Sputnik 2 launched on November 3, 1957, carrying Laika into orbit. The dog survived only a short time, while the spacecraft continued circling Earth until April 1958.
These images distinguish the actual 1957 photograph and 1958 tracking record from later museum exhibits and postage-stamp illustrations. Each carries its own date and source.
Topic: Science & Discovery
01 / 06
Laika before the flight
The Museum of Cosmonautics and Moscow’s city archive identify this photograph as Laika before her orbital flight in 1957. The exact exposure day is not recorded. It is a historical photograph, distinct from the models and commemorative drawings that later helped make the mission familiar.
Museum of Cosmonautics / Main Archive of Moscow / Mos.ru; photographer unidentified
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The spacecraft, reconstructed at full scale
Stanislav Kozlovskiy photographed this full-scale Sputnik 2 model in Moscow’s Cosmos pavilion in August 2018. The structure helps explain how different the second satellite was from Sputnik 1’s small sphere. This is a museum model: the spacecraft launched in 1957 burned up during reentry in April 1958.
U.S. Air Force personnel at Patrick Air Force Base made this tracking photograph of Sputnik 2 and its attached rocket. The archive dates it to March 30, 1958, long after Laika’s death and the end of radio transmission. The spacecraft’s continued presence in orbit should never be confused with the survival of its passenger.
Photo details
Date
March 30, 1958
Location
Patrick Air Force Base, Florida, United States
Photographer
U.S. Air Force personnel; individual photographer unidentified
U.S. Air Force personnel; individual photographer unidentified / Air Force Missile Test Center / Wikimedia Commons
04 / 06
A Romanian stamp from the launch year
Romania issued this Laika stamp on December 10, 1957. Its illustration celebrates the mission through the dog’s image. Although the Commons filename contains “1959,” the current catalog identifies the issue as 1957. The supplied scan has existing digital cleaning and color adjustments; it is a reproduction of a stamp, not a spacecraft photograph.
Photo details
Date
December 10, 1957 stamp; scan 2009; existing digital cleanup 2025
Location
Romania
Photographer
Colectivul Dumitrana; scan by Neozoon; existing cleanup by SyntaxTerror
Colectivul Dumitrana; scan by Neozoon; existing cleanup by SyntaxTerror / Poșta Română / Wikimedia Commons
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Laika remembered five years later
Albania issued this commemorative stamp on June 28, 1962, in a series about Soviet space exploration. Laika and Sputnik 2 appear together in a designed image made well after the flight. The five-year gap records the mission’s continuing public life, rather than another journey by the dog.
Post of Albania; designer unidentified / Colnect catalog197184 / Wikimedia Commons
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Sputnik 2 displayed from another angle
A Sputnik 2 model appears in this March 2012 photograph from Moscow’s Memorial Museum of Astronautics. The display places the hardware beside an explanatory panel and visitors, giving a sense of its size. It is a museum reconstruction of the spacecraft, not recovered flight hardware: the original burned up during reentry in April 1958.
