Mission type Technology Spacecraft type DS-K-8 Rocket Kosmos-2I 63S1 Launch date 18 August 1962 Decay date 17 August 1963 | Harvard designation 1962 Alpha Xi 1 Launch mass 337 kilograms (743 lb) Launch site Kapustin Yar Mayak-2 Manufacturer Yuzhnoye Design Office | |
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Kosmos 8 (Russian: Космос 8 meaning Cosmos 8), also known as DS-K-8 No.1 and occasionally in the West as Sputnik 18 was a technology demonstration satellite which was launched by the Soviet Union in 1962. It was the eighth satellite to be designated under the Kosmos system, and the third spacecraft launched as part of the DS programme to successfully reach orbit, after Kosmos 1 and Kosmos 6. Its primary mission was to demonstrate the technologies for future Soviet military satellites. It also carried a micrometeoroid research payload which discovered meteoroid flux.
It was launched aboard the eighth flight of the Kosmos-2I 63S1 rocket. The launch was conducted from pad 2 of the Mayak Launch Complex at Kapustin Yar, and occurred at 15:00 GMT on 18 August 1962.
Kosmos 8 was placed into a low Earth orbit with a perigee of 244 kilometres (152 mi), an apogee of 598 kilometres (372 mi), 49 degrees of inclination, and an orbital period of 92.9 minutes. It decayed on 17 August 1963, one day short of a year after its launch. Kosmos 8 was the only DS-K-8 satellite to be launched.