On July 22, 1972, a Soviet spacecraft landed on Venus!
The Soviet space probe Venera 8 was the second spacecraft to successfully execute a soft landing on the planet’s surface. Venera 8 spent 117 days traveling to Venus and only survived for 50 minutes before the planet’s harsh atmosphere got the best of its hardware. But it did manage to accomplish plenty of science before dying in Venus.
During its descent, it collected and transmitted data about Venus’s thick and toxic atmosphere. This data helped scientists learn that Venus’s clouds hover at a very high altitude, and that the atmosphere is actually a lot clearer close to the surface.
Related: Venera timeline: The Soviet Union’s Venus missions in pictures
Read more: NASA scientist explains why Venus is Earth’s ‘evil twin’ (video)
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