 Sputnik 2 (, , "Satellite 2"), or Prosteyshiy Sputnik 2 (PS-2, , "Elementary Satellite 2") was the second spacecraft launched into Earth orbit, on 3 November 1957, and the first to carry a living animal, a Soviet space dog named Laika, who died a few hours after the launch. Launched by the U.S.S.R., Sputnik 2 was a 4-meter (13 foot) high cone-shaped capsule with a base diameter of 2 meters (6.6 feet) that weighed around 500 kg, though it was not designed to separate from the rocket core that brought it to orbit, bringing the total mass in
Sputnik 2 “Korolev proposed substituting two 'simple satellites' for the IGY satellite”. The choice to launch these two instead of waiting for the more advanced Sputnik 3 to be finished was largely motivated by the desire to launch a satellite to orbit before the US. Sputnik 2, known to Korolev's design bureau as "Prosteyshiy Sputnik-2", meaning "Simple Satellite 2", was launched into a 212 × 1660 km (132 × 1031 mi) orbit with a period of 103.7 minutes on a modified ICBM R-7, similar to the one used to launch Sputnik 1. Sputnik 2's launch vehicle had several modifications for the mission.