Status
Success
Zond 5
Sat Sep 14, 1968 21:42 UTC
First living being to fly over the Moon.
An issue with the stellar trackers caused the spacecraft to splash down in the Indian Ocean instead of landing in Kazakhstan, despite this it was recovered intact, and the animals onboard survived.
Rocket
Mission Details
Zond-5
Zond-5 carried two 40-gram Horsfield tortoises each, as well as several hundred flies, Drosophilidae flies, sucker blackberries (a beetle), salads, algae and bacteria. The specimen survived the reentry. Zond-5 became the first spacecraft to circle the Moon and return to Earth.
L1 was a Soviet spacecraft launched on Proton, designed in parallel of 7K-L1, which flew on the N-1 launcher. It was conceived to carry out crewed flybys of the Moon, like Apollo 8. This spacecraft sent the first living beings to fly over the Moon, turtles, on board Zond 5. The work made on this spacecraft will be used for the improvement of the Soyuz spacecraft.